In the mobile phone hardware innovation caught in the 'ceiling', the new spoilers made a big splash. On June 19th, the OPPO Find X of the Louvre in France adopted the innovative dual-rail periscope structure to hide the camera inside the mobile phone. This week, Vivo NEX released a unique lifting front camera, as well as a number of screen technology and other black technology. In the recent month, glory, millet and other mobile phone manufacturers have also launched new products, competition hardware innovation.
In the current decline in mobile phone sales, into the homogenization of the competition, the domestic mobile phone is breaking Apple, Samsung is the first to follow the 'follow' strategy, in the hardware technology to achieve new breakthroughs.
Abandon 'Liu Haiping' and seek technological breakthroughs
Since September of last year, under the strong demonstration effect of iPhone X, 'Liu Haiping' mobile phone has become the current trend of smart phones. The domestic mobile phone manufacturers represented by OPPO and Vivo are doing their own thing and gave up 'Liu Hai'. The screen's design, has gone out of a road of its own, with a slide-type and pop-up proactive design.
In order to achieve a breakthrough in the proportion of frontal screens, the vivo NEX adopts innovative technologies including a front-mounted camera with lift, under-panel light, micro-slit infrared, and full-screen sound technology. From this, Vivo has achieved the closest design in appearance. Comprehensive screen program.
From the product form of vivo NEX, it is easy to see that Vivo chose a different path from Apple. Apple relies on 3D structured light to achieve face recognition, and vivo currently places more technical resources on screen fingerprints. For the radical sensor hiding scheme to achieve 'no Liu Haiping'.
The head of the marketing department of the top five mobile phone manufacturers in a domestic market told the Nanfang Daily reporter that this kind of innovation is very commendable because it is not a simple restructuring of the organization. It also involves comprehensive matching and innovation between different organizations, including heat dissipation, signal protection, etc. The system work is not as simple as I imagined.
Coincidentally, in order to get a truly airless body, OPPO Find X opens up a separate space inside the limited fuselage. It creatively joins the dual-rail periscope structure and successfully hides the front and rear cameras and most of the sensors. Inside the phone, this is the first of OPPO Find X.
On the May 31st before Glory released 'very scary technology' - GPU Turbo, Xiaomi founder Lei Jun released the Xiaomi 8 series in Shenzhen. In terms of hardware innovation, Xiaomi Transparent Exploration Edition uses screen fingerprint identification technology. Millet 8 also introduced the dual-frequency satellite positioning GPS navigation technology for the first time.
R & D front, Samsung changed 'follower'
For a long time, more people have attributed the rise of OPPO, vivo to over-reliance on marketing, and the way of selling from online to offline in the era of new retail, and the strategy of low-priced and high-priced has been criticized. '. But recently, OPPO, Vivo is trying to break this stereotype.
Hu Baishan, executive vice president responsible for vivo technology, said in an interview with the media that the conservative strategy has not been able to go, and it is no longer possible to follow the old path of Apple.
Previously, the X21 released by Vivo took the lead in adopting the screen fingerprint recognition technology, which was provided by Synaptics. However, the recognition effect was not good. Especially in some special scenes, such as showering, when the fingers were dry. In early April of this year, Vivo switched the X21's screen fingerprinting technology supplier from Xinsi to Huiding, which caused the shipment of X21 to stop for more than a week.
In April last year, vivo called the top suppliers in the mobile phone industry to the headquarters in Dongguan. Hu Baishan told these industry chain suppliers that the cooperation mode and cooperation rhythm of vivo should be adjusted. Vivo wants to change the original follow-up strategy, involving mobile phones. The key areas of innovation are laid out in advance, and the technical tracking and cooperation cycle should be advanced to 18 months or even 36 months.
The price to do this is that Vivo itself also needs to invest funds, the team and suppliers to R & D to accelerate the process of technology maturity. This approach is also Apple's habitual play, Apple's core peripheral chip, screen supplier Companies such as Synopsys, Samsung, LG, etc. worked closely with Apple to promote the upgrade of Apple’s core selling points of each generation. After Apple's industry chain supplier's technology matured, it took some time before Android vendors gradually followed suit.
It is worth noting that Vivo's technology leadership strategy has gradually gained its harvest. Taking screen fingerprinting as an example, after the vivo launch, more brand manufacturers have chosen to follow up. The Korean website The Bell recently reported that Samsung Electronics has decided The Galaxy S10 screen fingerprint recognition is the next-generation authentication technology. In addition, Samsung is also considering using a 3D sensor camera with Face ID function.
3D sensing is no stranger to domestic mobile phones. Just in May of this year, OPPO completed 'the world's first 3D structured optical video call demo', which indicates that the future video call experience will be very different, because it can be more intuitive and clear It is more realistic to see every detail of the video call object.
Measuring the technical reserves of a company can be pry into the number of patents. Among the top ten enterprises in China's invention patent grants last year, State Grid, Huawei, Sinopec ranked in the top three, OPPO ranked eighth in 1222, The only company that focuses on mobile phones.
'In fact, domestic mobile phones have already come out of the shadow of Apple, and there is no such thing as Apple’s shadow.” Kang Hao, the editor-in-chief of the operator’s world network, told the Nanfang Daily reporter that Apple’s sales in China have stopped at the moment, but it’s the rise of domestic mobile phones. It caused a 'threat'.
Control the supply chain system, and turn to the consumer experience
In addition to the system level, from the perspective of hardware and performance, the entire industry is in an anxiety period, and it is difficult for smartphone products to open the gap. What are the future opportunities for mobile phone hardware innovation?
Kang Ye believes that domestic mobile phones are shifting from hardware competition to consumer experience. For example, 'dual camera' is not new anymore. Some leading camera manufacturers have installed 6P lenses on the camera body. Even professional optical experts Leica are subject to Invited to join forces, and mobile phone manufacturers join forces to create momentum. The difficulty is that the imaging quality of the camera, quality and module thickness, ultra-thin body has become a contradictory body, 'mobile phone no matter how thin, but also to the chip, battery, camera, Antennas, etc. are packed in, all parts are of a certain size, which is very test the phone manufacturers. ' Kang Yu said.
In the future, the breakthrough in hardware innovation of smart phones is still in appearance, interactive experience, or changes in battery and screen technology. 'The new identification technology has extended fingerprint identification, iris recognition and other solutions, and the addition of gyro, Can help the camera anti-shake camera or assist GPS for inertial navigation. ' Kang Ye said that an endless stream of new technologies, but also allows the phone to continue the function of the competition, for example, the future around the flexible screen is a great article.
However, in the breakthrough of the core components, there are also many worthwhile domestic mobile phone reflection. A domestic brand marketing minister said, for example, advanced screens and cameras are still very much dependent on foreign suppliers. Shipment ranked first in Samsung, Relying on its strong supply chain system, including screens, processors, memory chips, light sensors, etc., it is ensured that the Samsung supply chain is more profitable than the mobile phone business.
In the industry, there is a widely circulated story: When the Xiaomi supply chain and the Samsung China Semiconductor team had contact, but the two sides also had a dispute, Samsung took a table to leave after angrily, in July 2016, millet Chairman Lei Jun personally took charge of the supply chain affairs. Before and after this, he went to the Samsung headquarters four times to seek more cooperation with Samsung, including Samsung's own processor, camera, memory, display screen, etc., and these elements are all Prepare for the millet's own high-end machine.
The upgrading of these core components requires the joint efforts of the upstream and downstream industries. In some areas, it can be seen that domestically produced technologies are also hard to turn around and continue to break foreign monopoly. On June 6, after Huaxing Optoelectronics, BOE, Tianma and other companies announced The launch of the AMOLED production line, a large-scale mass production line of the sixth generation full-flexible display screen in China was lighted and put into production at the Shenzhen Soft World International Flexible Display Base. The flexible display thickness of the soft-wool display is only 0.01 mm, with an annual output of more than 50 million pieces. In addition, in the field of flash memory, processors, etc., you can also see the localization of the figure.