China's Pad Corps Has No Heads Against Apple's Dragons

"Beijing Business Daily" reported that iPad 2 did not choose to enter the Chinese market the first time, iPad began to reduce prices globally. Does Jobs not value the Chinese market? This move is puzzling, but some analysts believe that "so that we can see the impact of the Apple series of tablet computers on the Chinese market, because the iPad 2 has not given domestic manufacturers the opportunity to face up front, and the domestic Pads have started a civil war."

Who leads the domestic manufacturers?

No solution may be because the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Association, Liu Chuanzhi, put it out as early as "a fight against Apple." Perhaps Lenovo's position in the domestic IT circle. "Lenovo confronts Apple" or "Lenovo leads domestic manufacturers to fight against Apple" is still talked about widely. It includes the PC Battle, the Battle of Phone, the Battle of Pad, the Battle of App Stores and many other interpretations. .

A few days ago, Lenovo Tablet PC music officially listed, also announced Lenovo in the field of mobile Internet and Apple's "back-to-back" full battle. Compared with the smartphone business that Lenovo is not good at, the tablet PC business that is more similar to the traditional PC may represent Lenovo's actual combat ability against Apple.

Lenovo tried to give some convincing figures on the day of listing. Chen Xudong, vice president of Lenovo, expressed his "very satisfied" with "1500 sales of music pads during the online pre-sale period." At the same time, he also announced that the first shipment of Le Pad was 100,000 units. Lenovo Group spokesman Chen Danqing directly broke the news. Le Pad's first-day orders have exceeded 100,000 units. For future expectations, Chen Xudong revealed that Le Pad’s market share in China is expected to reach around 32% in 2-3 years, “almost equal to Lenovo’s share in the PC market. This year, it aims to sell 1 million units”.

One million units, Lenovo's other important mobile phone, Music Phone, went public a year ago. Lenovo Group CEO Yang Yuanqing also set the same goal. According to data from Lenovo, as of December 31 last year, the accumulated sales of Music Phone were about 450,000 units, and the time left for Yang Yuanqing was still 5 months.

However, in response to Lenovo's competition with Apple and domestic flat panel makers, Qu Jingdong, president of Patriot’s electronic technology, and Bai Jie, general manager of Lenovo Group’s Greater China commercial business, recently had a “battle on the verge”.

Li Yi, secretary-general of the Mobile Internet Industry Alliance, quoted Qu Jingdong's view on Weibo that "Patriot Tablet PC has received 100,000 orders from Colombia." Bai Jie said that "this brand (Patriot) will be the first to leave music Pad." In the face of challenges from rivals, Qu Jingdong counterattacked with skepticism, saying that “Lok Phone is relying on Yahuo, selling hundreds of thousands of units, and selling less than half, far from the goal of millions, and the battle with Apple has failed. Let's send Apple away first, and do not engage in civil war."

Related information shows that, in addition to 100,000 orders received from overseas customers, the Patriot Tablet PC is also "a lot of the domestic education market and the police market, a conservative forecast, the education market 100,000 units, the police market 50,000 units." It is worth mentioning that Lenovo’s three sales partners, Gome, Suning, and Hongtu San, have all established sales targets for 100,000 Le Pads.

Analysys International previously forecast that China's tablet PC shipments will reach 4.5 million units this year. In addition to PCs and digital giants that have already entered the field, some e-reader terminal manufacturers will also transition to the tablet PC market. Before iPad 2 entered China, domestic manufacturers began to stifle.

Who has a competitive advantage?

In the description of the competitive power of Patriots, no solution Qu Jingdong believes that although Apple has created a tablet computer industry chain, it does not mean that it can meet the needs of all Chinese customers. “Different markets and different segments, It will be an opportunity for domestic tablet makers." Li Yi also commented on the route of the Patriot Tablet PC. "To avoid the confrontation with the iPad is to specialize in the industry segmentation market, and it deserves to be a wise way for national brands."

However, there are also insiders pointed out that the positioning of different segments of the market is just an "easy-going" approach to the market, the industry is more concerned about the brand in ordinary consumer market tablet computer killing. In this regard, domestic tablet PC makers currently have little competitiveness. Many analysts have been arguing that the killer of Apple products is "continuous innovation in user experience" when commenting on the lethality of Apple products. There are only two ways for domestic challengers to compete: price advantage and localized application.

Chinese users are sensitive to price, and this has been repeatedly verified in various fields. It is no wonder that when Apple announced the iPad's price reduction to 2,888 yuan, Wang Bangjiang, Vice President of Hanwang Technology, said with emotion that "Apple is on the way to a broken colleague." “There is no room for profit from purely selling terminals. Even Samsung, Hewlett-Packard, and Lenovo will suffer.” Wang Bangjiang said that Hanwang’s new tablet PCs will also be forced to reduce prices slightly.

However, the Lenovo Music Pad that was just listed did not follow the low-cost route predicted. It is reported that the 4 music pads are priced at 3499-5299 yuan, and they do not have the price advantage compared to the iPad. They are only a few hundred dollars cheaper than the iPad 2. Chen Xudong said to this: “After iPad cuts prices, we are under great pressure, but we discover that it will not affect Le Pad. Le Pad has better performance than iPad, and it is priced at iPad 2, which has certain price advantage”.

Market news shows that due to the dual impact of iPad price cuts and iPad 2 launch, domestic tablet makers including Hanwang have adjusted their product pricing. However, a simple price advantage may not be feasible, and the brand effect of Apple's manufacturing may even allow users to resist the low prices of other products.

Price wars do not work, domestic manufacturers need to work hard on product performance and application experience. Qu Jingdong believes that Patriots chose to launch products for custom industry applications in public security, education, and other fields. "These are not Apple's so-called 100,000 or 200,000 applications that can be simply replaced. These applications are exactly what Chinese manufacturers can offer to Chinese customers." Products and services, this is exactly the direction of our efforts."

As early as the year before Lenovo determined its mobile Internet strategy, Lenovo emphasized that it has already won the “Stalls” and applications for almost all Chinese local companies such as Tencent, Baidu, Alibaba and Sina. However, some analysts pointed out that the concept of localized application is effective in the early stages of Apple's Sinification. As an application development advocator of open source today, developers have the right to choose an application store. “Tencent and Youku are also keen to develop applications in the Apple App Store.” From the current momentum of domestic companies developing mobile applications, there is no single choice. Apple terminal customization.

Data shows that Lenovo's application store “Landscape” currently has more than a thousand applications on its shelves, and Apple’s app store has more than 200,000 applications, while other domestic tablet manufacturers have not had such a clear “content orientation”.

Taking the localization application line, domestic tablet PC makers need to go one step faster.

Who walks on the road to Pad?

No solution has practitioners told reporters that domestic manufacturers take different tablet computer routes: Lenovo Music Pad is only part of its mobile Internet strategy; Hanwang emphasizes technological attributes, but also has e-books and other similar products; Patriots and other manufacturers are more emphasis on hardware sales . Who can survive in the tide of tablet computers still has no solution.

The person jokingly said that watching Apple's face is not too good to live, may not yet decide the outcome, Apple has a new mobile terminal to replace the tablet.

Hanwang Technology Public Relations Department related persons, iPad in music, games and other entertainment features have been enhanced, the main entertainment market. However, the Chinese business demand for tablet computers is greater than the demand for entertainment. The demand of Chinese business people for tablet PCs is not limited to narrow entertainment fans.

In fact, the TouchPad previously launched by Hanvon Technology is aimed at business applications and uses a windowns operating system that is different from other manufacturers. However, at the beginning of this year at the International Consumer Electronics Show in the United States, Hanwang decided to launch an Android-based tablet HPad for ordinary users, and the two products belong to different departments.

The course of the Hanwang is only a kind of follower for Apple. It is too early to tell whether it will succeed. The coach Liu Chuanzhi changed his tone at the Le Pad swearing party. He stressed that “winning or losing is not an instant” and “Lenovo is still in the basic stage in the field of mobile internet”.

Data show that last year, Apple won 70% of the global tablet market share.