After Xiaomi, Huawei, apple and other mobile phone enterprises successively entered the auto circle, Geely, Weilai and other auto enterprises came to a wave of reverse operation and began to cross into the mobile circle.
On March 31, in a video interview, Li Bin, chairman of Weilai, responded to the previously rumored cross-border manufacturing of mobile phones by Weilai. “The starting point for us to consider making mobile phones is very simple. We want to give Weilai car owners a mobile phone with the best car machine interconnection experience, rather than thinking from the perspective of commercial success.” Li Bin said that Weilai looks at the mobile phone from the perspective of the car, not from the perspective of the mobile phone.
On April 2, the relevant person in charge of Weilai said in an interview with the reporter of daily economic news: “at present, the company is still in the very early stage of Market Research on making mobile phones. It is deeply thinking about the value of Weilai’s own mobile phones to users. It will explore more from the perspective of user experience.”
It is understood that the reason why Weilai wants to make mobile phones is at the request of its users. “Some users asked whether Weilai could build a mobile phone better connected with Weilai’s car. At present, while learning about the mobile phone industry, we are also thinking about what a mobile phone means to users’ interests and experience?” Li Bin said.
Weilai makes mobile phones to defend against apple
In February this year, Weilai was exposed to the news that it began to make cross-border mobile phones. It is reported that more mobile phone operators have been recruited in this business department. However, the news has not received a positive response from Weilai.
Recently, the WeChat official account of the “electric planet News” released a set of chat records of Li Bin in the core user group of Wei Lai. Li Bin said: “the mobile phone is now the most important device for Weilai users to connect to the car. Not making a mobile phone is equivalent to that the key at home is not in their own hands. Taking Weilai users as an example, more than 50% use Apple mobile phones, but apple is very closed to the automotive industry and has not opened the interface so far, which makes Weilai very passive.”
“Think about 2025, when the apple car comes out, 60% or more of our users use Apple phones, and we have no defense at all. We don’t make some preparations today, so it’s hard to do it then.” Li Bin said that Wei Lai is very clear that it is relatively simple to make a mobile phone, but it is very challenging to make a good mobile phone.
In this regard, Zhao Ming, CEO of glory, once said that the mobile phone is a system engineering with no less complexity than the car, and the number of people of glory R & D system may be more than that of most new forces of car building.
mobile phone industry and automobile industry are accelerating the integration
In fact, Weilai is not the first car company to announce that it wants to make cross-border mobile phones. As early as six months ago, Li Shufu, chairman of Geely Automobile, announced to enter the mobile phone industry and set up a mobile phone company – Hubei Xingji times Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Xingji times).
Li Shufu’s mobile phone business positioning is high-end smart phones. “Mobile phone is a fast iterative portable mobile terminal and an application carrier for electronic product market verification and software innovation. It can not only enable users to share innovative achievements as soon as possible, but also transfer some safe and reliable achievements to automobile applications, so as to realize the close interaction between vehicle and mobile phone software technology.” Li Shufu said that in the future, it has become a general trend to build a cross-border user ecological chain and build an enterprise moat according to law. Mobile phones can link the Internet of vehicles and satellite Internet to create rich consumption scenes and strengthen the ecosystem.
In addition to Geely, at the beginning of this year, Tesla CEO musk was announced that he would open up the mobile phone business and enter the mobile phone market. The first mobile phone was Tesla Model π. However, the news has not been officially confirmed by Tesla.
Xu Haidong, deputy chief engineer of China Automobile Industry Association, believes that the cross-border manufacturing of mobile phones by automobile enterprises is based on practical considerations. With the help of mobile phones, it can not only improve the interactive experience of people and vehicles, but also promote the transformation of car enterprises to digital.
TCL founder Li Dongsheng believes that the entry of Geely, Weilai and other car companies into the mobile phone industry is due to the development and competition of the industry. Mobile communication terminals are becoming the basis of smart Internet applications, including smart cars, so it is natural for car companies to seek new opportunities in the mobile phone industry in the process of intelligent development.
In fact, the first car company to extend its business to the mobile phone industry is Byd Company Limited(002594) . According to public information, in 2003, Byd Company Limited(002594) began to enter the mobile phone OEM business. Up to now, mobile phone related business has become one of the three core businesses of Byd Company Limited(002594) company.
Byd Company Limited(002594) released the annual performance report of 2021, which shows that the revenue of the company’s mobile phone parts, assembly and other product business is about 86.454 billion yuan, accounting for 40% of Byd Company Limited(002594) total revenue, second only to its automobile business.
Whether mobile phone companies represented by Huawei, Xiaomi and apple make cars across borders, or car companies represented by Weilai and Geely cross into the mobile phone circle, it indicates that the integration of the two industries is accelerating. In the view of the outside world, smart Internet connected vehicles are making the integration between mobile phone and automobile industries become the norm in the future.
