At the China Home Appliances and Consumer Electronics Expo recently concluded, sweeping robots are particularly eye-catching as the most intelligent cleansing products. Several brands brought the latest sweeping robots to the show, including various black technology sweeping robots. The product brings a new definition. The scene of the show is a scene simulation to restore the complex environment of modern homes. It shows the sweeping robot's intelligent and efficient cleaning function in various scenes.
In recent years, with the advancement of science and technology and social development, especially due to the acceleration of the pace of life and the increase of work pressure, consumers have sought to free themselves from the tedious routine cleaning of households. Sweeping robots have emerged in this context. , And is spreading at an alarming rate. GfK China's retail monitoring and pushing data show that the retail sales of sweeping robots have reached a 51% compound growth rate for 5 years. By 2017, the market size of China's sweeping robots retail volume has reached 3.325 million units, retail sales amounted to 4.41 billion yuan. Compared to other clean products, the current penetration rate of sweeping robots in China is still very low, and the sweeping robot market still has good development potential. According to GfK China, In 2018, China's sweeping robot market will reach 5.38 billion yuan, and retail sales will reach 4.35 million.
Technological innovation has driven the trend of functional upgrades
The basic functions of sweeping robots are sweeping, vacuuming, and mopping. Sweeping robots have been sweeping brush materials, structural forms, rotating methods, and vacuuming principles, mopping materials, mopping arrangements, and water supply. The technical aspects are continuously optimized. The constant optimization of the basic functions of the sweeping robot achieves a better cleaning effect and user experience.
Take the land-dumping function as an example, the proportion of sweeping robots with mopping function has been rising in recent years. According to GfK China's retail monitoring data, the retail sales of sweeping robots in 2015 have been in the overall sweeping robots. The proportion is 31.8%, and by 2017 this accounted for 59.3%. In 2017, the mopping function products solved the drag problem through the application of the pressurized flow control technology and the constant pressure floating design of the product. The uneven distribution of dryness and humidity in the process of the ground, as well as the functional bottlenecks of uneven product performance.
From the perspective of the price segment, sweeping robots with mopping function are mainly concentrated in the sweeping robot market of 1000~2000 yuan. According to GfK China's retail monitoring data, as of 2017, dragging down the price segment of 1000~2000 yuan. The retail sales of land function products accounted for 71.1%. And in 2017, the proportion of retail sales of sweeping robots with sweeping function in the price range of other sweeping robots has also been rising. In particular, the proportion of price segments in the range of 2000~3000 yuan has increased. Significantly, it increased from 26.6% in 2016 to 55.0%. The proportion of mopping-to-ground functional products continued to rise, reflecting the consumer’s pursuit of full-function products for sweeping robots.
High intelligence is the trend of sweeping robots
While sweeping robots continuously improve the cleaning effect, as the highest level of intelligent cleaning products, in the current wave of home appliances to the 'smart home' transition, the development of intelligent functions of sweeping robots has also gained a broader space.
The intelligent development of sweeping robots can be divided into two phases. The first phase is the “smart connection” phase in which sweeping robots and smart phones are connected. According to GfK China's retail monitoring data, 2017, it has intelligent connection functions. The proportion of retail sales of sweeping robots has reached 50.4%, and this figure was only 11.4% two years ago.
The second stage is to receive or observe the information in the environment through various sensors to achieve the autonomous navigation and positioning of the sweeping robot to complete the sweeping robot positioning-composition-planning-sweeping one-stop intelligent sweeping scheme. The navigation system is a robotic sensing technology. Important applications on cleaning products have greatly improved the degree of intelligence of sweeping robots. Especially the visual navigation systems used in high-end models on the market today, this technology is like giving the sweeper a pair of 'eyes' that can be more Good guidance for sweeping robots to develop in the direction of artificial intelligence and object recognition.
According to GfK China's retail monitoring data, the navigation system brought a high product premium to the robots in the initial stage of development. In 2015, the average price of robots for sweeping was 1,289 yuan, and in the same year, a robot with a navigation system was installed. The average price reached 3,422 yuan. However, in 2015, the retail sales of navigation system sweeping robots accounted for only 1.9% of the total sweeping robots. With the development and application of more and more cost-effective navigation technology, navigation system sweeping robots Entering more consumer households at increasingly affordable prices. In 2017, the proportion of retail sales of smart navigation systems increased significantly from 3.3% in 2016 to 16.6%. Meanwhile, in 2017, the company entered the brand of sweeping robots in navigation systems. The number of new products has increased by 16 and the number of new models has increased to 52. More and more brands are beginning to engage in the field of sweeping robots for navigation systems, which has promoted the further development of navigation system robots.
Channel is king, leveraging online traffic development experience
Since sweeping robots entered the Chinese market, online sales have been the main sales channel. According to GfK China's retail monitoring data, in 2017, sweeping robots accounted for 91% of online retail sales, and retail sales accounted for the online market share. The ratio is also up to 89%. The biggest advantage of the online market is that it can bring huge traffic, but there are still limitations in understanding the product information and experience product functions through the online market. The unsubstitutable role of the offline market is to be able to fully display the product. , So that consumers can intuitively understand the product features and characteristics.
Especially for intelligent technologies such as sweeping robots, there are many smart products with higher degree of intelligence. Consumers' offline experience becomes more important. Take advantage of existing online traffic to develop offline experience, sweeping robots. High-tech and high-intelligence capabilities make it easier for consumers to understand and make consumers accept faster through the display and experience of physical stores. The combination of online market and offline market is the focus of the overall sweeping robot manufacturers' channel layout in the future. Strategy.