Car Grand View | Car Companies Make Mobile Phones What is the intention of drunkenness?

The author | Wang Yunpeng

Produced | automotive grand view

After mobile phone companies have entered the game to build cars, car companies have begun to reverse the operation of mobile phones.

On May 5, a message that "Meizu mobile phones have been acquired by Geely and are in the delivery stage" was on the hot search lists of major social and information platforms. For a time, the matter of car companies making mobile phones has once again become the focus of attention in the industry.

In fact, the news about "Geely's acquisition of Meizu" has not been reported for the first time. As early as January this year, it was reported that the automobile company Geely Group was negotiating with mobile phone manufacturer Meizu for acquisitions, but at that time, the two companies did not sit firmly in the acquisition news.

At the same time, what is more noteworthy is that the car companies that bet against the mobile phone market are not Geely. Public information shows that at present, domestic car companies have announced that they have entered the mobile phone market and there is also a new power brand Weilai Automobile, and Tesla seems to have relevant intentions.

From a commercial point of view, it is not a big deal for car companies to enter the mobile phone market, but if you stand in the dimension of the automotive industry, the logic behind its business activities is still worth paying attention to. The reason is very simple, a company entering the blue ocean market, often do not need too much explanation, but companies in the sunrise industry to spend energy to lay out a red sea market, often feel a little puzzling.

Specifically, mobile phones and cars are already the two most representative intelligent terminals at present and in the future, but from the perspective of the market dimension, the former has become saturated, and the expansion of the latter has just begun. This can be seen from the sales growth rate of the two. According to the data, China's smartphone shipments in 2021 will be 329 million units, a slight increase of only 1.1%; while mobile phone manufacturers have entered the new energy vehicle market, sales will be 3.52 million units in 2021, and production and sales will increase by more than 160% year-on-year. Entering this year, the sales volume of the new energy vehicle market continued to soar in the first quarter, with a year-on-year increase of 146.6%.

It can be said that in this context, it is not unusual for mobile phone manufacturers such as Huawei, Xiaomi, and OPPO to enter the car-making track, but it is somewhat puzzling that car companies such as Geely and Weilai are marching against the current to the mobile phone market.

The logic of "betting" against the current of car companies

At present, when most car companies release new cars, the "highly intelligent" car machine system is almost the highlight of the conference.

But what is more embarrassing is that in the actual car scene, a manufacturer claims to have a "highly intelligent" car machine, but it is always fixed to a mobile phone holder.

In other words, no matter how much the car company introduces and publicizes the intelligence of the car machine system, it is still relatively backward compared to the mobile phone, and there are problems such as slow response speed, less application software, and low adaptability, and a poor sense of user experience.

Thinking of this common but ironic scene, it is not difficult to understand why some car companies want to reverse the flow of the mobile phone market. Quoting Zhang Xiang, a researcher at the Automotive Industry Innovation Research Center of North China University of Technology, he said: "The better development of mobile phones can bring better development of car machines, and the better development of car machines can promote the continuous improvement of the level of intelligent cockpits, which can help the competitiveness of intelligent electric vehicles to continuously improve." ”

At the same time, compared with the amount of user data that mobile phone manufacturers can grasp, it is not an order of magnitude at all, which may be another reason why some car companies choose to enter the mobile phone market. Specifically, in the actual car use scenario, users rarely operate the car machine system, which makes it difficult for car companies to collect in-depth data from users and improve the user experience.

"Car companies can make mobile phones to expand in a diversified way on the existing ecosystem, better realize vehicle-machine collaboration, occupy the initiative in the era of internet of everything, and even further plan the 'meta-universe' territory." Zhang Xiang said.

"After having a mobile phone and a large screen in the car, car companies can also obtain greater initiative and bargaining power when negotiating with software developers, allowing developers to optimize products for different terminals and realize the integrated link of terminals." Some insiders talked about it in an interview with the media.

In addition, economic benefits may also be one of the reasons why car companies choose to build mobile phones. The first is the software level, according to a report released by McKinsey, the current automotive software in the value of large passenger cars accounted for 10%, the future is expected to grow at an annual rate of 11%, by 2030, automotive software will account for 30% of the vehicle content, the overall market size will reach more than 400 billion US dollars.

For car companies, improving and enhancing their own strength as soon as possible on the eve of the market outbreak is undoubtedly the best choice.

In terms of hardware, an important consideration is the chip. Relevant statistics show that due to the shortage of chips, the cumulative production of cars in the global market in 2021 will be about 10.2 million, and the situation has not changed since this year. Therefore, how to firmly control the chip in their own hands has become a problem that many Chinese car brands want to urgently solve.

Taking Geely Automobile as an example, the core trade-off behind its entry into the mobile phone market is most likely to be chips. According to public information, Geely's mobile phone business is responsible for Hubei Xingji Times Technology Co., Ltd., and the company's legal representative Shen Ziyu is also the CEO of the automotive intelligence company "Yijiatong Technology". In 2018, Yijiatong Technology co-established the automotive chip company Xinqing Technology with Anmou China, and released a 7-nanometer process of vehicle-grade main chip SE1000 in November last year.

However, due to the high cost of chip research and development, if it is only applied to the automotive sector, it may make it difficult to carry out its future business. "The order of magnitude of automotive chips is small, so car companies need to expand their business to mobile phones and even the Internet of Things sector." Zhang Junyi, managing partner of Oliver Partners, said.

So, will other car companies follow suit into the mobile phone market? Some insiders said that this may depend on the actual performance of Geely and Weilai, if they can use the mobile phone business to create a closed-loop ecology, improve the interconnection experience between people, cars and mobile devices, and comprehensively enhance the core competitiveness of the smart car business, other car companies are likely to enter the game one after another.

There are also many invisible thresholds to cross

Kevin Kelly wrote in Out of Control: The Ultimate Fate and End of All Humanity: "Our entire world will be digitized, and a truly connected world is coming. ”

If you were in the 1990s, when books were published, it would be a fantasy. But at this point in time, Kevin Kelly's prediction is becoming a reality. Especially with the development of mobile Internet technology represented by smart phones, the era of Internet of Everything is accelerating.

It is worth mentioning that the arrival of the new era has also made the boundary between terminal manufacturers more and more blurred. Because of this, every terminal enterprise expects to create its own complete ecosystem and hold users and data in its own hands. At present, some car companies announced that they have entered the mobile phone market, which is the reason.

So, can entering the mobile phone market really allow car companies to quickly establish a complete ecology and improve the level of smart cockpits? In the industry's view, in order to achieve the above goals, car companies still need to cross multiple invisible thresholds.

Public information shows that after years of precipitation, the supply chain of domestic mobile phone-related industries has been relatively complete, and it is not difficult for car companies to produce mobile phones from a manufacturing point of view.

However, compared with the manufacture of products, how to build a brand recognized by users is quite difficult. Specifically, the current domestic mobile phone market pattern has been basically stable, vivo, OPPO, glory, millet, Apple five major companies have occupied 85% of the market share.

"The above brands basically have 10 or even 20 years of precipitation, including research and development strength, channel capabilities, brand and product strength, organizational management capabilities, and it is difficult for latecomers to surpass." Some electronics industry insiders said in an interview.

In fact, this is also true. Here to take Gree as an example, in 2015 Gree began to enter the mobile phone market, and now nearly 7 years later, most of the 6 products released by it have sold only a few thousand units.

In the case that the mobile phone market and consumer cognition have been basically solidified, it is still unknown whether the mobile phone launched by car companies can avoid the dilemma of Gree mobile phone business. Moreover, even if car companies can successfully attract car owners to use their mobile phones, annual sales may only be about one million units. Limited sales, how much help car companies can help to create an ecological closed loop and improve the level of intelligent cockpits, it is still difficult to determine.

Compared with brand building and product sales, product research and development investment is also a threshold that car companies must face and cross. Taking Geely and Weilai as an example, the two car companies are targeting the high-end mobile phone market.

This means that their products must not only reach the level of the flagship machine of the head manufacturer, but also have the corresponding research and development investment. However, in the case that the overall automobile market is more difficult, the profitability of the main business is declining, and the development of new models is still too late, where does the money for making mobile phones come from?

"It's not just about money, businesses and entrepreneurs have limited focus and are unlikely to do many things at the same time." In the view of industry insiders, in order to achieve the main business and other businesses go hand in hand, there are still many problems that relevant car companies need to solve.

Write at the end:

In the author's opinion, the biggest crux of the mobile phone market for car companies to enter the mobile phone market is the concern about data and technology dominance. Chen Hong, chairman of SAIC Motor, said at the shareholders' meeting last year on "whether to cooperate with third-party companies such as Huawei to drive autonomous driving" is the best example.

In other words, in the industrial revolution of automobile intelligence, car companies do not want to become vassals of other enterprises.

However, the more embarrassing reality is that before the full popularization of autonomous driving technology, mobile phones are destined to be an indispensable part of the Internet of Vehicles. Therefore, it is foreseeable that the competition between car companies and mobile phone manufacturers for market and technological dominance may last for a long time, and in this process, it is not excluded that other car companies will "make mobile phones".