Rebirth 08: Rise from copycat phones

Chapter 133 Xu Shenxue is going to use black technology

It's not just the chip manufacturing field that takes time; many other fields also take time.

The most core components of a mobile phone, or other smart terminal devices, are various chips, memory RAM, flash ROM, screen, and battery.

Xu Shenxue plans to develop chips on his own... He has no choice but to do it himself, because there are no corresponding manufacturers in China to support him...

It’s similar with memory and flash memory, we have to develop these things ourselves... Zhiyun Semiconductor has already started research and development of storage projects.

Memory is actually a major branch of the semiconductor industry. Like chips, it needs to be produced by chip foundries because it is essentially still a very large-scale integrated circuit.

The current DDR2 memory, the DDR2 memory developed by Samsung Electronics has adopted the -nanometer process, while some other slightly inferior ones use the -nanometer, -nanometer, and -nanometer processes.

As for screens and batteries, a supportive and cooperative approach was adopted.

For example, in the field of screens... Zhiyun Technology is already in contact with several domestic screen companies that are relatively well-performing in the industry, using Weiku Electronics' low-end mobile phone business and some of Zhiyun Technology's non-mobile terminal low-end display businesses to support the company's technological research and development.

The main reason is that domestic manufacturers are doing well in the screen aspect. The previous fierce competition among a large number of domestic mobile phone manufacturers has promoted the rapid development of the panel industry and laid a relatively good foundation. Although the current screen technology is still some distance away from the international first-class level, it is no longer a problem to use it as a screen for mid- and low-end mobile phones.

Therefore, Xu Shenxue did not have the idea of ​​doing it alone. Instead, he focused on partial strategic investment and order support, striving to break through the technology as soon as possible and produce high-end products for use in Zhiyun Technology's flagship phones.

There are also domestic manufacturers in the battery field, and their development is also quite good. For example, BYD and Desay. Both of them are currently battery suppliers for Zhiyun Technology and Weiku Electronics. Their overall technical level is still very good.

The research and development and production of some other non-critical spare parts are basically based on strategic investment and order support.

Basically, for things that domestic companies can do, Xu Shenxue generally prefers strategic investment and order support.

Xu Shenxue would only try to do it himself if domestic companies couldn't do it.

Of course, while working on the basic industrial chain layout and underlying technology research and development, Xu Shenxue did not forget to develop some of the black technologies that he had previously promoted to investors.

All the boasting has been made, no matter whether it can be accomplished in the end, it has to be done!
On February 1st, Zhiyun Technology officially established a subsidiary to research ridiculous brain control technology... trying to allow the human body and computer to exchange information through brain waves... Its ultimate goal is to create a helmet-like brain wave signal communication device, well, that is, the so-called virtual helmet often mentioned in science fiction novels!
Then he set up a virtual reality company and prepared to develop VR equipment, and then matched it with a universal joint. The core goal was not only to make a glasses demonstrator, but actually to develop a simulation device that can make people feel immersive in vision and movement!
An Intelligent Research Institute was also set up within the company to specialize in the research of artificial intelligence. The first task Xu Shenxue gave was to develop an intelligent voice assistant.

Finally, Xu Shenxue also made a strategic investment in a local aircraft company in Shenzhen called Xiaojiang. This company had not been well-known before and was mainly engaged in helicopter flight control. It had no products and no revenue... At first, no one knew why Xu Shenxue asked someone to make a strategic investment in this unknown and small startup company.

It was not until Xu Shenxue asked the company to abandon the unreliable helicopter flight control and instead develop a multi-rotor flight control system... some people within the company, especially the investors, reacted.

Xu Shenxue is finally going to start working on black technology: flying cars.

According to what Xu Shenxue boasted before... In addition to some mysterious AI and other things, the carrier of this flying car is a multi-rotor aircraft equipped with countless sensors.

And now Xu Shenxue has started working on this multi-rotor aircraft!
For a flying car, you have to make it fly first!

And this is a small drone, which involves unmanned autonomous flight technology. If this is done, and then simply enlarged later, it will be a multi-rotor flying car...

Give it an on-board AI, and deploy countless sensors and communication equipment on the ground and in low orbit, and you have an unmanned intelligent flying car.

Then, if you equip it with an urban traffic management AI based on a supercomputer, then the smart city traffic system will be a natural thing!

Don't blame them for having big imaginations. It was really because Xu Shenxue boasted too much at the beginning, and then seemed to have provided a practical and feasible path to success, which made them unable to help but fantasize!
Especially the scene after the fantasy succeeds...

That’s exactly the future world depicted in science fiction novels...and how much would the company that supports this future world be worth?

Even though they are extremely greedy, they dare not even think about it!

----

After entering the market ten years ago, Zhiyun Technology entered into various R&D and purchasing modes, investing huge amounts of money.

What supports Zhiyun Technology to invest so much money, in addition to more than 10 billion US dollars from strategic investments, is also because Zhiyun Technology is really making a fortune now.

It is early February, the Spring Festival is approaching.

Ji Chenghe, with a beaming face, found Xu Shenxue with the report and reported to Xu Shenxue the sales of Zhiyun mobile phones over the past period of time.

"Boss Xu, the situation has been very good in the past three months!"

"As of January 31, we have successfully entered the markets of 83 countries or regions. In addition to the domestic market, we have established cooperative relationships with more than 100 global operator exhibitions and more than 300 first-tier channel dealers in various overseas regions. In a real sense, our sales channels have been laid out in almost all major countries in the world!"

"We have already established a preliminary sales system even in Africa!" "Relying on local and overseas markets, our S9 and C1/C2 phones are sold all over the world!"

"For S9, we sold a total of million units in November and million units in December. In January, we observed that the potential accumulated in the early stage of the market had been greatly consumed, so we decisively carried out a small-scale price reduction promotion in some regions to maintain the sales volume at the scale of million units... Of course, we estimate that after this month, the sales volume may begin to decline slowly!"

"Since the S9 was launched, we have sold more than eight million units and our revenue has exceeded billion."

"The sales of the mid-to-high-end C series are even higher. The C2 series of mobile phones are our main shipments, with an average monthly sales of 2 million units. However, the C1 Pro model did not achieve the expected sales. The sales share is very small, only 1%, which is far lower than the sales of C Pro in the C era, which accounted for % of sales."

"The poor sales of C2 Pro are mainly due to the impact of our S9 mobile phone and the impact of Apple 3GS and 3G."

“Not only is the sales ratio of the Pro version lower, the sales of the 16GB version are also slightly lower!”

"Therefore, the main shipment of the C2 series is the C2 8GB version, accounting for % of the sales!"

“This also lowered our average selling price of the C2 series.”

"As for the C1 series, the shipment volume is still maintained at a certain level, but it has been declining for several months. In January, the shipment volume was only one million units, and most of them were sold to emerging markets in overseas regions. The main sales model is also the 8GB version, which accounts for more than % of the sales volume."

"The market is still somewhat fragmented now, especially after our S9 and Apple's 3GS were launched, the smartphone market is quite special and there is no obvious pyramid structure."

"On the one hand, the high-end market of over 4,000 yuan is very hot, with very high sales. On the other hand, the mid-range market between 2,000 and 3,000 yuan is quite hot, while the market between 3,000 and 4,000 yuan is somewhat blank!"

"It feels a bit like we're neither high nor low. The rich usually just buy our S9 or Apple phones, while the less well-off usually buy mid-range phones that cost more than yuan."

"The market for phones priced at over 1,000 yuan is also quite hot, but because the performance of low-end smartphones at this price is relatively average and the quality and workmanship are slightly worse, the market acceptance is not as high as expected!"

"The entire smartphone market is very strange. High-end phones that cost more than 4,000 yuan are the most expensive and should account for the smallest share of sales. However, their total sales are actually not much less than those of mid-range and even low-end phones. The entire market presents a trapezoidal structure... rather than the pyramid structure that is common sense."

Xu Shenxue didn't find this strange: "That's because you didn't count feature phones. If you count feature phones, you'll find that the mobile phone market is still a very typical pyramid structure. Low-end phones still account for the largest sales, followed by mid-range phones, and high-end phones are only a minority!"

"In the field of smartphones, the current hardware is still not very good. The performance of low-end smartphones is too poor, and consumers have a bad experience, which in turn affects sales. It is normal."

“Besides, the smartphone industry is different from ordinary industries!”

Smartphones are different from regular consumer goods. If you say they are cheap, they are not that cheap. But if you say they are expensive, even high-end phones can be afforded by ordinary people if they grit their teeth.

This also leads to the fact that in the smartphone industry, the sales volume of so-called high-end mobile phones is actually not low... On the contrary, the sales volume of high-end mobile phones is quite high.

Whether it is the Fruit 3GS or Zhiyun's S9, their sales can beat a lot of so-called mid- and low-end mobile phones.

Currently, the only mobile phone that can surpass these two in terms of single-unit sales is Zhiyun C2... Even the low- and mid-end mobile phones from Weiku Electronics cannot sell more than these two high-end models in terms of single-unit sales!
For example, the monthly sales of Bluemi 1 were only 9 to units, which is only half of the sales of S.

Its twin brother, the Vico K60, has more sales, but only million units.

Why are high-end phones from Apple and Zhiyun so popular?

On the one hand, in major markets for high-end smartphones such as Europe, the United States, and Japan, local people have relatively high incomes, and so-called high-end phones are not expensive for them.

On the other hand, in some emerging markets, because the base is large enough, although the proportion of rich people is small, the total amount is still large. When these people buy smartphones, they will only buy high-end phones and will not consider low-end phones worth a few thousand yuan.

Then it is also related to the mentality of most ordinary consumers:
I can’t afford a house worth hundreds of thousands or millions, nor can I afford a car worth hundreds of thousands.

Can’t I afford a mobile phone that costs four or five thousand yuan?

It’s impossible!
To some extent, smartphones are the most equitable consumer product...

No matter how rich a person is, he can only use an S9 or an Apple 3GS... At most, he can have it gold-plated by himself, but the chip inside will never be replaced for you.

Ordinary people can also buy a Fruit 3GS or Zhiyun S9 if they grit their teeth!

The rich and the poor use the same stuff!
There are very few industrial consumer products that can embody fairness like smartphones and erase the differences between people caused by wealth!
So… that’s why high-end smartphone sales are so high!
Of course, even if this is the case, it is impossible for the sales volume of high-end phones to occupy the majority of the entire mobile phone market... After all, the poor still occupy the vast majority!

But, poor people these days can’t even afford a low-end or mid-range smartphone that costs at least 1,400 or 1,500 yuan, or even better, 2,000 yuan…they buy feature phones that cost less than 1,000 yuan!

When the price of low-end smartphones drops further and reaches around 1,000 yuan, people will let the world see the power of the poor!

(End of this chapter)