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Chapter 588 0576 [The Explosive HarmonyOS New Phone Launch Event]

The HarmonyOS phone (North American special edition) was launched a few days before the release of the Apple 5S.

The contract is priced at $99.

This price point places it in the mid-range segment of the US mobile phone market.

The upcoming Apple 5S will be available for only $199 with a carrier contract.

Coolpad went the furthest, launching a $49 contract phone in North America.

The app ecosystem on this North American-exclusive version of the HarmonyOS phone is rather poor.

It can install Twitter and Facebook, and has all the basic functions, but future version updates will definitely lag behind. The only solution is to follow Microsoft's approach and create third-party clients to compensate.

At this time, some third-party clients even offered a better user experience than the official Twitter client. Examples include Mehdoh and Gleek.

But no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't reach an agreement with YouTube and Instagram.

Not to mention phones running HarmonyOS, even for phones running Microsoft OS, YouTube and Instagram have yet to release dedicated versions.

The same goes for Google's suite of services; they only serve Android phones, and last year they kicked out Apple's operating system altogether.

Throughout 2013, Microsoft's operating system held a 4% market share in the North American smartphone market, while BlackBerry's held a 1.9% market share. Adding "others," approximately 6.5% of newly sold smartphones were unable to use YouTube, Instagram, and the Google suite.

These types of phones can also be sold, as long as the operators offer enough discounts, they are willing to help sell contract phones.

The HarmonyOS North American special edition phone followed the path of Microsoft and BlackBerry—which, as it turns out, will be a dead end.

Chen Guiliang is here to test the waters.

The real show is happening in the country.

……

9 month 5 day.

Five days before the release of the Apple 5S, Chen Guiliang held a press conference to launch the new HarmonyOS device.

We have to act fast, as some features need to be the first in the world; if we're later than the Apple 5S, we'll be the second in the world.

The situation in China's Chinese smartphone market has become even more chaotic this year.

No brand has a market share exceeding 15%!

For example, Samsung and HarmonyOS have seen their sales volume increase, but their market share has continued to decline.

This is because the market size has exploded this year; smartphone sales in the first half of the year alone have already surpassed the total sales for the entire previous year. Many domestic brands are going all out, using low-price strategies to increase sales volume and capture market share.

The top ten brands in sales in the first half of the year were: Samsung, HarmonyOS, Lenovo, Coolpad, Huawei, ZTE, Apple, VIVO, OPPO, and Meizu.

HarmonyOS has launched three budget phones and two mid-range phones, and with the sales of other models, its market share has finally returned to second place.

HTC, Gionee, and Tianyu have all fallen out of the top ten.

Although Xiaomi phones are very well-known, they have too few models and insufficient supply, so they can barely rank in the top fifteen.

The launch event for the new HarmonyOS phone was held at the Water Cube, and nearly 5000 people attended!
Eight hundred people, mostly HarmonyOS fans, attended the event. Most of them were lucky enough to be randomly selected after registering themselves. There were also some celebrities from the HarmonyOS community who were invited by the official HarmonyOS team to participate.

These mobile phone brand fans are all die-hard fans of Chen Guiliang.

Jiang Yichuan is a typical example; he first became a fan of Chen Guiliang, and then a fan of HarmonyOS mobile phones.

He bought a HarmonyOS A1 phone during his freshman year of college, and then upgraded to the TianShu, TianShu Pro, and YaoGuang models. He has plenty of money and only buys flagship HarmonyOS phones.

His family was a relocated household, the kind that was relocated from an urban village.

They lost several houses and cash, but still make a good living from rent every month. However, neither of their parents can stay idle; their father works as a security guard, and their mother works as a cleaner.

He gave all the old phones to his parents.

What about Apple and Samsung? Do they have anything as amazing as Chen Laozu's HarmonyOS?
The large screen lit up, displaying the exclusive boot screen of the HarmonyOS Seven Stars series launched last year, with Chen Guiliang standing empty-handed as he slowly rose from "underground".

"Ancestor Chen! Ancestor Chen!"

Jiang Yichuan immediately started shouting wildly, and his fans in the area also started shouting.

The other guests and audience members were surprised by them and turned to look, wondering what kind of people these fans were.

Of course, they were all young people, with the oldest not exceeding 35 years old.

"Buzz buzz~~~"

A drone appeared from the opposite side of the stage, flew over the heads of thousands of audience members, and landed in front of Chen Guiliang.

"It's a DJI drone!"

Jiang Yichuan immediately shouted.

He didn't know this thing existed before. He only learned about this novel high-tech product after seeing Chen Guiliang's video a few days ago.

Chen Guiliang took his phone off the drone and pressed his thumb under the screen in front of everyone. The camera then transmitted the fingerprint unlocking screen to the big screen in real time.

Chen Guiliang held up his phone and smiled, "Hello everyone. This is the world's first phone to seamlessly integrate a capacitive fingerprint sensor onto sapphire glass."

The second one will appear soon: the Apple 5S.

However, some of the first batch of Apple 5S products will have various problems.

For example, when the battery is between 20% and 30%, the phone may unexpectedly shut down or drain rapidly. Some phones may also occasionally experience blue screens or screen flickering. Additionally, the Home button may have an abnormal feel; some are too soft, others too hard…

The above are hardware defects, caused by problems in the procurement of batteries and screens.

The iPhone 5S also has software issues. The iOS 7 code was heavily rewritten, causing apps to crash frequently, the system to occasionally freeze or restart, and the signal connection to be extremely unstable... It will take several months to fix these bugs.

Meanwhile, at the launch event for the new HarmonyOS device...

Even Luo Yonghao (the founder of Smartisan) has joined the fray this year; he registered the Smartisan phone brand two years ago. He's simultaneously developing the ROM to communicate with fans and continuing to raise venture capital to bolster his funding.

Unlike in another timeline, Luo Yonghao didn't create an Android ROM; instead, he chose to create HarmonyOS. This is because HarmonyOS has the best app ecosystem in China, and the HarmonyOS community sees all sorts of strange and wonderful applications emerge every day.

“Damn, fingerprint unlocking,” Luo Taijun asked Lei Jun beside him, “Is this thing technologically advanced?” Lei Jun shook his head: “I don’t know. It should be very technologically advanced, otherwise other brands would have made it long ago.”

Luo Taijun said, "Awesome!"

Chen Guiliang continued, "Fingerprint unlocking technology has existed for a long time, but integrating it into capacitive screens and sapphire glass presents many technical challenges. HarmonyOS, in collaboration with the microelectronics and materials science departments of Tsinghua and Peking Universities, has finally succeeded after more than two years!"

Chen Guiliang bowed deeply: "Here, I would like to pay tribute to all the R&D personnel who participated in this project."

On the large screen, two rows of photos of R&D personnel appeared, along with a long list of project participants.

"Clap clap clap!"

A round of enthusiastic applause erupted from the audience.

Chen Guiliang smiled and said, "Companies that have joined the Harmony Foundation (Hongmeng Foundation) can apply to use this patent for a fee, so that your phones can also have fingerprint unlocking functionality. As for companies that are not affiliated with this foundation, well... we can talk about that later."

"Clap clap clap!"

The applause rang out again, but this time it was the representatives of the HarmonyOS camp applauding.

Although Apple has developed this technology, it will not share it, even if you pay patent fees.

Other mobile phone manufacturers would need at least two years to develop similar features!
Chen Guiliang had wanted to develop fingerprint unlocking technology for a long time and invested heavily in research and development for two and a half years.

"Old Ancestor Chen is truly awesome, and Hongmeng is awesome too!" Jiang Yichuan exclaimed excitedly.

The person sitting next to him was also a die-hard fan of Chen Guiliang. Although they didn't know each other, they became friends after chatting for a few minutes: "I heard that when HarmonyOS was at its most aggressive, its R&D expenses accounted for 18% of its revenue. It was because it didn't have enough cash that it went public."

Jiang Yichuan said, "What is most admirable about Chen Laozu is his willingness to share. Various open source projects can benefit many people."

The fan next to him couldn't help but shout, "HarmonyOS is awesome!"

"HarmonyOS is awesome!"

Other fans joined in the chanting, and various shouts rose and fell.

It really looked like a fan meeting.

Chen Guiliang began to express his feelings: "A few days ago, I went back to my high school to attend the 110th anniversary celebration of my alma mater. This trip made me very emotional, and I kept recalling the bits and pieces of my entrepreneurial journey. Sometimes I wonder, what is the purpose of life?"

“It’s been eight years since I got the business licenses for ByteDance and Youke. Back then, I was full of vigor and thought the world was at my feet…”

On the big screen, photos of Chen Guiliang's entrepreneurial ventures and group photos of the founding teams of his various companies began to play.

Next, Chen Guiliang elaborated on his corporate philosophy.

It seems we've gone off-topic.

But the audience listened very attentively.

The richest man in China, even his farts smell good, let alone Chen Guiliang, who is genuinely sharing his insights from his journey.

Finally, Chen Guiliang held up a small transparent box: "Last year, HarmonyOS launched the power management chip 'Xirang'. What I'm holding now is HarmonyOS's self-developed motion coprocessing chip 'Diting'. It can sense weak signals from sensors such as gyroscopes and accelerometers..."

99% of the audience was completely bewildered.

What is this?

I've never even heard of it!
Chen Guiliang said, "First, it saves power. In sleep mode, all sensors are turned off, and it only wakes up when a signal exceeds a threshold. Second..."

Chen Guiliang started operating the phone, and a live feed appeared on the large screen.

He opened an app called Health, which contained only a few simple items.

A staff member came over, and Chen Guiliang handed him his phone. The staff member then took the phone and started running.

Chen Guiliang said, "It can record the user's daily steps, walking and running distance, climbing height... It can also recognize the user's status, such as driving status, and suggest that the user turn off certain unnecessary functions to save power..."

Chen Guiliang suddenly raised his voice: "I'm announcing here that a new startup project is coming. Those interested can develop all sorts of third-party applications based on the 'Listen' chip's capabilities. For example, fitness apps, sleep monitoring apps, and other health-related apps..."

A section of the audience erupted in cheers.

Those were all entrepreneurs who were fortunate enough to be invited, and some of them hadn't even graduated from university.

The representatives from other companies had mixed expressions. They had never even considered what Chen Guiliang had brought out today, and even if they had, they would never have invested money in its development.

Are you Doraemon? You keep taking things out of your pocket.

How can everyone catch up with HarmonyOS?
In fact, Chen Guiliang had his R&D team working on both fingerprint unlocking and motion chips for a while now. But R&D takes time!

Reporters at the scene were taking photos like crazy; they always have a lot to write about whenever they attend a HarmonyOS new phone launch event.

Fans at the event went on a frenzy posting on the HarmonyOS community, providing real-time updates on the launch event.

They don't need to introduce us.

Chen Guiliang's live streaming platform is broadcasting the entire press conference live, and the chat is already flooded with comments.

"Old Ancestor Chen has gone mad, unleashing one powerful move after another."

"HarmonyOS phones are the best in the world. Who agrees? Who disagrees?"

"Where are the Apple fans? Come out and take your beating!"

"Old Master Chen is indeed Iron Man, he's all about high technology."

"Honey, I love you! I'm your biggest fan!"

"Son, I love you, I'm your mommy fan!"

"Don't you dare steal my husband."

"He's so damn handsome, even I, a guy, can't help but think about him..."