Children's smart watches, new electronic shackles?

　"China News Weekly" reporter Meng Qian

　　Published in the 1139th issue of China News Weekly magazine on May 13, 2024

　　In the early hours of the morning, Zhang Han posted a "small composition" on social platforms with anger, titled "I disabled my son's little genius phone watch".

　　A year ago, she bought a little genius phone watch under her son's repeated begging, and her son said that her classmates were using this watch, and she couldn't add friends with her classmates without this watch. At first, she didn't pay much attention to her son's occasional phone calls and chats. It wasn't until she accidentally discovered that her son played with his watch for nearly two hours a day on average that she understood the reason why her son had to change his glasses again after half a year.

　　In addition to being angry, Zhang Han was more worried in his heart. My son, who is in the third grade, has been nearsighted since a few years ago, which may be more difficult to control. In addition to the affected eyesight, my son has been using chat software for the longest time, adding a lot of friends and many strangers in it. He kept chatting with his classmates, posting on Moments, posting his location at any time, and exposing his privacy. Zhang Han didn't expect that a watch would make her son completely lose her self-control, and she felt that the consequences might be even worse if she didn't restrict it.

　　After Zhang Han released this "little composition", many parents replied: For the sake of the watch, they are "fighting wits and courage" with their children. Many parents have set the time and content of use, but they will loosen their children's requirements, and after the relaxation, the child will be addicted to it, and parents "often rely on yelling to make him stop".

　　What triggered the tug-of-war is the increasingly "powerful" function of children's smart watches: taking pictures, beautifying faces, adding friends to send friends... In the eyes of many parents, children's smart watches are becoming more and more like mobile phones, but whether children's smart watches need these complex functions has become their inner confusion. Some parents even feel "kidnapped": if all the children in a class are using a certain brand of watch, then they have to buy the same brand for the child, otherwise the child may feel isolated.

　　Children's smart watches, which were originally positioned as "safe", are now "rolling" configurations and functions, which makes children face the test of digital survival, and also sparks controversy at the social level.

　　The big market behind "Touch".

　　At present, China is the world's largest consumer market for children's smart watches. There are about 170 million children aged 5 to 12 in mainland China, and the market penetration rate of children's smart watches is about 30%, with about 1 in 3 children having a smart watch.

　　The golden age of children's watches began ten years ago. Xu Zhong, as an old "backgammon" person, has witnessed the hot market of children's smart watches, and many manufacturers of mobile phones and tablets in the early days have turned to this track.

　　According to the "Wearable Device Research Report" released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, the market size of China's smart wearable devices in 2015 was 12.58 billion yuan, with a growth rate of 471.8%. Children's wearable devices, as one of the branches, are developing rapidly.

　　In 2015, children's safety smart watches ushered in a "blowout" outbreak. More than 300 companies in Shenzhen, Dongguan, Huizhou and other places have joined the battle group. This year, the Little Genius Smart Children's Watch was also officially released, playing the concept of "phone watch", and at the same time adding social functions such as micro-chat.

　　"When everyone knew that the little genius was making watches, they were all eager to try, but the ship was already full of people." More than 20 years ago, BBK launched a series of educational hardware such as repeaters, electronic dictionaries, point readers, and learning machines. Previously, Xu Zhong in a provincial company in the north of BBK responsible for product operations and agents for many years, in 2015 after the launch of the little genius phone watch, his focus shifted to the promotion of this new product, how to deploy the sales network of the little genius phone watch in the shortest possible time is a big challenge.

　　Xu Zhong recalled that in just over a month, he recruited hundreds of dealers in his province, and more than a dozen cities in the province successively sold little genius phone watches. In addition to traditional education channels, such as book buildings, shopping mall counters, etc., the same mobile phone brand sales channels give this new product a broader stage, and the little genius phone watch quickly appeared in OPPO and vivo's direct stores and specialty stores.

　　"Although there are channel advantages, the promotion was not smooth at that time, and the price of 798 yuan discouraged many parents." Xu Zhong said that brands such as 360 and Abba Town, which are booming, have attracted many parents to buy them because of their relatively low prices. Compared with brand watches, the entire market at that time was the world of white-label manufacturers, which were low-end, cheap, and simple in function, and the price may only be a few tens of yuan. Relevant data show that in 2015, children's watches below 99 yuan accounted for less than 1%, but in 2017, the proportion reached 80%, and white-label manufacturers with the help of the franchise stores of the three major operators, through the card to send children's watches shipments increased rapidly.

　　Under the crazy involution, many children's smart watch brands have "lost their value", and the prices of brands such as Bangbang Bear, Wei Xiaobao, and Qinmi have plummeted, and finally disappeared from the market. "After you make yourself worthless, it's too difficult to go up again." Xu Zhong does not approve of the use of low prices to attract consumers.

　　The dismal sales made Xu Zhong realize that it takes a process for children's smart watches to be accepted by consumers, and it is not realistic to get higher returns in the short term. Most manufacturers will go away with a handful of gold, "there are too many such brands, and they will eventually disappear."

　　At the beginning of the birth of children's smart watches, it was based on children's instant communication and security positioning needs. "When this kind of function comes up, my first reaction is 'I want someone else's function too.'" Zheng Yi, president of the Shenzhen Smart Wearable Industry Association, mentioned that in the early stage of market competition, he was very determined to catch up with his opponents, but he found it more difficult to catch up in the future.

　　BBK has more than 18,000 terminal sales outlets across the country, and has more than 400 service experience stores in major cities in various provinces and regions. According to Xu Zhong, in the BBK distribution system, the whole process of sales will be insured, such as the product can not be sold, after a period of time to adjust the price, the company will make up the difference, dealers do not have to worry about the risk of product price reduction. "This kind of agency system that has been built up for decades cannot be replicated by other brands in a short period of time, especially the loyalty of agents is difficult to cultivate." Xu Zhong said that within this system, even if they don't make money at first, they will stick to it.

　　In the overwhelming advertising, the little genius phone watch began to dominate the children's watch market. According to public reports, the shipment of Xiaotiancai phone watches in 2015 was 1.076 million units, and in 2016 it reached 3.604 million units, with a year-on-year increase of 234.9%. As of 2020, the cumulative sales of Little Genius phone watches have exceeded 20 million units.

　　The relevant person in charge of Xiaotiancai products responded to China News Weekly that children's watch products come from parents' safety needs for their children - parents are afraid of losing their children, "but in the long run, we believe that the core of market demand is communication." Whether it is an adult or a child, communication is the basic need of everyone, so the core needs of the phone watch are: communication between parents and children, and communication between children. The core functions of the products launched in 2015 are calling, positioning, and micro-chatting.

　　Jin Zhijiang, CEO of Little Genius Technology, also said: "The core demand of children's watches is communication, which incidentally solves children's positioning and safety problems. But in the long run, we don't think it's right – if China's law and order gets better and better, will this need not exist? Jin Zhijiang is sure that the future of children's smart watches belongs to socialization.

　　Social seduction in watches

　　After a year of repeated requests from his son, Yuan Bo finally bought him a little genius phone watch, and as an engineer, he knew the harm of indulging in it. But as the child grows up, Yuan Bo realizes that the child's social interaction can't drop the chain, "When the child is chatting with the watch, can your child chat?" ”

　　One day, Yuan Bo found that his son was chatting with a friend when he was supposed to be doing his homework. The child, who has always been more obedient, secretly unlocked his mother's mobile phone and lifted the control of the background. The reason is that the child wants to play football and does not get permission, so he tries to communicate with his friends and make an appointment, but he does not want to be known by his parents.

　　He also found that his son often posts dozens of friends a day, including "where am I eating today" and "I watched a cool movie today", etc., and after posting it, he looks forward to likes and replies from friends. These friends are "circles" that have been screened by parents, and under strong control, Yuan Bo's son has added seven or eight friends in a year, and these children meet the standards of parents: good learning, specialties and hobbies. "Those children who don't study very well, we don't agree with the child plus."

　　From "positioning watch" to "social artifact", the core function of the little genius "dating system" is closed, only the brand can directly add friends to each other, and the two watches can be added successfully by touching each other. This means that if there are two children in a class who are using the brand's watches, the remaining children are more likely to start using the brand's watches.

　　In Zheng Yi's view, the social scene was developed by the manufacturer after capturing the psychological needs of children with adult thinking. He commented that the ability to add friends is "overexploited".

　　Dai Jun has a deeper understanding of this, his daughter is in the third grade this year, and there are 25 children in the class, most of whom are using little genius children's watches. He described "my daughter as a chatter and needs to be constantly outdone". He observes that his daughter has a variety of social experiences through the watch: sometimes she and her best friend "block each other eight times" in a day, sometimes she and her friends get together in small circles to exclude and isolate others, and sometimes she gets isolated and ostracized. More often than not, my daughter interacts with her classmates by posting "circles of friends", but this interaction occupies quite a lot of her attention. "Sometimes when we have dinner together, she keeps her head down and keeps talking to her watch, all the time." Dai Jun would be angry at that time, and he often relied on strong means to stop his daughter.

　　A primary school teacher explained that most schools do not allow children to wear phones and watches to school, mainly because it will affect children's learning. What impressed her was that many children stayed up late chatting with WeChat chat after adding phone and watch friends, and even posted some sensitive pictures in the group.

　　Many parents have even begun to criticize and reject the social function of children's smart watches, "The original intention of parents is to call and locate, but in order to kidnap children, these manufacturers engage in socializing, building group chats, and inducing friends."

　　Qin Yiyuan, an analyst at market research company Canalys, told China News Weekly that in fact, every children's watch brand has a layout in the social ecology, some brands have their own closed social ecology, some brands break the closed social ecology, can realize cross-brand friends, and some brands directly add WeChat functions to children's watches to achieve a broader dating function.

　　In her opinion, children's smart watches can not only meet the needs of minors for convenient life, but also meet their psychological needs, such as a sense of security, belonging and achievement. But what she worries about is that setting up strict social barriers through children's watch brands to distinguish different groups can easily induce children's social comparison psychology.

　　Why is it becoming more and more like a mobile phone?

　　In the eyes of industry insiders, the little genius who was born as a children's product has a large user base, and when a closed system is established in the social scene, under this exclusive socialization, the Matthew effect is getting stronger and stronger. According to China's children's watch shipment data in 2022, Xiaotiancai occupies a three-percent share of the brand market, followed by Huawei and Xiaomi.

　　Qin Yiyuan analyzed that the advantages of Little Genius are mainly in the irreplaceability brought by brand awareness and closed social methods. Unlike the other two, Little Genius is not an ecological chain player, but is currently making up for it through OPPO and vivo channels, and is currently the only brand that only uses children's products to achieve a stable foothold. The advantage of Huawei and Xiaomi is that these two are domestic mobile phone manufacturers and belong to the ecological chain players, and the brand effect and channel advantages have a certain synergistic effect on the shipment of children's watches.

　　Competition between big brands is also intensifying. Sun Yanbiao, chairman of Chaodian Think Tank, revealed that in the second half of 2023, the shipments of the best-selling products of the little genius phone watch will be about 4.3 million, the shipments of Huawei's children's smart watches in the second half of 2023 will reach one million, and Xiaomi's shipments will be 300,000.

　　With the development of technology, China's children's smart watch market has experienced many product iterations in more than 20 years. At the beginning, children's smart watches mainly used GPS positioning technology to achieve real-time positioning of children, as well as calls, text messages and other functions; After the advent of the 4G era, children's smart watches have added functions such as video calls, heart rate monitoring, sleep monitoring and other functions, and at the same time have more games and learning content; The current children's smart watches have innovated in technology and materials, supporting more applications and services, such as online education, etc., and some can also realize face recognition and fingerprint unlocking.

　　Liu Quan, deputy chief engineer of China Electronic Information Industry Development Research Institute, believes that although there is a great controversy about the trend of children's smart watches, from the perspective of technological development momentum, the progress of sensors, battery technology and screen displays makes smaller devices can achieve more functions, and the mobile phone of children's smart watches will be an inevitable trend.

　　But in recent years, the technological innovation of the entire children's smartwatch market is no longer obvious. A manufacturer engaged in children's smart watches believes that even if it is a small genius, the product has not changed much over the years, and no new models have been developed, which means that it has encountered a bottleneck in technological innovation to some extent. Faced with this situation, working on software may become a choice that has to be made. Brand manufacturers, as leaders in the industry, are trying to attract children with more and more features.

　　The children's App application market is on the rise, and the functions of children's watches have increased from making calls and positioning to video calls, social networking, sports step counting, etc., slowly tending to entertainment and health, and there are dozens or even more apps that can be downloaded.

　　Taking Little Genius as an example, the design of the gamified point system is an important way to retain children. This point system makes children want to stop. Sports, socializing, and check-ins can help kids earn points that can be exchanged for special watch faces, boosting watch accounts, ordering birthday cakes for buddies, and even being exchanged.

　　Along with this, there are more and more expensive prices, and to some extent, watches are also easy to become a medium for children to compare. In November 2021, Xiaomi's newly released Mi Rabbit children's learning watch 5Pro, with a retail price of up to 1299 yuan, "Xiaomi released the most expensive children's watch" sparked heated discussions. The Z9 watch released by Xiao Tiancai in May last year reached 1999 yuan.

　　Liu Quan pointed out that the homogenization of the children's smart watch industry is becoming increasingly serious, and at present, functions such as positioning, dual camera and call have become standard, and functions such as health monitoring, sports mode and waterproof are also essential functions of brand watches. In order to reduce costs, many brands tend to imitate mainstream styles in product design, resulting in the same appearance and basically the same function.

　　On the China Judgment Online, the reporter found that there were as many as 380 judgment documents involving Guangdong Xiaotiancai Technology Co., Ltd., a company owned by Xiao Tiancai, and many cases involved disputes over utility model patents, design patents and trademark rights. Xiao Tiancai asserted that a number of companies had committed sales infringement, and demanded that the defendant company stop infringing patents and compensate for economic losses.

　　Behind the patent disputes, in fact, the children's smart watch track is becoming increasingly crowded, and the growth rate of the entire market is slowing down. According to public data, from 2015 to 2020, the demand for children's smart watches has increased year by year, with a compound annual growth rate of more than 30%. However, Pan Xuefei, assistant research director of IDC China, told China News Weekly that the shipments of the children's smart watch market will only increase by 3.4% year-on-year in 2023, and the growth trend of children's smart watches has slowed down significantly. Affected by the epidemic, the entire market also experienced a decline for a time.

　　The above-mentioned practitioners admitted frankly that as a small and medium-sized brand, life has become more and more difficult over the years. Large brands are still relatively recognized by the market, with room for development and profits, while small and medium-sized brands are at risk of being eliminated. "A watch priced at 300 yuan, the price of our OEM is less than 200 yuan, and we can earn more than a dozen yuan or even a few yuan."

　　"In order to make the product more attractive, some practitioners will design the product in a rather radical way." Zheng Yi, part of his company's business is to provide OEM services for brands, and many of the customers he has contacted have become more and more demanding on the functions of children's smart watches, "some even ask if they can help me add a Douyin or game."

　　He Yanzhe, deputy director of the evaluation laboratory of the network security center of the China Electronics Standardization Institute, has researched the children's smart watch market for a long time, and he found that those products that are priced at two or three hundred yuan often emphasize "powerful", these small manufacturers are not well-known brands, and often use the title of "genius boy" and "little talent" to sell to the sinking market, "these children may even use these watches to play the glory of the king."

　　How do you define a children's watch?

　　The soil behind children's smart watches is that minors in mainland China are almost "no one without the Internet".

　　According to the "Fifth National Survey Report on the Internet Use of Minors" (hereinafter referred to as the "Report"), the number of underage Internet users has exceeded 193 million in 2022. From 2018 to 2022, the Internet penetration rate of minors increased from 93.7% to 97.2%, basically reaching a state of saturation. More than 20% of underage Internet users are using new smart devices such as smart watches, smart desk lamps, dictionary pens, and smart screens.

　　Under the development trend of mobile phones, due to the sensitivity and particularity of service objects, the hidden dangers brought about in the development of children's smart watches have attracted much attention, and problems such as functional redundancy, induced consumption, and privacy violations have been repeatedly banned. A number of interviewees said that children's smart watches mainly rely on hardware to make profits, but in today's increasingly demanding software, this business is easy to deviate.

　　In 2022, many parents reported that there is a built-in game app to induce minors to consume in the little genius phone watch they bought for their children, and a variety of content similar to skin malls and games can be "consumed". Some parents said that when the child was using the little genius phone watch, he opened the Zhipet School App, and was inexplicably deducted 299 yuan, and the query of relevant transaction records only showed "Little Genius Application Center".

　　Previously, He Yanzhe participated in the compilation of the "Guidelines for the Protection of Personal Information and Rights and Interests of Children's Smart Watches" (T/CCIA003-2023) (hereinafter referred to as the "Guidelines"), which was officially released on December 31, 2023 and officially implemented on March 11, 2024. He said that this regulation is similar to a reference book, which aims to tell enterprises how to comply with uniform standards and models in terms of notification and consent and rights protection, guardian control, and online information content security. However, he stressed that the guidelines are not mandatory, but only a technical specification to help companies achieve safety compliance in production. "It's useful for people who want to do compliance, but it doesn't work for people who don't want to do security."

　　A very important dimension in the Guidelines is that companies should provide "gatekeeping" support for parents. From the aspects of app installation, functions, time, social control, etc., to ensure parents' control over children's smart watches.

　　The relevant person in charge of the above-mentioned little genius products told China News Weekly that the child's discernment is relatively weak, and the core of the third-party applications in the watch app store is mainly tools and life, and there must be strict application specifications. For example, it is strictly forbidden to automatically renew all apps and pay password-free, and the watch cannot install unofficially certified apps, and unknown links cannot be opened. Children's self-control is relatively weak, and the watch supports a variety of time management functions, such as limiting the continuous use time, daily use time, and supporting class disabling, etc., to assist parents to guide their children correctly and develop good usage habits.

　　He Yanzhe believes that parental control is the core of children's smart watch use. If you encounter a situation such as your child is addicted to chatting or games, you can only activate the default protection mechanism in the background through the parent. However, he also pointed out that there are many situations that are different, "If the child is addicted to taking pictures and takes 500 photos a day, should there be an anti-addiction setting for taking pictures?" ”

　　Zheng Yi found that many parents often have ambivalence in the process of buying children's smart watches: on the one hand, they want the watch to be powerful, and on the other hand, they don't want their children to use it excessively.

　　"I didn't feel bothered in any way, but I envied the children now. They have watches, and the watch is their phone so that he doesn't lose contact with his friends. I only had a mobile phone after I went to university, and I only had a smartphone after I did my PhD, and many of my former college classmates lost contact. Dai Jun believes that although his daughter is "addicted" to the watch, this is controllable, "We adults have lived in the world of the Internet for so long, how can we ask our children to use paper books to meet and chat with classmates?" ”

　　Compared with Dai Jun's open-mindedness, many parents are fiercely opposed to their children's use of children's smart watches. A parent questioned on social media, and now the Internet is full of positive reviews of phone watches, with few negative cases, and seriously suspects that this is the result of being brainwashed by marketing. According to him, the second-grade children in the family often listen to the stories in the watch at one or two o'clock in the morning, get up at four or five o'clock to continue listening, and cry and quarrel with their parents after confiscating the watch. In addition, there are not a few parents who report that their children's vision loss is very serious after using the watch.

　　"The beautiful tech storm poses a threat to the most vulnerable member of our society – our children." Chris Rowan is a children's occupational therapist who tries to tell the outside world that society's overuse of technology is causing children to be excessively "virtualized" by technology. She believes that children who are wrapped in information technology from birth are suffering from technological invasion, which has led to a variety of development crises.

　　The development of information technology has made children's watches more and more "high-end", mainly because manufacturers are trying to improve their product power and attract more consumers through the addition of high-end functions. The addition of "high-end" functions often brings an increase in the amount of time children spend on the watch and the impairment of children's vision brought by small screens, which is inconsistent with the needs of a considerable number of parents.

　　Qin Yiyuan said that the original intention and pain point of children's smart watches is to "ensure the safety of children's lives".

　　But judging from the current market "truth", all children's smart watches are gradually moving away from the "original intention", or in other words, the security function is taking a back seat and needs to attract the attention and attention of the society.

　　(At the request of the interviewee, Zhang Han, Xu Zhong, and Dai Jun are pseudonyms in the article)

　　China News Weekly 2024 Issue 17 (21)