After the continuous downturn in domestic mobile phone shipments for three consecutive quarters from Q1 to Q3, the domestic mobile phone shipments in Q4 are even more interesting. Although it is still only October, the curtain of Q4 has just been lifted, but in the market, with the launch of the iPhone 14 series, the Mate 50 is popular, and the Q4 change has appeared. In order to cope with this change, Rongmi OV and other domestic manufacturers have made a response to the market action, while strengthening inventory cleanup, the newly released models are also inclined to the low-end market, under many variables, Q4's domestic mobile phone shipments, market share will inevitably change dramatically. We have the following guesses:
Apple or climb to the top of the blind guess realization probability is 70%.
Every year, Q4 is the season with the highest apple shipments and a sharp increase in market share. The reason is also very simple, Apple's annual iPhone new product conference is placed in September, so that the first round of rush and early tide brought huge sales, are concentrated in Q4, which is also the reason why Apple has reached the top of the Chinese shipping list in Q4 for two consecutive years. Of course, Apple's sales are highly dependent on the expressiveness of this generation of products. On the iPhone14 series, market opinion can be described as several reversals, from the iPhone 14 Pro series exclamation point digging hole to bring boos, to the launch of the decay into a magical smart island caused by a good sound, and then to the recent smart island design due to poor adaptation, the presence of shadows in the screenshot, etc., and has become a mixed reputation. The iPhone 14 series is not very popular with consumers due to small upgrades, and even has reports of a sharp drop in shipments in the media.
However, the author believes that the iPhone 14 series does not have much of a problem in the product, although it is difficult to say a breakthrough in the product, but the product maturity is high, there is no obvious defect, which also makes the iPhone 14 have a strong competitiveness. When it comes to starting, the huge number of bookings is the best proof of that. While iPhone 14 sales declined, iPhone 14 Pro sales increased significantly, high-end increases, sales, and profits increased, which is Apple's long-planned layout. As for the unfavorable remarks in the market, it is common for Apple, after all, every generation of iPhone releases will be accompanied by a bunch of negative remarks, and even the more negative, the greater the sales.
Apple's own product side has no problem, Q4 has the strength to reach the top, and the biggest obstacle affecting Apple's Q4 to the top may be the Mate 50, after all, the iPhone 14 and Mate 50 are also positioned at the high end, the two have a direct competitive relationship, and it can even be said that for every ten Mate 50 sold, iPhone 14 series sales may be reduced by 5 units.
When the high-end market ushers in its first official rival in three years, perhaps the probability of Apple Q4 reaching the top will plummet by 30%, leaving only seven.
Huawei or return to TOP 5
The release of Mate 50 makes us seem to see the style of Huawei's peak moment, queuing, snapping, scalper price increase, etc., which shows the huge market influence of Huawei and Mate 50. There are rumors on the market that the Mate 50 sold out of 4 million stocks in just a few days after the release, and many media predicted that the sales volume of the Mate 50 life cycle will easily exceed 10 million units.
If according to this statement, then in Q4, the shipments of the Mate 50 series will easily exceed 5 million or even higher, coupled with Huawei's production capacity has been alleviated, nova and Changxiang series sales are quite good, many good stacking, so that Huawei in Q4, tens of millions of shipments are only basic operations, twelve or three million seems to be easy to achieve. After the increase in Huawei shipments, it will inevitably squeeze the shipments of other mobile phone manufacturers, so Huawei Q4 into the domestic shipments TOP 5, and even ranking high seems to be a sure thing.
But the basis of this series of inferences stems from the fact that the Mate 50 sold out 4 million stocks in just a few days after its release, but the author noted that this data was not officially supported by Huawei, and the more authoritative media and market research companies did not mention this data, but more appeared in some less rigorous self-media.
From JD.com's sales of 2w+ two weeks after the listing of the Mate 50 series, it is obviously unrealistic to want to reach 400W sales. Even in Huawei's heyday, models with a life cycle of tens of millions of units are difficult to reach 4 million sales in the first wave of sales, and whether Huawei dares to stock 4 million units in the first batch is also doubtful. Therefore, the author does not feel credible about the rumor that the Mate 50 series has been sold out in 4 million stock within a few days of its release.
However, the hot sales of Mate 50 are objectively existent, and under the high heat of Mate 50, Huawei's exposure rate will increase, which is bound to drive the sales of nova, enjoy and other models, thereby improving Huawei's shipments in Q4. At the same time, we also noticed that although Huawei has not appeared in the top 5 list of domestic shipments for a long time, in the near future, the market share of "other" manufacturers has gradually increased, which is also a manifestation of Huawei's recovery.
Driven by Mate 50, Q4 Huawei shipments will inevitably increase significantly, but the shipments of Mate 50 may not be as much as rumored, so that in the case of a large lead in the domestic TOP 5 manufacturers, the shipments of various manufacturers are relatively uniform, the difficulty of trying to break into the TOP 5 is still relatively large, and the author feels that there is a 20% probability, which is enough to show Huawei's strong recovery.
Rongmi OV who bears the pressure first?
Apple is expected to reach the top, Huawei greatly increased, these two shipments growth, will inevitably be in Q4 on the Rongmi OV oppression, affecting its shipments, in the iPhone 14 and Mate 50 under the combined force, Rongmi OV high-end market in Q4 or lost out, in the high heat of these two products, and even attract many mid-range users to high-end, these manufacturers of mid-range machine sales will also have an impact.
That is to say, the impact of Q4's Rongmi OV is not only displayed in shipments, but also the contraction of its sales and profits will even be greater than the shipments, which will have a greater impact on Rongmi OV. Of course, since this year's Snapdragon 8 Gen2 will be listed in advance, in December may see mobile phones equipped with this chip on the market. Therefore, after December, the shipments of high-end models of the starters may rebound, but for the entire Q4, the impact is not large. In addition to the high-end impact, what impact does this change have on Rongmi OV?
In Huami OV, perhaps the biggest impact is Glory, although Huawei and Honor have long been separated, but it has to be said that in the hearts of many people, Honor is still regarded as a subsidiary of Huawei, and in terms of product positioning and appearance, Honor and Huawei are also very similar. Coupled with the high degree of overlap of target users, Honor will be under pressure first after Huawei's recovery in Q4. In response, the X40 recently launched by Honor can be called the appearance and cost-effectiveness of Honor after a single flight, and its hot sales period is also in Q4, which can at least hedge the loss of high-end in sales. Q4 glory, or difficult to be at the top of the list.
The impact of OV is more concentrated offline, after all, Huawei's offline channels are also quite strong. The release of Mate50 has made the popularity of Huawei stores soar, which is a comprehensive impact on OV. From the perspective of this year's situation, OV, whether at home or abroad, its decline is greater than that of manufacturers, such as glory and millet. Under the dual influence of the inertia decline and Huawei impact, the OV of Q4 will not be too good in the data, and it is difficult to say how much of it is affected by Huawei.
As for Xiaomi, it may be the manufacturer that has been least affected by Huawei's resurgence, after all, in terms of target users, Xiaomi and Huawei are still clearly distinguished. In Q4, Xiaomi may set off another low-end offensive to avoid the high-end market and Huawei and Apple, with dislocation competition to ensure shipments.
Can the decline in shipments be alleviated?
Although the Q3 shipment data has not yet been released, the data of IDC and other market survey companies show that in Q1 and Q2, domestic mobile phone shipments have shrunk by more than 10%, while the data released by the Institute of Information and Communications Technology is even more amazing, showing that in January to July, domestic mobile phone shipments have dropped significantly by more than 30%. No matter which data, it shows that domestic mobile phone shipments have suffered a serious contraction. There are many reasons for this shrinkage, among which the lack of a strong leadership model is a problem that cannot be ignored.
The listing of the iPhone 14 and Mate 50 shows the return of strong models to a certain extent. Especially the Mate 50 series, which can activate many precipitated users and Huawei fans, is actually beneficial to the cake of enlarging mobile phone shipments.
But the lack of leaders and star models is only one factor in the shrinking shipments of mobile phones. Even if this point is improved in Q4, the impact of the epidemic risk control on the economy, as well as the decline in the evolution of the mobile phone industry, the unfavorable market basis such as excess performance in some applications still exists, and the structural crisis is unlikely to be resolved in the short term.
So, can Q4 mobile phone shipments be improved? This depends on what the comparison with, if it is the chain, that is, compared with the Q3 shipments, then the Q4 shipments will be greatly improved, after all, the traditional peak season of Q4 mobile phone shipments, the strong sales of the iPhone and the consumption boom at the end of the year, will increase the shipment of mobile phones. This year's Q4 with the Mate 50 hot sales, its month-on-month increase will be even greater.
However, if it is compared with last year's Q4, in the case of no improvement in the market basic environment, Q4's mobile phone shipments will still decline, but the decline rate may slow down. In short, the weak market is not something that one or two mobile phones can reverse.
The biggest variable is on Double Eleven
Of course, in Q4, there is also a huge market variable, that is, double eleven, although double eleven years ago, but this year, the impact of double eleven on the mobile phone market will inevitably be magnified. The reason for this situation is mainly because many mobile phone manufacturers this year are too optimistic to predict the shipment of mobile phones, resulting in a significant increase in the inventory of mobile phones. At the same time, the release time of this year's Snapdragon 8 Gen2 has also been advanced, and it is expected to be released around November 15, and the first mobile phones equipped with Snapdragon 8 Gen2 will be launched in December. Coupled with Q4, Apple, Huawei high-end machine strength, so Q4, many manufacturers of high-end machine inventory pressure is quite large, and the best time to clean up inventory is undoubtedly double eleven.
When many manufacturers have many inventory models that need to be promoted, the price reduction of this round may be beyond usual, and how big is the price reduction? Will this round of price cuts usher in a sales frenzy? Will the manufacturer be able to clear the inventory to easily enter the battle in the future? There are many variables in this, and it has become the biggest market variable in Q4.