1. Interview: MediaTek Why smart speakers in the market riding a ride?
Set micro-network (text / Deng Wenbiao) 'Our smart speakers last year is Intel's platform, but now we just want to cut into MediaTek's platform.' This is the author recently visited a smart hardware vendors in Shenzhen to hear the real feedback. Imported MediaTek smart speaker platform ODM vendors revealed that although Zhuhai Quanzhi, Hangzhou Guoxin and other manufacturers to push their smart speaker platform, but we certainly preferred or MediaTek.
When you hear these first-line voices, it is inevitable curiosity, why MediaTek smart speaker platform in the industry so highly recognized? This will not be MediaTek won the global intelligent speaker nearly 80% market share in 2017? 2018 MediaTek can continue in the international manufacturers and second-rate smart speaker chip maker under the attack, riding a ride?
With these questions, set micro-network reporter went to an interview with MediaTek Deputy General Manager and general manager of home entertainment products group tourist Jie, trying to find the answer.Guest Jie is responsible for MediaTek in addition to the business of mobile phone chip business, the outside world called MediaTek's' Second battlefield. "In the past year, MediaTek triumph in the 'second battlefield', including the industry's highest market share of smart speakers.
Layout card bit, let the trend guide
Since the advent of the Amazon Echo in 2014, the market for smart speakers has been on the rise, but the client is notoriously unpopular until market shipments begin to explode in 2017. Global smart speaker shipments in 2017 exceeded 30 million units, compared to 2016 The 3 million units have 10 times the growth.
'The explosive growth of smart speakers in 2017 shows that smart speakers have gradually become the successful products recognized by the market.' In the view of Visitors, there is no more than three conditions for the success of a product. The first one is the user experience. The second is that the price of the product can be accepted by the market. The third point is that the product behind the product can bring a large number of functional services and is loved by users. At present, there are more than 15,000 services in Amazon Echo.
Visitor Jie further stressed that based on these three conditions, the user experience in place that intelligent speaker technology has been initially mature, the product price has also been in line with market acceptance, and the smart speakers out of the service and features that make consumers feel new Value. These three points are undoubtedly the key driver for smartphones to grow rapidly in 2017.
We know that in 2017 the global smart speaker market, the largest shipments overseas are the Amazon and mainland China's largest shipments of Alibaba, are MediaTek customers, MediaTek in the global smart speaker market share has reached 7-8 into So how does MediaTek quickly layout and become the industry leader in the emergence of this new application of smart speakers?
Visitor Jie said that many new applications appear in the era of the Internet of Things, MediaTek, how to layout the market, in the early stages of new applications to seize market opportunities, is clearly a challenge to IC design companies. MediaTek has a very good customer Based, covering the world's leading industry trends, we are able to work with our customers to develop products that lead the market in the early stages, and this is our existing customer base, all of whom are leading the industry trend.
At the same time, MediaTek's hardware and software services in the past to provide more than just a single chip, more of the Android system and hardware and software platforms, through these platforms with leading the trend of manufacturers to develop new applications, often can shorten the product cycle, Do more with less.
In addition, the visitors Jie believes that MediaTek has long been plowing the multimedia market, including voice, video field has a key technology.So smart speakers, we have a good system integration, hardware and software system integration, including the development of smart speakers , Sound quality adjustment, etc., MediaTek also has a complete set of tools, but intelligent speaker manufacturers have better sound quality requirements, MediaTek can provide a better solution, which is the lack of most intelligent speaker terminal manufacturers where.
MT8516 why fire?
Amazon Echo and Lynx elf are two smart speaker products with the largest shipments at home and abroad in 2017. They all adopt MediaTek smart speaker chip MT8516 and are the early layout and self-advantages of MediaTek to seize the market opportunity rapidly. However, Amazon Echo was not a MediaTek chip but was Texas Instruments when Echo was introduced in 2014. At the time, Amazon Echo was not well recognized and focused on the market until the introduction of MediaTek's solution led to a proliferation of products.
Tourists Jie said Amazon Echo really with MediaTek chip production point in time about the same in late 2016, but also because of the use of MediaTek's solution, the entire product to become the hottest smart hardware in 2017. At present, Amazon Echo sales of more than 1000 Million units, the market sales of more than 1 billion US dollars.
MediaTek has now become the dominant chip supplier for Amazon Echo, and Amazon Echo, which uses TI's chips, is not available on the market. '
Lynx MT8516 also uses the same genie, is the largest mainland shipments of smart speakers, double eleven in 2017, Lynx Wizard sold within 9 hours 1 million units.
'We worked with Lynx genius to create a new history record. In a very short time, MediaTek employees involved in supporting Lynx product development did not go home after 12pm.' Product cooperation above, including customer support services, involved in the development, in a very short period of time, both quality and meet market demand for the product, it is MediaTek in intelligent speaker market to provide customers the value and advantages.
In addition to Amazon Echo and Lynx elf using MT8516, the world there are many smart hardware vendors are inclined to import MT8516, then this chip much customer favor what are the reasons?
MT8516 is the second generation of MediaTek smart speaker chip.According to the introduction of visitors Jie, in the product, MT8165 has a higher degree of hardware integration, the first generation of IC peripheral devices, circuits, etc. are all integrated in the second generation of IC In the same time developed a more intelligent software tools Power AQ, through Power AQ, effectively adjust the sound quality of intelligent speakers, accelerating hardware vendors to market their products.
In the MediaTek second-generation smart speaker chip evolution, Power AQ the most effective.In general, the traditional speakers want to enhance the sound, often need to plug-DSP, and MT8516 by providing Power AQ tools, the equivalent of integrated high-end DSP sound, Can give users better sound quality.
WiFi chip is killer, the mainland market will welcome 10-year growth this year
In addition to MediaTek nowadays, more and more chip manufacturers in mainland China have started to launch dedicated smart speaker chips, including Zhuhai All-purpose, Hangzhou Guoxin, Beijing Junzheng, etc., in an attempt to seize the smart speaker market. MediaTek does not seem to worry about this.
For a smart speaker, fast network connection is a very important part of the WiFi chip is essential.After Zhuhai Quanzhi, Hangzhou Guoxin, Beijing Jun Zheng mainland companies such as WiFi chip has been provided by Broadcom And support, but then Broadcom WiFi chip package sold in the Internet of Things business to Cypress, the mainland manufacturers have begun to cooperate with Cypress.
However, due to Cypress's WiFi chip did not pay enough attention to the mainland smart speaker chip manufacturers supporting support and services is not enough, which allows the mainland smart speaker chip maker is quite passive.In addition, the smart speaker chip often through the master IC Plug-in with WiFi chip, the cost will increase a few dollars more.
In contrast, MediaTek acquired Ralph Lauren in a few years ago, the WiFi chip on the product performance and market have greatly improved, compared to its products Cypress's WiFi chip is not inferior, supporting support and services already In addition, MediaTek's smart speaker chip integrates the WiFi chip into the host IC through embedded, which is more cost-effective.
Not afraid of second-rate smart speaker chip makers to seize the market, MediaTek also do not worry about competition from overseas manufacturers; now the Transtech Services MT8516 platform has become the first smart speaker manufacturers at home and abroad to introduce the 'Hong 饽 饽', its WiFi chip into the Apple smart speaker supply The chain is the best proof.
Of course, MediaTek's smart speaker chip is not blindly pursue the cost of visitors Jie said the price is one of the most important factor in the market, but for MediaTek, continued to introduce more competitive products, consider providing new technologies, New support and services to make products to play a greater value, speed up the market penetration is the focus of the future direction, will not blindly pursue lower prices.
According to Canalys data, the annual smart speaker shipments in 2017 exceeded 30 million units, and the global shipments of smart speakers in 2018 are expected to reach 56.3 million units, which will be the decisive year for the popularization of smart speakers. Among them, the popularity of the mainland market The degree is more crucial.According to MediaTek disclosed that in 2017 the Chinese mainland market smart speaker chip shipments of about 200 million is expected this year will have 10 times the growth.
Tourists also believe that the smart speaker market in 2018 relative to last year should be doubled, because the major manufacturers of ecological chain is very active in building ecology, MediaTek will launch this year, the third generation of new smart speaker.
In the new product planning, visitors Jie said MediaTek continue to introduce more competitive products, will use more advanced ARM core, there will be more features and applications solutions, including with a display, add more advanced AI features, It will also introduce MCU-based voice solutions to some white goods.
It is worth mentioning that Apple's latest HomePod with display, smart speakers with a display will be the new direction this year, MediaTek MT8167 also supports the screen with the program. Tour Jie said the smart speaker can bring a display Screen, so that information can be seen more clearly, at the same time, after the screen, we will combine the identification and processing of images to bring more applications.At present, from the layout of each home, smart speakers with a display will have More different versions of the product.
Focus on the ecosystem management, intelligent speakers become epoch-making products
Today, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Alibaba, LG, Sony, Baidu, Jingdong, etc. have introduced smart speaker products, intelligent speaker market will continue to be hot this year, the industry chain involved in the many manufacturers.For MediaTek, Will focus on the construction of the ecosystem.If the smart speaker is just a simple product applications, the industry is very difficult to lasting, what is important is the intelligent speaker behind the service, these services can make the consumer feel the value.
For example, there are children habitually listen to intelligent speakers tell stories to sleep; there are children with smart speakers to learn, etc., which is an important reason for the generalization of smart speakers, not just the smart speaker itself.Guest Jie believes that the future of smart speakers Will support including the family all the monitoring, home safety, elderly care and other applications, follow-up with a variety of different services is to support the continuous development of smart speakers the main reason.
'So for MediaTek, will pay more attention to the management of the ecosystem.' Tourist Jie said.
From the perspective of the development of smart speakers, smart speakers are still continuing the evolution of innovation.Jokers Jie said that currently in the intelligent speaker semantic recognition is still in the cloud, the future in the cloud semantic recognition will be able to switch to the front of the chip, which may be a long-term Possible development.
At the same time, the intelligent speaker will evolve into a voice control entrance, in theory, but also ubiquitous.But the current intelligent speaker charging power cord has limited the freedom of movement of intelligent speakers, the future of smart speakers with battery-powered or wireless charging, will Become the new direction of future development.
On the whole, smart speakers broke out rapidly in the past few years and became the most successful consumer electronic product following the iPad. This is achieved after smart AI technology is mature in the cloud, with in-depth learning and raising the accuracy of semantic recognition Product out. Tourists believe that this is the second after the iPad, from a technology evolution perspective, the smart speaker will be an epoch-making product, so that the semantic recognition of this matter becomes possible, and issued in the voice command after more new applications And service, which is an important reason for the smart speaker orderly development.
2. MediaTek monthly revenue hit a two-month low;
Set micro-mesh news, by the smart phone inventory adjustments affect the market, MediaTek January revenue fell below NT 17 billion in one fell swoop, rewrite the two-month single-month low.Industry expects the company in February revenue continued downward in March to Restore growth.
MediaTek announced on the 9th January revenue of 16,835,000,000 yuan NT, 9.7% month-on-month, also a decline of 8.1% over the same period last year, with the monthly growth rate and the annual rate of decline simultaneously, but in line with the mobile phone supply chain in January camp Income profile.
MediaTek CEO Cai Li-line had admitted at the last conference, because the mobile phone market has not yet recovered, the new product will have a contribution in the second half, so the second half of the season the revenue peak will be more obvious.
As February coincided with the Lunar New Year holiday, coupled with dismal market conditions, continue to inventory, this year there are many smart phone factory in China even more special extended holiday, and some even holiday more than twenty days, resulting in February working days than in previous years Less, the off-season effect is more pronounced.
In the first quarter of MediaTek financial point of view, in February and March the average monthly revenue will fall 15.732 billion yuan to 18.183 billion yuan between the NT, in order to reach the financial test goals, so in March the client's delivery status to catch up 2 The gap in the month will play a key role in determining whether the financial measure can meet the standards. The rise in the exchange rate between the Taiwan dollar and the U.S. dollar will also have a partial impact.
3. Creative: bitcoin turmoil does not affect customer enthusiasm
Set micro-network news, bitcoin mining machine Taiwan IC Design Services Factory last year, creative ideas and have significantly contributed to the original Wisdom, for this year's related orders outlook, the idea that the bitcoin rose sharply plunged, not easy to expect this year to temporarily conservative Attitude estimation; Wisdom said that the current customer-related open and not affected.
Bitcoin was the best-performing creator last year, accounting for 30% of the total revenue of last year. Contribution to this year's bitcoin, the creative hub Chen Chaoqian said that in 2016, Bitcoin accounted for about 15% of revenue and rose to 30 %, This year's estimate slipped to 15%.
Last year, Wisdom also benefited from Bitcoin mining machine orders rose profits throughout the year, Wisdom General Manager Wang Guoyong said the recent bitcoin fell, but the current customer engagement did not change.