"Bland, without any substantial upgrades", "seems to have been updated and seems not to be updated", "this time even toothpaste does not want to squeeze", this year's highly anticipated "Technology Circle Spring Festival Gala" - after Apple's new product conference, the iPhone 15 series suffered an unprecedented decline in word of mouth.
Previously, Huawei announced the "Pioneer Plan" without warning, directly selling the new flagship mobile phones Mate 60 Pro and Mate X5, which triggered a discussion on the whole network and was instructed to "catch off guard" Apple.
What's more interesting is that when Huawei was carrying Apple behind its back to "do big things", the glory of solidarity also turned around at the 2023 International Consumer Electronics Show in Berlin, Germany (hereinafter referred to as IFA), with the title of "Unfold Tomorrow", and talked to the world about folding screen mobile phones.
When the overall demand for consumer electronics declines and smartphones fall into the bottleneck of micro-innovation, Apple also shows that there is no "surplus food", how many advantages does Apple have to "rule" the high-end market for a long time? Are new opportunities for domestic giants coming?
There are many variables, and Apple ushered in the year of the "big test"
The first time to be equipped with periscope lenses, the first time to use a chip with 3nm process technology, the first time to use a titanium alloy frame, the first time to use a Type-C interface...
iPhone 15 Pro。 Source/Apple's official website
The iPhone 15 series was released, and although there were many "firsts", it still did not stop accusing it of "nothing new" with various negative comments.
It may sound surprising to think that in 2007, Steve Jobs called the imperfect first generation of Apple "five years ahead of the industry", but by now, Apple has already proved its multi-year monopoly in the global high-end mobile phone market.
But more than a decade later, the smartphone market has long been rolled into twists. Android manufacturers are very good at stacking materials, and the performance of mobile phones is crazy.
Although the 3nm process A17 Pro chip used in the iPhone 15 Pro series is regarded as "king fried" by the industry, it is not much attractive to the vast majority of general consumers, but the pain points such as battery life and poor signal that consumers are most concerned about have not been solved.
This also made Apple not only fail to rely on the iPhone 15 series to create surprises, but also encountered unprecedented external challenges. The latest earnings report shows that Apple has experienced three consecutive quarters of revenue decline. The iPhone has always accounted for half of Apple's revenue, with the release of the highly anticipated iPhone 15 series, disappointment spread, during the conference, Apple's stock price fell 2.5%, and finally fell 1.71% to close, the total market value fell below $2.8 trillion.
When Apple ushered in a "mid-life crisis", the Android camp is taking the initiative.
After more than 1,000 days, Huawei returned to the high-end market with the HUAWEI Mate 60 Pro, which was not publicized in advance, but it was enough to cause a sensation.
HUAWEI Mate 60 Pro。 Source/Huawei official website
The mobile phone adopts a new self-developed processor, the second generation of Kunlun glass and basalt body architecture, and cooperates with Huawei's long-standing imaging system and Hongmeng 4.0 system, which set off a rush of sales as soon as it was released.
HUAWEI Mate 60 Pro is the only smartphone in the world that supports dialing/receiving satellite phones and freely editing satellite messages, becoming a veritable "upward stabbing sky".
Tianfeng International Securities analyst Guo Mingxi said that Huawei's return is a good thing for consumers, which will force Apple to step out of its comfort zone and innovate more actively. The implication is that Apple's lack of innovation is direct.
Capital markets are often the first to feel the change in wind direction. Even before the release of the iPhone 15, affected by multiple factors such as Huawei's recovery and shorting by capital institutions, Apple fell more than $180 billion in market value in the week from September 1 to September 7, and then UBS, Mizuho Bank and other institutions lowered their iPhone 15 shipment expectations and faced iPhone sales with a more conservative attitude.
Traditional mid-to-high-end smartphones have long entered the competition in the stock market, and trade-offs have become the norm.
The most typical example is that Huawei and Apple have formed a situation of biting each other in the domestic high-end machine market, but since Huawei chips began to "cut off" in 2020, Apple has rapidly eaten away at a large part of its vacated market margin. Now that Huawei has returned to the frontal battlefield, Apple's "one family" situation is about to loosen rapidly.
Not only that, but more and more new players have emerged on a golden track that Apple has not yet set foot in. The rapid rise of folding screen mobile phones, related manufacturers take the opportunity to seize part of the high-end market share, has become the biggest variable to break through the bottleneck of the development of the smartphone market.
On September 2, with a new generation of folding flagship Honor Magic V2 and fashion folding screen concept machine Honor V Purse, Honor's high-profile appearance at IFA was a successful "show of muscles".
Technology crushing, glory leads the "card slot" folding screen golden track
Why did the IFA choose Honor as the only Chinese tech brand to deliver an IFA Opening Keynote in three years? Why will Honor use the theme of "Unfolding the Future" to show the technical strength of folding screens to the world?
Very simple, the technological innovation of folding screens represents the latest direction of future mobile phone development, and glory is a leader.
When the overall mobile phone industry is cold, only folding screen mobile phones show a trend of rapid growth against the trend. IDC report shows that in the first half of 2023, China's folding screen mobile phone market shipped about 2.27 million units, a year-on-year increase of 102%.
Counterpoint, a market research institution, predicts that China's folding screen mobile phone market is expected to explode in 2024, reaching 10 million; In 2025, the size of China's folding screen market will reach 17 million units.
Compared with Huawei's "upward stabbing the sky", Honor is "downward to root" attitude, from the underlying logic of the mobile phone market to make adjustments, cut into the "folding screen", the current golden track.
"Rooted" means a lot of time that is not in the spotlight, behind which is Honor's annual 10% of revenue invested in research and development regardless of the cost, is a folding screen R & D investment of 1 billion stupid kung fu.
An important selling point of the iPhone 15 Pro is the choice of titanium alloy with a higher strength-to-weight ratio, lighter and more durable, making it the lightest and thinnest iPhone Pro model to date. This material was first introduced into the smartphone industry by Honor, and the Honor Magic V2 released on July 12 is the world's first folding flagship machine using titanium alloy hinges, and the shaft cover part of the hinge is the first titanium alloy 3D printing process in the industry.
The thick problem and the technical path involved behind it were once the biggest constraint to the folding screen being unable to travel lightly.
iResearch's "2023 China Folding Screen Mobile Phone Market Insight Report" shows that from 2020 to 2022, the average thickness (folded state) of new folding screens in China will exceed 1.2cm, and it will reach 1.5cm in 2021, and the thick body is one of the important pain points of user experience folding screens, and it is also a key factor why folding screens can only be niche and backup machines, and cannot replace straight board flagships.
Thinness is the first technological power of folding screens. Only the evolution of the dimension of innovative ideas can bring about the dimensionality reduction blow of results.
"Many consumers around the world are actually misled about the large inner folding screen, such as Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold4 and Fold 5, 13, 14 mm thick, the battery life is only more than 4,000 mAh." Zhao Ming said that Honor's research and development goal is to surpass the existing rules of the game, so that folding screen mobile phones have outstanding battery life and comprehensive performance experience compared with straight plate machines, and also have the same light and thin grip feeling.
There is a law in the technology world that only by being 10 times better than similar alternatives can you truly have a leading advantage barrier in the competition. And the clearest way to make 10-fold improvements is to create something completely new, break it and then be able to stand up, and create unprecedented value.
This is also what Apple used to do on tablets during the Jobs era. Before 2010, tablets were not practical, and there was almost no market for Microsoft's Windows XP tablet in 2002 or Nokia's "web tablet" in 2005.
After Apple released the iPad, the design improvement is difficult to measure, but Apple has made huge improvements in all aspects, and the tablet has gone from being difficult to use to being useful. And Apple has naturally jumped over the "front wave" and become a category pioneer recognized by the public as a tablet computer.
In the field of folding screens in 2023, Honor is obviously retracing the path that Apple took on tablets back then.
Starting from user needs, Honor jumps out of the existing R&D logic and innovation of traditional folding screen products, reconsiders all aspects such as design concepts, materials, devices, modules, heat dissipation, structure, etc., and even cross-border aerospace, geological research, biomimetic science, new energy materials, integrated manufacturing and other disciplines, and comprehensively reconstructs mobile phones with more than 210 technological breakthroughs.
The Honor Magic V2 has the ultimate thin and light experience created by shield-grade high-strength steel material, titanium alloy durable hinge, Qinghai Lake battery, etc., with a closed state as thin as 9.9mm and an unfolded thin as 4.7mm, making it the thinnest smartphone ever; While providing 3 times the screen area of the straight board, it is even lighter than the iPhone 14 Pro Max (weighing 240g) and the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra (233g), only 231g, which is also the world's lightest book-style folding screen mobile phone so far.
So far, Honor has established its own leading barriers in the field of folding screens, and completely broke the boundary between straight plate machines and folding machines with the ultimate thin folding technology.
Since its listing, Honor Magic V2 has won the first place in the folding screen market share for four consecutive weeks, and its hot sales have also helped the Honor brand market share rise rapidly, third-party authoritative agency data shows that since July, Honor's market share has topped the Chinese market for four consecutive weeks, with a share of up to 19.5%, the first in the whole brand.
Following the Magic V2, which led the industry into the "millimeter era", the Honor V Purse, a large folding screen product that will be released in China on September 19, broke its previous thin and light industry record with a thickness of less than 9mm.
The evolution of smart devices is not only about technology, but also about leading the way of life in the future. It can be said that the Honor V Purse, which has been preemptively unveiled at IFA in early September, its thinner and lighter experience has become another landing of Honor's reconstructive thinking, and at the same time, it goes one step further on this basis, showing the breakthrough of mobile phones at the aesthetic level, turning into a fashion item, changing a wallpaper is like changing a handbag. The attempt of Honor V Purse undoubtedly makes the integration of technology and fashion sense more possible, and has also become a symbol of Honor's continuous breakthrough innovation and leadership in the field of folding screens.
Britle, bulky, expensive, these labels that are almost firmly tied to folding screen phones are now a thing of the past.
When Apple is still hovering in its comfort zone, Huawei is breaking through the restrictions head-on and returning to the main track of the high-end market; Glory is to change lanes of sniping, cut out its own new increment from the main track, and take the lead in debuting in the C position in the folding screen mobile phone "card position race", so that the cognition of "folding screen = glory" continues to penetrate into the hearts of the people under the blessing of core technology and innovative concepts.
A thousand sails race, a new cycle of the industry has begun
Before the release of the iPhone 15 series, Wall Street bigwigs chose to short Apple, and then many institutions have also lowered Apple's shipments, Apple's innovation "routine" is gradually failing, and the era of Apple's steady win has passed.
IDC data shows that from the fourth quarter of last year to the second quarter of this year, Apple's market share in domestic mobile phones of more than $600 has fallen from 71.9% to 65.4%.
IDC analysts also said in the latest analysis article that with the return of Huawei and other domestic Android manufacturers working hard to establish their own high-end product rhythm and high-end brand image, Apple will encounter greater challenges in China's high-end mobile phone market.
After Huawei's rapid return to the Chinese market, Apple's rising share in the domestic high-end market is expected to decline rapidly. At one point, there were comments that Honor will be the most affected mobile phone manufacturer after Huawei's return.
As everyone knows, Honor is not only of the same origin as Huawei, but also when Huawei is dormant, it has innovated and sprung up in the field of folding screens, and accelerated the pace of overseas expansion, and has blazed a path of its own for the global market, and also let the outside world see the ambition of Chinese technology brands to go global and compete with the strongest.
The situation of "one family" not only limits the full innovation and diversity of the industry, but also prevents consumers from having more product choices and service experiences; Taking the lead in breaking through the existing innovation bottleneck, expanding the mobile phone consumption experience, and opening a new cycle of mobile phone industry development is the common responsibility of the core players in the industry.
"I recognized the storm and was as excited as the sea." When Huawei's "light boat has passed the 10,000 mountains", the smartphone market is ushering in a new situation of "a thousand sails racing" in the mouth of Honor CEO Zhao Ming.
Innovation is still on the way, and the future is already "unfolding".
Source: China Newsweek