The competition between the big manufacturers has accelerated the conversion of the entire market, the industry is undercurrent, and the more brutal 5G battle between mobile phone manufacturers has begun.

Editor’s note: This article comes from WeChat public account “CV 智 知” (ID: CVAI2019) < / a>, author: Zhang Xue, Han Jingxian, editor: Zhang Lijuan .

Near the end of the year, the 5G battle for mobile phone manufacturers is becoming increasingly fierce. After all, mobile phone sales are declining. Just as Lu Weibing said in a public event on the 28th, “the arrival of 5G, the mobile phone market should have a big rebound.”

This can be seen from the intense mutual conflict between Huami OV: On November 26, Honor released its first 5G dual-mode mobile phone, the Honor V30, in Beijing. On the same day, Lu Weibing, vice president of Xiaomi Group, also announced on Weibo that Redmi’s first 5G dual-mode phone K30 will be released on December 10.

OPPO is also in a hurry. On the 28th, Shen Yiren, vice president of OPPO, disclosed the information about his first 5G mobile phone on Weibo: “probably the lightest and thinest dual-mode 5G mobile phone at the same price in the same period.”

Hua Mi OV's 5G ambition: People to middle age, competitive upgrade

Before that, in September and October this year, Huawei had released the Mate 30 series and Mate X folding screen phones that support NSA and SA dual-mode. After you chase me, no one of the mobile phone manufacturers dares to relax.

The competition between manufacturers has accelerated the conversion of the entire market, the industry is undercurrent, and the more brutal 5G battle between mobile phone manufacturers has begun.

5G + mobile phone: Giant melee, Xiaomi and OPPO have lost the lead

In less than half a year of 5G mobile phone sales in the Chinese market, many manufacturers have launched new 5G-enabled mobile phones, covering the mid-to-high-end and low-end markets. Up to now, there are 12 5G smart terminals on the market.

From the perspective of China ’s 5G mobile phone market share released by IDC, the current competitive momentum of 5G mobile phone manufacturers is already very clear.

Data shows that in the third quarter of this year, the total shipments of 5G mobile phones in the Chinese market reached 485,000, of which vivo is mainly low-endThe machine has a market share of 54.3%.

In the 5G mobile phone market in China in 2019, Huawei and vivo are aggressive, while Xiaomi and OPPO are still poised for growth.

In terms of Huawei, first Mate20x mainly supports both NSA and SA, and then Mate30 5G relay in November. The integration advantages from chips to mobile phones and networks support Huawei’s leading position in 5G mobile phones in China in 2019.

Hua Cheng, CEO of Huawei Consumer Business, said, “From next year, Huawei will continue to increase the number of 5G mobile phones. At the same time, Huawei will provide more comprehensive solutions, which are reflected in two aspects of chip innovation. The first is independent networking Compatible with non-independent networking, so that consumers do not need to consider network issues when choosing. Second, it is equipped with the first flagship 5G SoC chip, not a transition solution. “

Similarly, vivo has also released two 5G models, iQOO Pro 5G, the first 5G mobile phone launched in August 2019, and in September, vivo ’s second 5G mobile phone, NEX 3 5G, was launched. Both mobile phones have aggressive pricing strategies, and “the early layout of the mid-to-high-end performance machine market dominated by online channels and the high-end flagship market dominated by offline channels was made.” Taking full advantage of the time difference, it took the first-mover advantage in the competition of the first 5G mobile phones.

In addition, recently, vivo also announced that it will launch another 5G mobile phone—vivo X30 series in December. It is worth noting that this series will be equipped with the Exynos 980 dual-mode 5G AI chip jointly developed by vivo and Samsung. It can be seen that in the layout of 5G mobile phones, vivo has also begun to test water self-developed chips.

Xiaomi’s performance is unsatisfactory in comparison. Today Xiaomi has only one 5G phone, the Xiaomi Mi 9 Pro 5G, which is listed in China. Although the price is also low, the market response is flat.

Hua Mi OV's 5G ambition: people to middle age, competitive upgrade

After realizing that it lost its first-mover advantage, in order to catch up with the outbreak of 5G mobile phones next year, Xiaomi also accelerated the launch of 5G mobile phones. Lu Weibing, vice president of Xiaomi Group, revealed that the Redmi K30 will be released on December 10, which will also be Redmi’s first 5G mobile phone, and also supports 5G NSA / SA dual-mode.

Lei Jun, president of Xiaomi, also stated that Xiaomi is expected to release more than 10 5G models next year.For mobile phones, the penetration rate of 5G mobile phones in the Chinese market is expected to reach 40% -50%, and Xiaomi will still be a pricey 5G mobile phone.

In addition, OPPO, which has been going hand in hand with vivo, has also been slow in the domestic 5G product layout. Even now, it has not launched a 5G mobile phone in the domestic market. OPPO aims to release its first Qualcomm model at the end of the year. OPPO Reno3 series mobile phones that support SA. This series supports dual-mode 5G across the board.

The OPPO sub-brand realme phone also officially announced that it will release the first realme 5G dual-mode phone. Although OPPO has abandoned the Chinese 5G mobile phone market in 2019, it has already settled for the spring of 2020.

Of course, an optimistic fact is that in October 5G mobile phone shipments were 2.494 million units, a surge of 402% compared with 497,000 units in September, showing a blowout growth trend.

The more brutal 5G mobile phone market

As we all know, the excessive price of 5G mobile phones has always been the biggest obstacle to its acceptance by the market. From the current point of view, whoever has the most competitive low-cost products will have the mobile phone market in 2019. In other words, 5G mobile phones are not a good business that can make money now.

IDC said that after the decline in smartphone shipments for three consecutive years, 5G has little room to increase its average selling price. It can be said that no terminal change caused by a network upgrade is even more cruel than this one.

Compared with 4G mobile phones, the cost of 5G mobile phones is much higher. On the one hand, there are hard costs in terms of baseband and antenna, on the other hand, due to the relatively low maturity of the current industrial chain, manufacturers’ R & D investment is greater.

First of all, in the pricing of mobile phones, the chip is in a crucial position, and it is not too much to say that it is the decisive factor.

“5G mobile phones are expensive on the processor.” Previous industry researchers said so, but the fact is that 5G mobile phones are only “a little bit” more expensive than 4G mobile phones. For example, iQOO Pro released 4G version and 5G version at the same time this year. In terms of price, the standard price of 4G is 3198 yuan, and the price of 5G version is only 600 yuan more expensive.

In order to meet the needs of mobile phone manufacturers, in terms of baseband, mainstream chip manufacturers have launched their latest 5G mobile processing platforms, and they have lowered prices.

China’s 5G market has entered a three-legged model: Kirin 5G mobile processing platform, Qualcomm 5G mobile processing platform, and Samsung Exynos 5G mobile processing platform, and these three platforms have their own player representatives. The Kirin chip has naturally become the first choice of Huawei, OPPO has joined the Qualcomm camp, and vivo has chosen the minority Samsung Exynos.

MediaTek also recently held 5G SoC processor conference, officially launched the Teana 1000 processor. Public information shows that Redmi K30 will launch MediaTek’s 5G chip, and it will be officially released on December 10. Industry insiders predict that the MediaTek processor is likely to help the price of Redmi K30 break through 3,000 yuan.

Undoubtedly, the competition among chip manufacturers in pricing and performance will eventually be amplified and manifested among mobile phone manufacturers. At the same time, with consumer demand driven, the price war between mobile phone manufacturers has already started.

Since the market’s pre-judgment of 8,000 yuan was given at the beginning of the year, the price of 5G mobile phones fluctuated greatly. Among them, Huawei Mate X 5G and Xiaomi MIX Alpha cost over 10,000 yuan, and most 5G terminals cost more than 4,000 yuan.

The industry believes that this year ’s 5G mobile phone price war started with vivo ’s new iQOO pro (5G), which first broke through the lower price limit. The price is only 3798 yuan, and Xiaomi ’s mobile phone, which has been focusing on “cost-effective” Xiaomi Mi 9 Pro (5G) was released in September and pulled the price down again to 3699 yuan.

Two months later, Honor released the first 5G mobile phone, V30, and set the minimum configuration price to 3299 yuan, which is currently the cheapest 5G mobile phone on the market. Considering Honor’s shipments of more than 50 million units in 2018, the industry believes that this price has quickly reduced the price of 5G mobile phones in the Chinese market.

Yu Chengdong also said before accepting the media that the relatively lower price of 5G mobile phones will arrive in 2020. Yu Chengdong said that the price of 5G mobile phones will definitely reach the mid-range or even lower price range. Huawei will launch 5G mid-range mobile phones next year and will launch cheaper models later.

Hua Mi OV's 5G ambition: people to middle age, competitive upgrade

This means that after the first product is launched, 5G mobile phones will have a price dive once a month.

In addition to mobile phone manufacturers and chip manufacturers, carriers also play an irreplaceable role in the 5G mobile phone market.

It is reported that the three major operators originally planned to subsidize 5G mobile phones in the initial stage of commercialization of 5G networks to attract users to use 5G networks. However, according to the latest situation, the three major operators have not done so. , And even ordered its subsidiaries to prohibit similar 5G terminal subsidy activities.

Similar to terminal subsidies, operators have done it before when commercializing 3G and 4G networks.One is that as long as the user purchases a package when the user purchases the package, the operator will greatly reduce the mobile phone. The other is that when the user orders the package, the operator will give the user a mobile phone.

In the early stage of commercialization of 5G networks, the reason why this model was rejected was mainly because 5G mobile phones are not expensive now, and even the price is the same as some 4G mobile phones. If it continues to subsidize, it will be meaningless and even disrupt the market. Orderly behavior is also to avoid vicious competition.

In addition, the three major operators clearly know that due to the time required for network deployment, in the early stage of commercialization of 5G networks, network coverage is not enough to withstand the explosive growth of users. In this way, it is the three that slowly and slowly allow users to switch to 5G More willing to pursue, after all, 5G coexistence of 4G and 5G has become the industry consensus.

Although traditional subsidy programs are missing, this does not mean that the three major operators will become bystanders of 5G mobile phones. They are also promoting the popularization of 5G mobile phones in their own way.

China Unicom said that prices will reach 2,000 to 2500 yuan in the first quarter of next year. China Mobile also plans to push the price of 5G equipment to below 2,000 yuan by the end of 2020.

The market predicts that by the end of 2020, 5G mobile phones with a price of 1,000 yuan to 1,500 yuan will appear on the market. At the same time, President Zhao Ming of Glory said that the cost of 5G mobile phones will drop much faster than the era of 4G mobile phones.

Obviously, mobile phone manufacturers need to sell goods, and operators need to find users. The combination of the two has caused the 5G mobile phone market to enter a price war too early, and it has also caused mobile phone manufacturers to enter a more brutal race of life and death prematurely. in.

However, the “October 2019 Domestic Mobile Phone Market Operation Analysis Report” released by the Information Technology Institute shows that in terms of mobile phone standards, 4G mobile phones are still the absolute main force of mobile phone shipments and still firmly suppress 5G mobile phones, 5G Mobile phone sales account for only a fraction of the entire mobile phone market.

5G + IoT: Xiaomi launches first, Huawei and OV come later

OPPO founder, president and CEO Chen Mingyong once said, “The 5G era will lead to more new hardware. We need to gain insight and grasp the core needs of users to create the next entry-level product.” Lei Jun also said, ” 5G + AI + IoT is the next generation of super Internet. “

As the big brothers have a bright attitude, the industry generally believes that 5G will not only bring huge opportunities to smartphones, but also heavily empower loT: 5G’s low-latency characteristics can better support intelligence The data transmission of devices and sensors makes it work more smoothly, which coincides with the vision of IoT interconnection.

What is more worth looking forward to is the broad market prospects of loT: research by the Institute of Obstetrics and Gynecology of ITRI has stated that the global IoT market will be from 631 in 2017USD 400 million, breaking through USD 1 trillion for the first time in 2021, and growing to USD 1.19 trillion in 2022, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.6% from 2017 to 2022. Great motivation.

Take Xiaomi as an example, in the just-released third-quarter 2019 financial report, Xiaomi’s IoT & consumer products business revenue reached 15.6 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 44.4% and accounting for 29.1% of total revenue. Compared with the weak mobile phone business, Xiaomi’s IoT & consumer products business can be said to be a major contributor to revenue growth.

Xiaomi is also the first wave of companies to bring IoT into the country.

Xiaomi released the Xiaomi router in November 2013. The idea is to use the router as the center and the mobile phone APP as the entrance to control the connected hardware. In 2015, the core of the IoT connection was determined as the mobile phone; 2017 At the first IoT developer conference, Lei Jun believed that Xiaomi has become the world’s largest intelligent hardware IoT platform; at the beginning of this year, it also launched a “mobile phone + AIoT” dual-engine strategy, and officially put AIoT in the same position as mobile phones in order to respond. 4G switches 5G market opportunities.

In fact, it really relies on the layout of IoT. Xiaomi affixed the label of the Internet company to itself before listing in 2018, entrusting a declining valuation.

After the C-side has been completely covered, Fan Dian, Chairman of the Xiaomi AIoT Strategy Committee and General Manager of the IoT Platform Department, said at the Xiaomi Developer Conference 2019, “In addition to the consumer market that Xiaomi excels at, the enterprise market is the next focus for Xiaomi. . “

Compared to the logic of Xiaomi’s first To C and then To B, Huawei has adopted the development strategy of To B first and then To C.

In 2018, Huawei shouted the slogan of “All-scenario Smart Living Ecological Strategy” and officially announced the AIoT ecological strategy in December. On March 14, 2019, Huawei announced that “the Huawei IoT ecological strategy will be fully upgraded to Smart strategy for all scenarios.

Between concept changes, Huawei’s business focus has changed: In the past, the focus of the IoT business was on the B side, and the most important thing in 2019 was to land on the C side.

As for how to promote the C terminal? Huawei chose a similar “1 + 8 + N” strategy to Xiaomi: 1 is the mobile phone as the main entrance, and 8 is the eight auxiliary devices including PC, tablet, smart screen, speakers, glasses, watches, headphones, and cars. Entry-level equipment, N is smart travel, audio and video entertainment and other equipment. Among them, Huawei only does 1 and 8 and chip parts.

Compared with the model of Xiaomi’s self-operated ecological chain, Zhi Hao, President of Huawei Consumer Business Wireless Broadband and Smart Home Product LineIn a previous interview with the media, he said, “Our biggest difference is openness. We don’t do it ourselves. We hope that our partners will focus on making their refrigerators and washing machines, because this thing is still very difficult to do.”

Hua Mi OV's 5G ambition: people to middle age, competitive upgrade

Huawei ’s IoT business is coming later than Xiaomi, but from the first half of 2019’s performance report, Huawei HiLink Ecology has gathered 260+ brands and 30 million + users and connected more than 140 million IoT devices. Super Xiaomi trend.

At the same time, it also has the leading OV in the mobile phone market. Although there are not many voices in the IoT market, they are not idle.

It’s not difficult to see from the mid-term mission and vision re-established by vivo last year: becoming a technology company driven by the ultimate product, with intelligent terminals and intelligent services as its core.

At the OPPO 2019 annual meeting, the founder, president, and CEO Chen Mingyong first proposed OPPO’s three future tasks, one of which was to deploy IoT.

However, compared to the previous two singles fights, OV chose to cooperate in the first stop of OV’s entry into IoT.

In July 2018, OV, together with Midea, TCL, XGIMI and many other manufacturers, established an IoT Open Ecological Alliance to utilize their respective traffic advantages and technical strength to achieve interconnection.

Vivo then launched its own IoT product, Jovi Internet of Things. This year, it updated its strategy again, called “one master and three assistants”, that is, mobile phones, VR glasses, headsets, and watches.

Unlike the ambitious ecological extension plans of other manufacturers, Hu Baishan, executive vice president of vivo, said in an interview with Tiger Sniff, “We still do what we can do. WeChat was born in the 3G era and 4G era. A small video was born, and there will definitely be such applications in the 5G era, but this is not something we should do. The thing we want to do is to do a good job of 5G terminals. “

From this perspective, OPPO shows more similarities with Huawei and Xiaomi. First, it launched the “5G + X” strategy. In X, priority will be given to smart phones, smart headphones, and smart watches focusing on sports and health.

There are media reports that OPPO has recruited more than 200 headphone R & D teams this year. In addition, OPPO will also launch a new sub-brand “Zhimeixinpin”, which will be developed through self-research and cooperation.And selection models to provide users with IoT products.

Meanwhile, similar to Xiaomi ’s Xiaoai classmates and Huawei ’s Xiaoyi, OPPO also plans to let the intelligent assistant Breeno not only integrate the AI ​​capabilities of OPPO, but also “integrate multiple technologies in the 5G era” and become the hub in the 5G era. To control IoT, wearable, connected car and other devices and platforms.

Observe that the layout of Huawei, Xiaomi, and OV in the 5G + IoT field is very similar. Before the initial stage of product development, whoever can seize user time and ports will have greater advantages.

After all, in this network, consumer brand loyalty will migrate to different types of products and the cost of learning, money, etc. to change the brand is also within the user’s consideration.

From the perspective of the entire industry, as four powerful players have entered the game, smartphone manufacturers’ road to IoT in the context of 5G is becoming more and more clear: mobile phones are the mainstay, everything is connected, and data value is tapped.

Conclusion

This year is known as the “first year” of 5G commercialization. On November 1, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology jointly announced the launch of 5G commercial services with the three major operators, and the entire industry is in the ascendant.

According to the calculation of the China Academy of Information and Communication Technology, 5G will drive China’s digital economy to grow by 1.52 billion yuan in 2020-2025, of which the value-added of the information industry will increase by 3.3 trillion yuan, and other vertical industries (Internet of Vehicles, Industrial Internet, medical care) increased by 11.9 trillion yuan.

Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO, and vivo have all rushed to the starting line, fighting each other, hoping to occupy the market first.

Perhaps, we can expect that, as Lei Jun said, 5G will bring tremendous changes to the fields of communications, mobile Internet and AIoT in the coming year.

Of course, with it, in the near future, in the 5G market, Huami OV will still repeat a round of elimination, competition, and merger games.

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