Attacking mobile phone manufacturers, Huawei pulled down the curtain on 2023.
2023 will be a year of continuous breakthroughs and good development for the mobile phone industry. Although from the perspective of the overall market, the overall shipments of China's mobile phone industry have continued to decline this year, but since September, it has stopped falling, rising 60% year-on-year, and the growth has continued to this day.
In addition to the continuous recovery of the mobile phone industry and the clearing of inventory pressure, in terms of products, China's mobile phone industry in 2023 will also have a lot of highlights.
In the domestic market, the biggest attraction of the mobile phone industry in 2023 is Huawei - in 2023, the unprecedented launch of the "Pioneer Plan", the mobile phone industry for the first time without a press conference will be on sale, Huawei Mate 60 series and Mate X5 are hard to find for a while, Huawei has once again stood on the top of the table in China's mobile phone shipments, becoming a catfish that stirs China's mobile phone industry.
Not only is China's mobile phone market full of highlights, but Chinese mobile phone manufacturers in 2023 will be in full bloom in overseas markets. In particular, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers, including Transsion and Xiaomi, continue to grow in Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Chinese manufacturers have replicated growth miracles overseas, and Chinese technology brands are gradually going global.
The flowering of China's mobile phone market inside and outside is a "long-planned" war, which is inseparable from the continuous cultivation of technical skills by Chinese mobile phone manufacturers represented by Huawei in recent years.
Since 2023, domestic mobile phone manufacturers have not only presented impressive mobile phone chip technology, but also have many innovative highlights in mobile phone operating systems, satellite communications, mobile images, and even mobile phone design. The breakthrough of the underlying technology has promoted the domestic mobile phone to build the underlying moat.
In the camp of domestic brand mobile phones, Huawei is one of the vanguards of continuous innovation. Even when the chip business was limited and the mobile phone business was at a low point, Huawei did not give up its mission as a technology company and laid a solid foundation for development.
Looking back, judging from the development of China's mobile phone industry in recent years, Huawei's drive is continuing to inject more positive attitudes and positive influences into China's mobile phone supply chain and Chinese mobile phone manufacturers. All Chinese manufacturers work together to shape the brand rhythm of Chinese mobile phones.
China's mobile phone chips have reached new heights
To pay attention to the technological development of the mobile phone industry, the chip must be an unavoidable topic, the chip determines the performance, battery life, heating and other key characteristics of the mobile phone, is the cornerstone of the mobile phone.
It's just that the chip that ordinary users "can't see" requires a huge investment. For mobile phone manufacturers, this does not seem to be a very large input-output transaction, in addition, there are Qualcomm, MediaTek and other mature and easy-to-use options in the supply chain, therefore, mobile phone manufacturers have been swaying in the early stage of the underlying chip research and development.
Among the many domestic mobile phone manufacturers, it was Huawei that took this difficult step earlier - and started with the most difficult and core processor chips. As early as 2009, Huawei started chip research. Three years after Huawei's HiSilicon chip R&D started hard, Huawei released the "K3V2" chip, which is also Huawei's first self-developed chip.
However, Huawei quickly adjusted the pace of chip research and development, focusing on the normalization of chips on Huawei Mate and P series mobile phones, and each generation of Kirin chip technology has its own technical highlights.
For example, in the early days of the Kirin chip, Huawei focused on signal optimization - the Kirin 910 chip launched in 2013 was Huawei's first 4-core LTE SoC, the Kirin 920 released the following year was the industry's first commercial LTE Cat.6 SoC, and the Kirin 960 was the first SoC to integrate the full Netcom baseband.
The evolutionary history of Huawei's chips is also closely and continuously chasing the golden rule of Moore's law (chip density doubling every 18 months). In particular, in the era of wavering domestic chip research and development, Huawei is also continuing to make progress together with the supply chain, which can also be glimpsed from the intensive process progress of Kirin chips - Kirin 950, 970, 980, 990, and 9000 are the industry's first SoCs using 16nm, 10nm, 7nm, 7nm + EUV, and 5nm, respectively.
Soon, with the gradual deepening of the technological competition of China's mobile phones, higher requirements were put forward for the underlying scientific and technological strength of mobile phone manufacturers. In addition, Huawei's past experience has also made all companies fully aware of the potential supply chain risks in the uncertain international environment, so Chinese mobile phone manufacturers have successively promoted the road of self-development of mobile phone chips after 2017.
However, the chip is a slow work with a large investment and a long cycle, and mobile phone manufacturers are also starting to accumulate experience from a simple small chip for the time being-Xiaomi has successively launched an image chip C1, a charging chip P1, and G1; OPPO Although Zheku has decided to disband, it still launched a number of image NPUs and self-developed Bluetooth chips; vivo and Honor have made relatively slow decisions in chip research and development, but in the past two years, they have also launched self-developed image chips and radio frequency enhancement chips, and handed over an answer sheet.
Although chips are an invisible and invisible investment, for Chinese technology manufacturers, breaking through the constraints of foreign manufacturers is conducive to long-term supply chain security, and it is of far-reaching significance for building China's technology brands.
Where there is a concentration of grain, grass and ammunition
In addition to the chip field, mobile phone manufacturers also like to smash the food and ammunition of technological competition in the most obvious places of user experience, especially the operating system and image.
In terms of operating systems, Huawei decided to release its operating system HarmonyOS at the developer conference in 2019 after the setback of overseas GMS. In just four years, Huawei's HarmonyOS ecosystem has made rapid progress, and in 2023, it will be in full swing.
In particular, in 2023, the initial results of Hongmeng's ecological construction - the market share of Hongmeng system in China in the first three years was only 3%, but it increased by 7 percentage points in the first half of this year.
An interesting phenomenon is that after Hongmeng, making their own operating system has slowly become the consensus of Chinese mobile phone manufacturers. It's just that the risk of decoupling Android is very great, the difficulty is not small, and the cost performance is limited, and many mobile phone manufacturers choose to base on the Android system, first make a set of their own UI, and accumulate experience. For example, vivo has OriginOS, Honor has MagicOS, OPPO has an intelligent cross-terminal system codenamed "Pantanal", and so on.
If it is said that in order to get off to a better start and facilitate the migration of developers, China's mobile phone operating system either uses ASOP code compatible with Android like HarmonyOS, or directly develops based on Android, then there will be some changes in the wind direction in 2023.
As mobile phone manufacturers gradually build their own mobile-centric IoT ecosystems, Android is no longer a good choice - Android is more based on mobile phones, and is not very suitable for use in the vast IoT category. Driven by business, mobile phone manufacturers have gradually become brave to decouple Android.
Also this year, Huawei's original intention to involve operating systems was truly revealed - not long ago, Yu Chengdong, CEO of Huawei's Device BG, announced that HarmonyOS NEXT is ready to go. This means that a "pure-blooded" HarmonyOS is slowly emerging and truly becoming the third largest operating system independent of Android and iOS.
In order to join the "pure-blooded" HarmonyOS ecosystem, in 2023, there will be more big applications with more MAUs of more than 200 million to set an example, such as Genshin Impact, Xiaohongshu, Meituan, etc. The actions of big apps are still forming an invisible demonstration effect, and continue to attract more developers and users to join. At present, there are more than 2.2 million developers in the HarmonyOS ecosystem.
Other mobile phone manufacturers, since 2023, have been surprisingly consistent in their actions on the system. For example, vivo previously launched the Blue River operating system, indicating a clear attitude that it is not compatible with Android, but in order to be safe, it chose to test the water on the watch first, and it has not yet penetrated into the mobile phone;
Operating system, in fact, is not the most ammunition-intensive field of Chinese mobile phone manufacturers, mobile imaging is undoubtedly a sniper war on the plains of China's mobile phones. From the history of China's mobile phone image development, we can also see strong traces of Huawei's leadership.
An impressive example is that Huawei first cooperated with Leica in 2016 to launch the popularity of the camera, using black + color dual lenses, which re-established a new benchmark for moving images.
Cooperation with high-end camera brands has proven to be an effective means of marketing users' minds, and has been used by mobile phone manufacturers to this day. For example, starting in 2020, vivo began to cooperate with Zeiss on the X60 series, OnePlus officially announced the partnership between OnePlus 9 and Hasselblad in 2021, and after the merger of OnePlus mobile phones and OPPO, Hasselblad naturally reached a cooperation with OPPO and became the standard configuration on OPPO's high-end mobile phones, and Xiaomi announced its cooperation with Leica in 2022 after the expiration of Huawei's cooperation with Leica, and launched it on Xiaomi 12 Ultra.
High-end camera brands have their own "tastes" and audiences, and they also have a high-end brand tonality. In cooperation with these high-end camera brands, domestic mobile phone manufacturers have also slowly found their own image characteristics and built a high wall of image power in the process of their own high-end, such as the image brand XMAGE released by Huawei.
If co-branding is just a soft marketing shortcut, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers are still exploring better hardware-level solutions.
It is not easy to cram a telephoto into a thin mobile phone with a thickness of only 7.5mm, and it is not easy to do so, and on the Huawei P30 Pro released in 2019, Huawei made its first attempt, equipped with an 8 million pixel 5x periscope telephoto lens, setting off a wave of "shooting the moon".
Since then, the periscope telephoto has attracted a lot of attention in the industry. Although the telephoto is not the most frequently used camera module for users, it is indispensable on mobile phones.
Until now, the "periscope telephoto" is still a competition point that mobile phone manufacturers continue to cultivate, and the war has even burned to the folding screen mobile phones that have more extreme requirements for stacking.
On the Mate X2 released by Huawei in 2021, it achieved a periscope telephoto of up to 10x for the first time on a folding screen phone. By 2023, there will be more folding screen mobile phones, slowly emphasizing the camera function, so that folding screen mobile phones can also have the shooting experience only found on straight board machines. For example, the OPPO Find N3 and Xiaomi MIX Fold 3 released this year have successively announced that they can be equipped with ultra-light periscope telephoto and 5x periscope telephoto.
In the most difficult fields of chips, operating systems, and imaging, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers have been frantically piling up huge labor costs and capital offensives in recent years. Behind this, it is inseparable from mobile phone manufacturers such as Huawei to try to be the first to eat crabs. Scientific and technological innovation requires a role in finding the right direction for the industry, and it is also inseparable from the joint cooperation of industry chain manufacturers.
In addition to technology, focus on the subtlety of sensibility
Hard technology has built a solid foundation for consumer electronics, and in addition to continuing to tackle tough problems on this fortress, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers have slowly gained insight into some perceptual subtleties, starting from the material of the mobile phone body, mobile phone ID design, etc., to explore the new order of scientific and technological aesthetics.
One phenomenon is that for a long time after the mobile phone entered the era of full screen, the back panel material was either glass or plastic. The same selection of materials and design, which makes people nostalgic for the various brain-opening mobile phone form designs in the era of feature phones.
Recall, what are the most impressive phone designs of 2023?
It may be difficult for most people not to think about the "gambling stone" craze caused by the rococo white design of the Huawei P60 series. And this may also give the mobile phone industry a feasible answer on how to break the bottleneck of mobile phone design.
In the Huawei P60 series released in March this year, Huawei launched a new rococo white color matching - the first "condensing mother-of-pearl" process, which integrates natural mineral bead powder into the fuselage production, so that the fuselage presents a natural texture that cannot be replicated by natural mother-of-pearl.
The biggest charm of this design is that every time consumers buy a mobile phone, it is like opening a blind box, and each mobile phone is a unique design.
The success of the Rococo color scheme has also made mobile phone manufacturers increasingly consider using materials with natural textures in the back panel of mobile phones. For example, OPPO's recently released Reno 11 series also launched a glossy gemstone design, and the recently released Honor 100 series of Moon Shadow White has also begun to emphasize the "natural texture" design.
When mobile phone manufacturers jump out of the original thinking framework, from traditional visible industrial materials to natural materials, mobile phone manufacturers gradually lead the mobile phone aesthetics and promote the wave of artistic and personalized aesthetics.
In fact, Huawei's innovation in backplane design is not the first time.
Huawei has long been aware of the problem of homogenization of the appearance of smartphones in the era of full screen, and in 2019, the Mate 30 Pro used plain leather materials with higher recognition and feel for the first time.
Plain leather material leather texture with solid color design with a sense of luxury, and mobile phone manufacturers have a natural fit with the high-end road, since then other mobile phone manufacturers have gradually introduced the plain leather material back cover, each of them jointly promoted the back design revolution of China's mobile phone industry.
If design aesthetics are the icing on the cake, Huawei has also brought the same material innovation ideas from the backplate to the screen, cutting into the user's rigid needs for the durability and reliability of the phone.
The innovation path of Huawei's mobile phone screen materials is: in 2021, the Huawei P50 series uses nano glass-ceramic, and then the Huawei Mate 50 series debuts ultra-reliable Kunlun glass, which increases the drop resistance of the whole machine to 10 times; Subsequently, the Huawei Mate X3 inner screen also uses non-Newtonian fluid materials, and the Mate X5 outer screen also brings ultra-scratch-resistant basalt tempered Kunlun glass;In September 2023, the Huawei Mate 60 series adopts an ultra-reliable basalt architecture, integrating three layers of protection.
Subsequently, on Honor, Meizu, and Xiaomi mobile phones, the innovations of nano glass-ceramic, giant rhino glass, Titan glass, and dragon crystal glass are also visible.
Whether it is natural stone, plain leather, Kunlun glass, or non-Newtonian fluid, these are just the tip of the iceberg of China's mobile phone design innovation, which belongs to the innovation of underlying material science, but in fact, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers are also slowly subverting from the basic design.
For example, on the Mate 50 series in September 2022, Huawei adopted the Paris stud design, which was organically integrated with the matrix camera - the Paris stud is delicate and elegant, which can reduce the visual protrusion of the lens part in terms of appearance, remove the heaviness of the camera module, and add a touch of elegance to the model.
Since then, the Paris stud design has gradually become popular in the mobile phone industry in 2023, and since 2023, there are many mobile phones with similar designs, such as the OPPO A2 Pro, Xiaomi 14 series, iQOO 12 series, and OPPO Reno11 series.
In general, for Chinese mobile phone manufacturers, the user needs of subtle sensibilities other than hard technology are also concerned, and intensive innovation has been made, focusing on materials and underlying design ideas.
Chinese mobile phone manufacturers are breaking through the boundaries of aesthetic design step by step, so that technology and aesthetics can be perfectly combined.
From "overseas leading" to "industry counterattack"
For a long time in the past, China's mobile phone industry has been led by overseas brands.
This is not surprising. China's smartphone industry followed the enlightenment of overseas brands like Apple, and then as more and more supply chain companies squeezed into its supply chain table, the domestic mobile phone supply chain technology slowly matured, and together with the mushrooming mobile phone brands, jointly promoted the inclusion of communication technology.
Reflected in the terminal, in the past, China's mobile phones, whether in technology or design, were based on overseas brands as the vane, but the situation seems to have slowly changed in recent years.
As the world's largest mobile phone market, competition in China is becoming fierce. China's mobile phone manufacturers have also slowly gone from the original "led" and "enlightened" to now drawing their own counterattack curve.
Taking satellite communication as an example, after Huawei's 5G chips were limited, Huawei opened up a new journey in the field of communications, and launched the Beidou satellite messaging function for the first time in the world on the Mate 50 series in 2022. In just one year, Huawei's Mate 60 series has launched Tiantong satellite calls, which can achieve dead-end coverage of voice communication - a milestone technological innovation in Chinese mobile phones.
This is just a small example. Another visible change is that the Android ecosystem led by Chinese mobile phone manufacturers has rapid technology iteration, whether it is a periscope telephoto, a high refresh rate of the screen, a large memory of 1TB, or wired/wireless fast charging, it is basically after the Android camp has been rolled up and rolled, and overseas brands have slowly followed up.
Sales volume is a strong proof of user favor - after the return of Huawei mobile phones, Apple's domestic sales have declined, and at the same time, Chinese mobile phone brands are catching up, and the cake of the mobile phone market is facing a re-division.
The development of Huawei's mobile phones is a microcosm of the process of Chinese brands catching up with overseas brands and gradually becoming a global high-end brand, and the process of Chinese high-end brands from 0 to 1 and constantly breaking through. But it's not just "catching up", now Chinese mobile phone manufacturers have also begun to follow their own leading path, constantly from the hard technology innovation forward-looking (chips, systems, mobile images), and design aesthetics (backplane aesthetics, ID design) two aspects, both soft and hard.
The innovation of Huawei's mobile phone itself is to retain the fire of Huawei as a technology company and prepare Huawei to pass through the darkness. Continuous technological innovation and nirvana rebirth are cause and effect of each other.
The significance for the industry is that Huawei has set an example by continuously opening up and broadening new technology tracks, injecting more innovation drivers into China's consumer electronics supply chain and brands that are tired of innovation, and jointly promoting the construction and development of China's supply chain.
However, the common technological progress of Chinese mobile phone manufacturers is ultimately benefited by users, and in the end, the public enjoys the most interesting technological innovation experience. And these continuous innovations also make Huawei's actions in 2024 more worth looking forward to.
China's mobile phone industry in 2023 is exciting enough, which is an inevitable result of persevering in the face of a complex environment, but in 2024, it will be even worse.