Where is the overtaking opportunity of Apple's market value exceeding 2 trillion domestic mobile phones?

2020-09-03 05:07:00 [Original by Zhongguancun Online] Author: Zhao Guoqing | Editor in charge: Zhou Bolin

As the number one brother in the technology circle, Apple has lived up to expectations, and its total market value finally surpassed Saudi Aramco and returned to the top in the world at the end of July. But all this is not over yet. In the following weeks, Apple's US stock continued to rise, and eventually broke the $2 trillion threshold, becoming the first listed company in the US stock market to break the $2 trillion threshold.

Where is the overtaking opportunity of Apple's market value exceeding 2 trillion domestic mobile phones? (Not issued)

Apple itself is a company that is good at creating miracles. After opening its history, it was founded in April 1976 and listed in December 1980. When Jobs died, Apple's market value was 300 billion dollars. In 2018, it broke the trillion mark. In less than two years, Apple created another miracle.

It can be said that in the past 40 years, Apple has gradually grown into the top enterprise in terms of company market value, revenue, profits, product line layout, market leadership and other aspects. Especially after the death of Steve Jobs, the outside world is generally not optimistic, and under the situation of one-sided "declamation", it has become more and more dynamic, and finally reached a new level one after another.

The author has no intention to reveal the reason why Apple has repeatedly created market value miracles, but the simple truth should be understood that the market is a big cake, which used to be eaten by everyone. Now it is different, not only to grab, but also to grab. Apple is a giant in front of us. Every time it is strong, domestic mobile phone The pressure of survival will also increase rapidly, and the growth space will be compress In this case, it is difficult to follow without falling behind, let alone surpass.

Is Apple worth learning?

Everyone's so-called learning is nothing more than learning from people who are better than themselves. iPhone How awesome is it? Wang Xing, the boss of Meituan, once said, "No matter what they say or not, people in the mobile phone industry know more about how strong Apple is than ordinary consumers.".

Although Wang Xing is not in the mobile phone circle, he will definitely not shoot at random based on his contacts and insights. There is no doubt that the iPhone has always been strong. This strength stems from both its unique position in the Jianghu and the tireless technological innovation of generations of iPhones.

Looking back at the amazing appearance of the early iPhone, although it is often regarded as an electronic vase of "what you want is nothing", it is still popular for the simple reason that it has changed the human-computer interaction mode and brought users into a new era of touch interaction, leading to the appearance of that seemingly arrogant but taken for granted advertising slogan: "Today Apple has reinvented the mobile phone".

Of course, some people think that the iPhone is a product of the times. It was there, but Apple found and improved it. The author disagrees with this. I think the iPhone is a revolutionary product. After all, its emergence has subverted the development of the mobile phone industry. Although it does not break away from the scope of smart phones and is also "standing on the shoulder of peers", only the iPhone has led the world and driven the development and change of the industry, which can be regarded as an industry revolution.

In the years that followed, users saw a more revolutionary iPhone OS system, which was never expected to be closed, but eventually gave birth to the reputation of good system ecology of iPhone. In short, iOS has a very strong control over the ecosystem, so strong that all apps need to be reviewed, verified, controlled and supervised by the system. There is no way to live with such behaviors as arbitrary charges, crazy background bootstrapping, privacy seeking, private solicitation of other apps, disorderly access to advertising, hot updates, etc. Compared with Android, I think users obviously prefer the former.

In addition, The iPhone has also formed a consistent ecological experience with other Apple devices. When users choose an Apple device, they don't need to spend too much time and cost to learn and research new hardware devices. Users who are accustomed to iPhone can easily accept the Mac, and files on iPhone can be easily AirDrop onto Mac. The global clipboard allows users to copy a sentence on iPhone, Paste directly into Mac. Under this ecosystem, a new order of collaborative work has been established. Once users get used to it, it is difficult to break away from it. User stickiness is far higher than that of Android.

At the same time, the iPhone A series chips are another place that is often talked about by Apple fans. Since the first release of the A4 processor on the iPhone 4, Apple has officially embarked on the path of developing its own chips. After that, the chip performance has soared, and A7 has opened the door for mobile phone processors to enter the 64 bit market. Who dares to say that this is not epoch-making?

Series A chips of all previous dynasties are scored (see Watermark for image source)

Since then, the A-series chips have made great progress and achieved the highest degree of self-development at A11. Among them, CPU, GPU, neural network engine, etc. are self-developed, and their performance is once again ahead of the peers. In the upcoming autumn press conference, A14 chip will also be released with the new machine. It is reported that this chip can increase 25% compared with the previous generation of single core, and its multi-core performance can increase 33%. This performance is really amazing.

As the saying goes, "Learning is not before or after, and those who have achieved it are teachers.". The iPhone has opened up an era, and at the same time, it has blazed a brilliant path. If this is not qualified to be learned and used for reference by peers, it would be absurd.

What can I learn from iPhone?

As the saying goes, knowing oneself and the enemy is invincible in every battle. The first step in defeating an opponent is to understand the opponent. Today, iPhone It is still a benchmark in the industry. Even if it is repeatedly "hanged", you have to admit that people still go their own way and look unattainable.

It can be seen that its brand effect is so powerful that no matter what the design is, people will pay for it. What's more, Apple's mobile phone has not fallen to the point of being insignificant. It still maintains absolute advantages in many aspects. This is Apple's confidence, and it is also a place where domestic mobile phones need to learn.

IPhone 11 lenses are arranged in equilateral triangles

To put these advantages to a specific level, Apple has no more than the real core technology, and the so-called core technology comes from hardware research and development Software Service, industrial design, product development capability and so on. Of course, this is not an encouragement to learn from Apple's model. After all, an enterprise has grown to such a scale, and there is a deeper logic behind it. It is not a simple "imitation" that can be perfectly copied.

What should we learn from Apple? In my opinion, there are only three points.

One is the positive output of product values; Many people complain that Apple is expensive, but people still pay for it every time they take out a new machine. The reason is not that the product is really good. It is a fact that Apple's profits are extremely high, but behind the high profits, it means that more investment will also be used for the next generation of products. Users will continue to buy if they like the upgrade of product experience. Under the virtuous circle, users will use better products. The enterprise has won profits and established brand value, and both sides will be beneficiaries.

Second, dare to create unknown consumer needs, but also pay attention to user experience. The mobile phone is not only used for making calls, it is a tool integrating social interaction, entertainment, work and life. But the great thing about the iPhone is that I have all these functions, but not just "yes". Sometimes it will be more advanced, even beyond users' cognition, and dare to create and ultimately serve users, rather than being enslaved by the current public demand. So Apple tends to pioneer, Create epoch-making works. The reason is that users' cognition is limited, but enterprises need forward-looking cognition to develop.

iPhone X Liu Haiping

Of course, any research and development of advanced functions is based on improving the user experience. If we blindly carry out some radical reforms, we may get half the result with twice the effort, or even lose more than the gain, which will eventually lead to the loss of users. The iPhone itself is a product that attaches great importance to experience. Therefore, although some technologies exceed user needs, users will often get a satisfactory experience after a period of time.

Third, continuous innovation! I don't think any industry will underestimate how important innovation is. Apple's innovation is reflected in "making things out of nothing", such as original color display, touch keys, Face ID, Siri voice, fingerprint recognition, 3D touch, etc., while many domestic manufacturers' so-called innovation is more conceptual innovation, and it is called innovation if you change your name or design your appearance.

Touch Home

In fact, this is not just a problem in the mobile phone industry. Judging from the development of modern science and technology, such as cars, trains, planes, refrigerators, washing machines, televisions, engines, the Internet, satellites, and so on, there are almost no Chinese people doing anything about all the inventions that are worthy of the name and change the world. The lack of innovation soil will also hamper the development of the domestic mobile phone industry.

Fortunately, over the years, the country has spared no effort to publicize the importance of enhancing independent innovation capability and attaching importance to independent intellectual property rights. Enterprises have also increased the proportion of scientific research investment, and innovation will continue to emerge in the future.

Are there any opportunities for domestic mobile phones to overtake on curves? Where?

Having said so many good things about Apple, it is estimated that many small partners will complain again: "Can't you see the progress of domestic mobile phones?", "The iPhone also has many shortcomings", "Kneeling for a long time"... In fact, the author does not deny that domestic mobile phones are getting better and better, and even there has been the possibility of breaking hands with the iPhone flagship. But objectively speaking, there is no perfect product, let alone the mobile phone, which is an electronic collection. The same is true of iPhone, which also has shortcomings. In particular, it should be noted that Apple's position as the industry leader has taken shape. Unless there is another revolutionary change in the nature of mobile phones, it will be difficult to repeat the drama of "Apple kills Nokia to the top".

There are almost no invincible enterprises in this world. The most benign development gene will become mottled with the development of time. Although it is not an objective law, it also reflects some facts. At present, any brand at the height of the sun will have the risk of being surpassed by other brands in the future. As for domestic mobile phone brands, in the golden period of mobile phone development in the first decade or even two decades, Apple has accumulated a lot of advantages and rapidly grown into a giant with a market value of more than 200 million dollars. If you want to surpass it, you can only do better than it.

Fortunately, Apple has its own disadvantages, and domestic mobile phones have developed more rapidly. While making up for the gap, it is also sparing no effort to play its own advantages. Once the brand value is consolidated, it will have the strength to compete with iPhone and Samsung on the global stage.

Huawei P40 Pro

It seems that there is still a big gap between domestic mobile phones and iPhones. Even if a single model has an outstanding user experience that is comparable to the iPhone, it is still difficult to form an overwhelming advantage. But you may have found out what was our mobile phone like a few years ago? How dare we say that we can surpass Apple? Now, we are full of momentum. At least, the flagship has the strength to challenge the iPhone flagship. This shows that domestic mobile phones are really better than iPhones in some places, and this is just the turning point of overtaking at corners.

For example, the super fast charging technology that has become more and more popular in recent years, when Apple came to the 18W, it found that even the taillights of its peers Look be missing. In 2019, OPPO released Reno Ace， As a mass production mobile phone with the highest fast charging power in the world at that time, a 4000mAh battery capacity model can be filled with 65W flash charge in about half an hour, which is surprisingly fast; This year, OPPO 65W flash charging has been further released, and some midrange models have also been equipped with this level of flash charging.

In addition to OPPO, Huawei, Xiaomi, Vivo and other domestic mobile phone manufacturers have not been idle, and have also released a number of 40W and above models, which will become even more scary in the second half of the year. Xiaomi iQOO 120W super fast charging mobile phones have also been released in succession, and even OPPO models equipped with 125W flash charging scheme are in the process of being brewed, which can fill a mobile phone in ten minutes. In contrast, only 18W wired fast charging iPhone is supported at most, and the charging experience will be greatly reduced. Of course, if someone has to say that Apple does not do faster charging with higher wattage for safety, rather than lack of technology, then I can only "hehe".

In addition, off screen fingerprint technology is also one of the contributions of domestic mobile phones to promote industry reform. When it comes to fingerprint recognition, it was driven by the iPhone. When it came to iPhone X, it also changed from solid fingerprints to 3D structured light, which was once thought to represent the new direction of mobile phone fingerprint unlocking in the future. But soon, this trend was replaced by the offline fingerprint technology of domestic mobile phones, especially Vivo, which has successively developed and developed several generations of fingerprint unlocking schemes, which has played a key role in promoting the development of offline fingerprint technology. Now even an ordinary 1000 yuan mobile phone has the fastest online fingerprint unlocking scheme.

Next is 5G communication technology, which does not need to be described too much. In fact, we all know that this is the year of popularity of 5G mobile phones. From Huawei, OV, Xiaomi, ZTE, Lenovo and other domestic mobile phone manufacturers to Samsung, Google and other major foreign manufacturers, there are 5G models, but one Apple is missing. Compared with Apple's "no tight, no slow" pace, major domestic manufacturers attach far more importance to 5G than others. Huawei and ZTE have taken 5G as their core development strategy. Not only have they achieved remarkable results, the number of 5G patents has taken the lead in the world, but also they have built a set of products and technical advantages in network terminals, industrial applications and other aspects, thus accelerating the commercial popularization of 5G.

In addition, it was mentioned earlier that Apple's system has a strong closeness, which has a lot of advantages, but also many disadvantages. For example, it will sacrifice some convenient functions that are very common on Android phones, such as what kind of game space, dual application, NFC analog access card, etc. In addition, Apple mobile phones still have no infrared remote control function, but the infrared function on Android mobile phones is very useful, which can be used to control infrared hardware devices such as TV and air conditioner.

Conclusion:

Apple has a market value of more than 2 trillion yuan, and has become a giant in front of all domestic mobile phones. However, practical experience tells us that no matter how strong an opponent is, it is also possible to defeat it, which depends on historical opportunities, but also on its own strength. Obviously, the rapid development and popularization of 5G is a golden opportunity, and the continuously improved product quality of domestic mobile phones is also increasing the competitive advantage.

Finally, the definition of "overtaking" is very broad. The author believes that it is difficult to convince people simply in terms of market value, sales volume and shipment volume. However, when it comes to "technical overtaking", it is too broad and general. The real transcendence should be the complete victory of brand value. Users should buy domestic computers at the same or even higher price but feel justified, Or when you use an Apple phone, you will be told that "this Apple sells 6K, and the domestic machine only sells 8K", which will really achieve overtaking.