Regardless of whether Gree intends to abandon the mobile phone business, the mobile phone business is tantamount to today’s Gree, and it is the kind of “no taste, no waste”.
Editor’s note: This article is from WeChat public account “New Technology Knowledge” (ID :kejixinzhi), the author of the East.
On the evening of October 30, Gree Electric announced the third quarter of this year’s financial report, the financial report shows Gree Revenue in the third quarter was 57.742 billion yuan, a slight increase of 0.03% year-on-year; net profit was 8.367 billion yuan, an increase of 0.66%.
At the same time, Gree also disclosed a “Articles of Association Amendment.” Gree’s proposed company charter has adjusted the company’s business scope, adding the contents of “research and development, manufacturing, sales of new energy power generation products, energy storage systems and charging piles”, and deleted “operating telecom services and value-added telecommunications”. business”.
There are speculations that Gree’s move means that Gree is about to give up the mobile phone business. Then Gree Electric responded that “no mobile phone is not used” and said that it will explain it to the shareholders’ meeting on November 18.
But no matter whether Gree intends to give up the mobile phone business, the mobile phone business is tantamount to today’s Gree, and it is the kind of “no taste, no waste”.
Gree dance sword, intended for IOT
Speaking of Gree’s mobile phone business, Miss Dong has always been a man who can’t get around.
Gree mobile phone enters the public for the first time. In March 2015, Ms. Dong said at the Davos Forum and the two sessions that year. “If I do a mobile phone, I will let the consumer not change the mobile phone for 3 years. Minutes over millet.”
At that time, some people thought that this was just the mouth of the Iron Lady. More people thought that Miss Dong’s madness was related to Lei’s “Billion Gambling” in 2013, but no one thought of it. The Iron Maiden is really going to make a mobile phone, and it is still ironic.
After a week, Ms. Dong’s speech at the Sun Yat-sen University’s Bo Xue Lecture Hall as a “traditional growth of traditional enterprises” suddenly turned around and talked about Gree mobile phones. Then she asked her secretary to send a mobile phone, and then told everyone to “disclose that Gree’s mobile phone has come out, I have already used it.”
At this point, everyone is aware that Miss Dong is really going to enter the mobile phone market.
In 2015, the Gree mobile phone generation was launched, equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 processor, Android 4.4, and the camera used 8 million pixels rear + 2 megapixel front-end, priced at 1599 yuan.
It must be said that compared with no one believes that Miss Dong will enter the mobile phone market, the Gree mobile phone is so amazingly configured, the moving price is the most shocking to everyone. Some netizens bluntly said, “I didn’t expect anyone to put it.” The mobile phone of 500 yuan is sold for 1,500 yuan.”
But Miss Dong does not think that there is any problem with Gree mobile phones, not only for the Gree mobile phone platform, but also for every time to use the “bright words and clear words” for the Gree mobile phone.
“You can throw away your phone and buy a Gree phone.”
“Gree mobile phone world number one, selling 50 million units is no problem, and selling 100 million units in the future is not a problem.”
“Gree mobile phone quality is very good, it is a bit expensive, you don’t know the goods, whoever uses it.”
“My phone is going to sell expensive because it is made with the best materials in the world.”
…..
In 2016, the second generation of Gree Mobile was listed, and the “big bull” in the industry was found to help R&D. At the same time, Gree also built its own mobile phone assembly line. Driven by R&D costs and production costs, the price of Gree’s second-generation mobile phones has also increased to 3,599 yuan.
But the high price of R&D and self-built assembly lines still failed to bring the distance between Gree and consumers closer, but it was counterproductive.
From the design concept to the material, the second generation of Gree mobile phone is a remote control with a mobile phone function. Consistently low configuration and high price, the fate of Gree’s second-generation mobile phone is no different from that of its predecessors. The sales volume of normal channels is almost negligible. The final inventory has become the “welfare” of employees at the end of the year, and each employee has one.
In 2017, after the second generation, Gree launched a small-screen version of the second-generation mobile phone “color world”, equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor and 5.5-inch Sharp full HD screen, the main POCA color purification algorithm, for sale The price is 3,200 yuan.
This year, the industry also announced that Gree launched three generations of mobile phones, still running my own “low with high price + enlarged version of the remote control”, the price is also 3,600 yuan. Gree also quietly put the phone on the official flagship store of each sales platform, the sales volume is only double digits, basically negligible.
However, although the Gree mobile phone progressed quite unsatisfactory, and the telecommunications business was deleted in the charter, it seems that it still has not given up on the mobile phone.
According to the sky-eye inspection, Gree recently applied for a new patent – folding screen, which has to be reminiscent of Samsung’s foldThe multi-screen mobile phone Galaxy Fold and Huawei’s MATE X.
Does the Gree mobile phone have to fold the screen? Even Samsung, which has first-class panel technology, has suffered a big loss on the folding screen. At present, only Samsung, Huawei and Rouyu have launched folding screens. How much is Gree?
If the Gree generation mobile phone is the decision of Miss Dong’s brains, then the four mobile phones have been built and the assembly line has been built. Now I have applied for the folding screen technology. It can only show that Miss Dong’s mobile phone may be serious.
It is worth noting that at the China Manufacturing Summit Forum in 2015, Ms. Dong once said to Gree a mobile phone: “The future mobile phone must be connected with other home appliances. The advantage of Gree lies in these electrical appliances. I am in my hands.”
The Gree Group previously stated in its 2014 annual report that the mobile phone is to bear the carrier of linking and controlling smart home appliances, and to obtain smart home entrance.
So, Gree made the mobile phone into a “magnified version of the remote control”. Ms. Dong’s intention was not to make a mobile phone, but to use the mobile phone version of the “remote control” to enter the IOT field.
Is the mobile phone a good choice for Gree?
Before answering whether Gree is a good choice for Gree, let’s take a look at another reason why Gree is doing a mobile phone.
In fact, compared with the use of mobile phones to do IOT imports and then incite the trillion-level market, another factor is more important for Gree to solve.
That is the main business of Gree has encountered a bottleneck.
On October 30, Gree Electric released its third quarter earnings report for 2019. According to the financial report, Gree’s revenue for the first three quarters of this year was 155.309 billion yuan, up 4.26% year-on-year; net profit was 22.117 billion yuan, up 4.73% year-on-year. In the third quarter, revenue was 57.742 billion yuan, net profit was 8.367 billion yuan, up 0.66% year-on-year, and net profit after deduction was 8.172 billion yuan, down 6.21% year-on-year.
Gree’s goal set for 2019 in 2018 is to achieve 250 billion yuan in revenue. It seems that Gree is unlikely to achieve this goal.
Lack of growth in revenue and a decline in net profit are just a microcosm of many problems with Gree. The more important issue is that Gree, who has reached the “year of the year”, is still relying on the air-conditioning business for revenue to find the next growth engine. According to Gree’s 2018 and 2017 financial reports, the revenue of air-conditioning products has accounted for about 80% of total revenue.
According to the data from the August-September of this year, the retail volume and retail sales of the air-conditioning industry began to decline on a quarterly basis. In the third quarter, the retail sales of the air-conditioning industry fell 9.7% year-on-year. It fell 4.5% year-on-year.
Gree, though