Tencent Technology reported on May 21
Former New Oriental English teacher, today Hammer Technology founder Luo Yonghao was still eloquent on the stage last night's launch, and the last hammer ROM release is different, this time he finally came up with the first hammer smart phone Smartisan T1, and Venture 2 Numerous times during the years of panic four, the price of 3,000 yuan also make this phone continues to be a "talkative" product.
Luo Yonghao clever rhetoric provoked the enthusiasm of the fans at the scene, but the conference site features demo session out of control for the first time people feel Lao Luo far more than their own show care about this product.
Unfortunately, analysts are not optimistic about the timing and price of this product to market, in their eyes, this market is not the best time to release new products.
According to GfK China, retail sales of smartphones in China's handset market are expected to grow 21% YoY in 2014, up from 83% in 2013, and the growth potential has drastically reduced. Wu Xiaofeng, China market strategist at GfK, said that means the window of opportunity in China's mobile phone market is getting smaller and smaller.
Other voices are more radical that the price of 3,000 yuan market is not the best choice. Yan Zhanmeng, senior analyst at IDC, said that unless there is near perfect product and strong marketing branding, or domestic brands to do 3000 price segment almost impossible to succeed. Wang Yang, director of China Research at IHS iSuppli, predicts that the smartphone market share of more than 3,000 yuan will fall to 8% in 2014.
Analysts may not always be accurate, but T1 was officially shipped in July from the second half of Apple's new iPhone is too close, but also the top flagship of the domestic mainstream mobile phone manufacturers have competition, which any mobile phone startups to That is a fierce fight, but at this conference, Luo Yonghao also did not make any statement on how the market competition, only all the focus is on the product itself.
Only rely on the enthusiasm and focus of fans, you can survive in the dangerous mobile phone industry? This is a huge test that Luo Yonghao will face.
Hammer technology in the past year
ROM released in March last year, Luo Yonghao and hammer technology done? At the press conference, Luo Yonghao tells the story of hammer technology during this period of experience.
Unlike last year's team of just seven people, the number of engineers this year has risen to about 200. Luo Yonghao focused on the technology from Motorola, Chen, who served as CTO Hammer Technology. As one of the three major technical directors in the golden age of Motorola, Qian Chen and Zhou Guangping, the current vice president of the millet, came together.
In order to solve the imaging technology problem, Luo Yonghao dug up a senior editor from a digital imaging magazine. After conducting preliminary research on the market, Luo Yonghao personally flew to Japan twice in succession to meet with the chief engineer of Fujitsu Fiftieth Landscaping and introduced the latter's Technical solutions.
In terms of sound quality, Luo Yonghao adopted the same strategy, in addition to inviting Motorola senior electronics and acoustic engineers responsible for the objective tuning, but also invited the musician Zuo Xiaosu curse and Zhang Yadong conducted a subjective tuning. Luo Yonghao said only through the Texas Instruments chip to achieve and Vivo Hi-Fi phone almost identical frequency response curve.
In addition, Luo Yonghao flew to San Francisco invited the United States ammunition design company founder Robert Brunner involved in improving the Smartisan T1 overall industrial design. He said the cooperation between the two sides will continue to the next generation of products. In order to reach a deal, Rowenhoop even found a publishing house, recommending a second edition of Robert Brunner's book.
Of course, Hammer Technology also balances hardware configurations based on user surveys and market conditions, and continuously improves Smartisan OS (Hammer ROM) with user feedback.
As for branding, Luo Yonghao is heavily bought t.tt domain name. Its owner Showfom (net name) did not disclose the amount of the transaction, but described it as "old Luo is not bad money." He bought the domain name in April 2012 the price is 3 years 3,000 US dollars (about 18,600 yuan or so), and Hammer technology negotiations continued until early May this year, the last transaction price is far from the first offer 10 Million yuan.
It is reported that "tt domain name" is Trinidad and Tobago's country domain name, belonging to the national domain name. Hammer Technology also acquired the main domain name smartisan.com and other protected domain names.
Hammer cell phone can go far?
However, as Luo Yonghao grind on the occasion, the outside world does not seem optimistic about Luo Yonghao's grand blueprint, even after the conference ended, this voice has already begun to spread in the fans, aside emotional factors, the hammer cell phone There are still many problems to be faced.
First, innovation does not have to rely on a hammer cellphone. With the continuous popularization of the Android system, the handset manufacturers greatly improve the control ability of the upstream components and the increasingly homogenized smart phone products. In the market opportunities narrowed, the technology evolution has not changed qualitatively, the new entrants manufacturers if you can not achieve a revolutionary user experience, then you need to integrate hardware and software to try.
However, in Luo Yonghao's presentation, except for one-handed operation and quick snatching, most of them did not think in terms of hardware and software because once a user swipes other Android mobile phones into a hammer ROM, they can use the existing mobile phones to do the same Experience the operation, coupled with the micro-innovation based on Android is too easy to imitate, Hammer UI on Hammer cell phone sales gain is not large.
Second, product listing missed the best time. Unlike previous generations of Internet handsets, which were not the main features of the price / performance ratio, Luo Yonghao did not emphasize this concept but instead used a series of "most" attributive terms to describe its products. However, analysts do not agree with this view, especially in the product shipped in July does not support 4G, and even 3G only supports China Unicom.
Yan Zhanmeng said that this year is the 4G mobile phone in China for four years. Hammer cell phones are not enough to attract consumers from the network technology. Internet speculation from time nodes can not gather too much popularity. From a company background, talent and technical strength are far behind .
Thirdly, the selling price will restrict the conversion rate of fans and further affect the market. At present, the mobile phone manufacturers in China mostly introduce their flagship models, which are priced at more than 3,000 yuan. They are mainly characterized by differentiated features such as business, video or fast charging. But its market share is not high, because the market has been dominated by international brands, especially Apple and Samsung.
Hammer cell phone price of 3,000 yuan so that the outside world did not see it clearly positioned. Wang Yang believes that the main reason is that such a price will make the hammer technology from OPPO and vivo flagship from the pressure on the next will be Xiaomi and Huawei glory competition. In fact, the latter two new product prices are less than 2,000 yuan, and performance and hammer cell phone T1 are not much different.
Not only that, but fan conversion costs have also risen. Xu Hao, an analyst at Analysys International, said that Internet thinking has become widely known and numerous terminal manufacturers are also gradually cultivating their own fan groups. Hammer cell phones want to expand their fan base in this piece of mobile phone Red Sea will require a high fan conversion costs, both money and time will be a large-scale investment.
Obviously, this is a huge test.