5G "Machine Sea" Surging: New Machine Release Is Unprecedented Active, Manufacturers Scramble For "Window Period"

In the critical window period of seizing market share, a wave of "Jihai" which has not been seen for many years is coming.

According to the statistics of the information and Communications Institute, in the first two months of this year, the total volume of domestic mobile phone market continued to show a high-speed upward trend: the year-on-year growth rate in January nearly doubled, and that in February more than doubled. In the first two months, the cumulative shipment volume increased by 127.5% year on year.

The number of models on the market increased by 77% in January. The 21st century economic report reporter backtracking statistics found that the number of new aircraft released in a single month can reach or exceed 50% year-on-year growth rate, and the latest one happened in 2018.

Matching with the crazy launch of new phones, and in the process of sprint to the high-end product line, the price of mobile phones has moved towards the people-friendly performance. In addition, some high-end flagship products of some manufacturers that have not promoted spokesmen in the domestic market have begun to sign various spokesmen in recent days, and expand their joint marketing influence through films and other means.

The window of opportunity is fleeting. Mobile phone manufacturers in the Red Sea are trying to plot a surprise attack.

Sui qian, senior director of strategy analytics, believes that 2021 will be the year for Chinese smartphone manufacturers. "In the Asia Pacific region, vivo, Xiaomi and oppo will be top 3 through vigorous marketing, expanded channel coverage and competitive pricing."

"Huawei's decline will certainly give other manufacturers opportunities. To seize Huawei's share, we need the support of channel relations and supply chain. Huawei's more online share will benefit Xiaomi, and the offline part will benefit oppo and vivo more. Most of the opportunities will fall to mainstream manufacturers, and small manufacturers will have limited competitiveness in these aspects. " Canalys research analyst Liu Yixuan said.

"Air sea war"

In the first quarter of this year, the new aircraft release period seems to be more lively than in previous years. Even just released a new product, immediately warm up the next new model.

For example, iqoo, a sub brand of vivo, announced the relevant information of Z series immediately after the launch of its Neo series. At the end of the month, the new brand realme announced that another series of GT Neo would be launched at the end of the month.

Feng Yufei, President of iqoo's China market, also said frankly that 2021 will be a year when iqoo is ready to start and make a full-scale sprint. To this end, iqoo has prepared a wealth of ammunition, will speed up the pace of product updates, strive to stabilize the high-end market, and spend three to five years to sprint to the first camp.

All the marketing voices of the manufacturers are surging up and trying to "break the circle", and the connection and cooperation between brother brands are becoming more and more important.

For example, ZTE, which pays special attention to consumer business opportunities in 5g period, listed the terminal business company as a first-class subsidiary in 2020, and completed the action of taking back most of Nubia's equity by the end of the year. Since then, ZTE's three major mobile phone brands have been unified under the control of the terminal company, and its release rhythm is also rapidly following up.

Lu Weibing, vice president of Xiaomi group, who has a high degree of attention on the social platform, will be active on the social platform every time after the new products are released by manufacturers of the same competitive track. He once publicly stated that the small goal of (Hongmi) K40 is: to be a 2021 flagship mobile phone weldman. Its main meaning includes: the door of welding quality and the door of cost performance.

Indeed, behind the frequent release of new machines, the price sensitive red line affects all consumers' money bags and expectations.

This year, oppo, which is trying to compete in the high-end market, and the newly released high-end flagship new product, find X3 series, has a lower price than the previous series. Industry insiders believe that, compared with the first generation of find, the product power is relatively insufficient, but the price of find X2 is relatively high, so the balance of the new generation is particularly important.

In an interview, Liu Bo, vice president of oppo and President of China, pointed out that "in terms of sales volume, find X3 will be the most popular generation of products in this series of history, that is, find X3 will surpass each generation (same series) products in the past."

For this reason, oppo has made comprehensive consideration in terms of design, performance and pricing. From the perspective of high-end product lines, oppo has also made targeted changes in channel strategy, marketing strategy and differentiated service strategy for high-end users. Its purpose is to make oppo the top 3 mobile phone market in the price range above $600, in addition to the other two overseas brands.

Brands that focus on Internet channels emphasize "performance". The new neo5 series released by iqoo points out that it is the first time for the industry to bring the independent display chip to the price range of 2500-3500 yuan, and the first time to bring the flagship unique 66W fast charging experience into the price range of 2000 yuan.

In summary, only in this busy March, whether it is the impact of high-end lines or internet groups, a large number of models are flocking to the market together, trying to wake up the consumer demands of different segments.

However, Wang Xi, manager of IDC's China research, told the 21st century economic reporter that at present, this may not be regarded as an aircraft sea strategy, but a deployment plan to advance the release rhythm of new aircraft.

"At present, the core problem is that there is a gap in market demand, leading to the release rhythm of many models ahead of time, which makes it look like the number of new machines may increase slightly throughout the year." He continued.

Wang Xi told reporters that IDC estimated that China's mobile phone market will grow by about 6% this year, with an overall volume of about 340 million to 350 million.

This means that this year can not be called the "big year" of the mobile phone industry, and "only last year's new crown pneumonia epidemic has deducted 1-2 months of mobile phone production demand. If there is no impact of the epidemic, we believe that the overall market will be stable last year and this year, and there will be no sustained rise. Therefore, we don't think that the release of more new phones means that this year is a big year for the mobile phone industry. " He pointed out.

Seize the window period

Although it seems that manufacturers are trying their best to be user-friendly in terms of pricing strategy and performance matching, this may not be reflected in the sales price performance of the whole industry.

Liu Yixuan pointed out to reporters of the 21st century economic report that the domestic flagship mobile phones did not significantly reduce the price, but high-end products were laid out between the flagship and the middle end, and the ladder of the product line was not obvious. Manufacturers are also promoting configuration leapfrogging, and high-end configuration will penetrate into the low-end, causing a certain price illusion. For example, high-end price comparison models such as Hongmi K series and realme GT equipped with snapdragon 888 are designed to let consumers experience high-end configuration with relatively low prices, which is different from the positioning of flagship machines such as find X.

"The price of end products is bound to be downward." She added that the rise in unit prices was driven by the increase in the proportion of high price segments. With the maturity of China's mobile phone market, major manufacturers are already in the layout and will continue to develop high-end strategy.

"From the average sales unit price data, we do not see a downward trend." Wang Xi also analyzed. On the contrary, from the point of view of the whole year 2020, the average sales unit price has increased by more than 10%. This is due to the insufficient supply of mainstream Pratt & Whitney models within the price range of 1500 yuan in most of that year, and its supply proportion is smaller than that in 2019, which is related to the price range of manufacturer's product supply.

Wang Xi believes that in this year, the average price of mobile phones will not increase by 10%, but the subsequent price trend will be determined by the price fluctuation of components and the proportion of 5g models. "At present, we judge that with the increase of 5g market share, the average price of 5g mobile phones will decline to some extent."

Cost is closely related to the price. In the context of core shortage and rising prices of industrial components this year, whether such products with cost performance ratio can meet the market demand will undoubtedly bring a key guiding significance to the final result of the window period of seizing the market share.

Recently, Feng Yufei, President of iqoo China, said, "behind the warehouse full of goods, it is the colleagues who are responsible for purchasing to negotiate and strive to pay with the supply chain partners day and night. Chip shortage is a dilemma for the whole industry. Our goal is to ensure the supply of neo5. Although the opponent speed request is not so high, but may still want to snatch. "

Lu Weibing even emphasized the specific amount. He pointed out, "for sale, we have prepared more than 300000 goods, which are all in stock! It is true that the supply of chips is very tight this year. Under such a tight situation, we still make the best price performance pricing instead of raising the price. Therefore, the demand may be several times of the stock quantity, resulting in a very short supply. Production is still speeding up, we will work hard! "

In this regard, Wang Xi pointed out to reporters that at present, the lack of core has not reached the level of "no rice pot" for terminal manufacturers. He further analyzed that, behind the core shortage, on the one hand, other terminals such as automobiles are seizing a certain capacity, but the more important aspect is that the terminal manufacturers, taking into account this year's market share window period and the hidden risk of overseas instability, will report relatively aggressive component procurement plans to the upstream, and may adopt procurement strategies higher than the previous inventory level.

"But we don't think it's enough for normal demand to be met. Of course, although the overall hardware is not very high gross profit performance, but temporarily do not think that the gross profit margin will be worse than in previous years. " He continued.

Liu Yixuan believes that the root cause of the current chip shortage is wafer capacity. "Out of stock is a whole line. Manufacturers can prioritize not chip models, but different regional markets and products. They will invest limited sources of goods into medium and high-end products and regional markets with higher priority."

She pointed out that the impact of the current shortage is that the current shortage just can't drive new growth, or can't even meet the normal supply. Compared with Huawei's problems, the final performance of the average price of domestic mobile phones is mainly affected by supply and demand, such as whether consumers are willing to upgrade mobile phones and whether manufacturers can meet the supply and other factors.

But relatively speaking, this will eventually mean that the competition between manufacturers on the purchasing side will be extremely fierce this year, which will also bring a test to the manufacturers' targeted platform research and development.

Wang Xi pointed out to reporters that in this context, manufacturers in the product development process, to a certain extent, will take into account the risk sharing situation, in the opening stage of the mobile phone design, they will prepare different schemes, and the final selection will be decided by the specific situation.

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