China Fund News reporter Wen Xi
Apple's first headset, the Vision Pro, which is rumored to be ready to go on sale outside the United States, has ushered in significant progress in China.
According to the information disclosed on the website of the China Quality Certification Center on May 13, a "wearable computer" with the model A2117 of Apple has passed the national 3C quality certification.
The product code name of the Vision Pro was A2117, which was previously FCC certified in the United States. This also means that this controversial headset product is expected to be sold in China.
It is manufactured by a subsidiary of Luxshare Precision
The reporter found on the website of the China Quality Certification Center that on May 13, two new Apple devices passed the national 3C quality certification, one of which was shown as a "wearable computer" with a model of A2117.
In January of this year, the Vision Pro received approval from the FCC in the United States before being sold to the public in the U.S. market, when the product code name of the Vision Pro was A2117. According to the information, the product is manufactured by Likai Precision Technology (Kunshan) Co., Ltd., which is a subsidiary of Lixun Precision.
As early as September 2023, Lixun Precision said that the company provides Apple with development and manufacturing services for products such as iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods and Apple Vision Pro.
In fact, Mark Gurman, a well-known Apple whistleblower, revealed on May 13 that Apple is ready to sell the Vision Pro headset in countries and regions outside the United States to boost shipments of this product.
Apple has shipped hundreds of retail store employees around the world to Cupertino, California, to attend a four-day Vision Pro training course and teach them how to demonstrate the $3,500 device to customers, the person said.
Employees from retail stores in China, Germany, Australia, France, Japan, South Korea and Singapore are attending training sessions, indicating that these countries are likely to be the first international markets to launch the Vision Pro after the United States.
Apple plans to bring the Vision Pro to the international market after the Worldwide Developers Conference, which will be held from June 10 to June 14, the people said.
The Vision Pro was announced by Apple at WWDC last June, but it was not first available in the US market until February 2 this year, and it is currently only available in the US market. Apple CEO Tim Cook said in March that Vision Pro will land in Chinese mainland this year.
The Vision Pro is also one of the products that Apple has spent the most resources on in recent years. When it went on sale in the U.S. market in early February, the Vision Pro caused a sensation. But after the enthusiasm passed, the demand for the product gradually slowed. The Vision Pro's high price, as well as its lack of compelling applications, make it a niche product.
Apple previously reported its first-quarter results without specifying how the Vision Pro has performed so far, but sales of the company's business unit responsible for the device fell 10 percent.
Global sales of the Vision Pro are expected to boost sales, with China and Japan being the most anticipated, mainly due to the strong consumer interest in virtual reality in these countries.
However, in the eyes of many industry insiders, the high price of the product may still be a major obstacle.
There are still shortcomings from the ideal form
"As a first-generation product, the Vision Pro still has some hardware shortcomings from the ideal form, and it may take several years to gradually iterate." CITIC Securities made such an evaluation in a research report.
The agency believes that the first thing that needs to be upgraded is in terms of weight, "in user feedback, reducing the weight of products is a very high demand". The Vision Pro's weight distribution includes the two side temples and speaker modules (19%), the inner screen and lens modules (14%), the metal middle frame (13%), the visor (12%), and the front glass cover (6%).
The agency expects that the next generation of weight reduction solutions may reduce weight by prioritizing the optimization of structural design, such as the adoption of hollow structures for some structural parts.
In terms of display effect, although the Vision Pro uses a silicon-based OLED screen to greatly improve the display accuracy compared with the previous LCD screen, there is still room for improvement from the ideal state of the human eye. On the other hand, the user may observe black bars around the field of view when wearing them.
In terms of the most interesting price, CITIC Securities believes that one of the important reasons for the luxury attributes of Vision Pro in the early stage is the low yield, and if the yield is increased in the future, it is expected to reduce costs and selling prices.
In addition, the agency believes that the Vision Pro is a product with personalized attributes, such as headband model and size, lens hood size, vision correction such as lenses or contact lenses, eye tracking correction, and many other parameters that may limit the initial experience.
It is reported that in June this year, Apple will launch the second version of the VisionOS operating system for the Vision Pro, and the performance of the Vision Pro may be improved again.
As for the release of the next-generation Vision Pro, the industry expects that it may be postponed until the end of 2026, and the retail price is expected to be between $1,500 and $2,500. In the industry, this price may drive sales of this product.
Domestic Internet giants rush to the beach
Although Vision Pro has many shortcomings, many domestic application manufacturers have rushed to it.
Previously, after the Vision Pro was sold in the United States, Tom Cat, an A-share listed company, announced that the company's core IP game works debuted Vision Pro through the Apple Arcade platform, bringing a new interactive experience to the first batch of Apple MR users.
So far, domestic Internet giants including Tencent, Taobao, AutoNavi Maps, and Ctrip have seized the opportunity to launch the Apple Vision Pro native app.
Among them, Taobao recently launched the Apple Vision Pro version on the App Store, which can present goods in the real world in a three-dimensional way.
Combined with Vision Pro's unique spatial computing technology, the map service is no longer limited to the traditional two-dimensional screen interface, but can be integrated with the user's actual environment.
Ctrip recently launched a new app called Trip.Vision, which claims to be the first travel service app in the country to be compatible with Vision Pro technology.
Guojin Securities believes that the application landing scene of Vision Pro has been greatly expanded compared with before, and the overall situation is more daily and life-oriented, without too much emphasis on a certain scene such as games and movie viewing, which is also conducive to its application prosperity and market scale opening.
Editor: Captain
Review: Muyu