2019, smartphones have no savior

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Compared to last year, the smartphone industry in the spring of 2019 seems much more lively.

First, at the beginning of the year, Xiaomi and Royole had a "fight" over foldable screens. Then, in late February, Samsung and Huawei released two foldable screen phones, bringing a new trend to the smartphone market, which had been lacking innovation for a long time. As foldable screens became popular, manufacturers such as OPPO, Nubia, and Motorola also leaked information and technologies related to foldable screens.

5G has also become a hot word in 2019. After nearly two years of hype, this concept finally ushered in a number of new phones during the 2019 Mobile World Congress (MWC): Xiaomi MIX3 5G version, Samsung S10 5G version, Huawei Mate X, LG V50 ThinQ, etc.

Mobile phone manufacturers are scrambling to launch new phones in the spring of 2019. Image source: All-Weather Technology compiled based on public information

As manufacturers scramble to launch new models, smartphone sales have been declining for two consecutive years. Since 2017, this huge industry, with an annual shipment of 1.4 billion units and a market capacity of nearly US$500 billion, has begun to enter a downward channel. According to IDC data, mobile phone sales fell 2.5% year-on-year in 2017 and fell again by 4.1% in 2018.

Can foldable screens and 5G usher in spring for the sluggish smartphone industry?

There seems to be no definite answer yet. For 2019, foldable screen and 5G mobile phones are "too new", and the price of more than 10,000 yuan also makes consumers stay away. According to the forecasts of multiple institutions, the shipment volume of the two types of mobile phones will only be millions of units, which is almost negligible for the mobile phone industry, which counts 1 billion units.

So far, no less than three institutions have predicted that the mobile phone industry will continue to decline in 2019. The real recovery of the mobile phone industry may be a year later. "The impact of 5G should start from the second half of 2020, and then usher in the peak of phone replacement in the next two years," said a mobile phone industry practitioner.

Perhaps, it would be more appropriate to regard 2019 as the "chilly spring period before the recovery" for smartphones.

1. The battle for foldable screens

In late February, Samsung and Huawei released two foldable screen phones in succession within 5 days, once again refreshing people's perception of foldable screen phones.

Since their inception, foldable screen mobile phones have been accompanied by controversies, such as: the hinge radius is too large, lack of practicality, low battery, high price, etc.

"Foldable screen phones have no special value until the problem of whether they can bring improvements in user interaction or experience is solved," OPPO Vice President Shen Yiren said bluntly on Weibo on February 15. Shortly afterwards, Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun responded to the "foldable screen dispute" with Royole, saying that the mass production technology of foldable screens is not good enough, "because the battery is pitifully small and the space is occupied by the hinge components."

However, with Samsung's official release of the foldable screen mobile phone Galaxy Fold on February 20, the practicality of this form of mobile phone has been preliminarily confirmed.

The Galaxy Fold adopts an inward-folding design. When unfolded, the folding screen is a 7.3-inch flexible AMOLED screen. After folding through the hinge system, the outer 4.6-inch screen can be used for operation.

The emergence of Galaxy Fold means that the battery and hinge problems are being solved. The phone has a battery installed on each side of the fold, with a total power of 4380mAh, which is small for a 7.3-inch screen, but has entered the mainstream level; "Hidden hinge" is another black technology of Samsung. From the official pictures, the hinge is thinner than the surrounding area and can be hidden in the device after opening, improving the appearance of the phone.

Samsung's foldable phone Galaxy Fold Image source: Samsung official website

Four days later, Huawei released the foldable phone Mate X, which further expanded people's imagination of foldable screens. Unlike Samsung, Mate X adopts an outward folding design. When folded, the front is 6.6 inches and the back is 6.38 inches. When folded and unfolded, the entire screen is 8 inches.

There has been controversy about the inward and outward folding design. Supporters of the outward folding design say that the design does not require an additional screen and is a "real folding screen phone." Opposing voices believe that because the outer screen of the folding screen is not glass but a CPI film, it is not scratch-resistant enough, and the inward folding design can better protect the screen.

Apart from the controversy over the design direction, the public information shows that Huawei Mate X has two advantages in the form of "folding screen": First, it is highly portable, with a folded thickness of only 11mm. In comparison, the Samsung Galaxy Fold is reportedly 17mm thick, while the Royole FlexPai is 7.6mm thick when unfolded, and may reach 20mm when folded, including the hinge. Second, the 4500mAh battery and 55W fast charging have more power, and are equipped with the fastest charging speed in the industry, which can charge the Mate X to 85% in 30 minutes.

As relatively mature foldable screen phones have been launched one after another, the doubts about foldable screens in the industry have weakened, and more manufacturers have gradually revealed their plans for foldable screen phones. Shen Yiren also posted a photo of OPPO's foldable screen phone on Weibo. Although he still emphasized that the foldable screen did not improve the user experience, he also mentioned, "If you really want it, please forward it and see how many people want it? If there are enough people, we can consider whether to 'mass produce' it."

However, with current technology, foldable phones are still a long way from becoming popular or stimulating sales growth in the entire mobile phone market. Even Huawei Mate X and Samsung Galaxy Fold face technical issues such as external screens and hinges. The Mate X, which is already thin and light among foldable phones, weighs 295g, while Huawei's other flagship phone, Mate 20 Pro, weighs only 189g.

What further hinders users’ willingness to change their phones is the high price of foldable screen phones. When the FlexPai was released, it was questioned because of its starting price of 8,999 yuan, while the starting prices of the Galaxy Fold and Mate X are more than 13,000 yuan and 17,000 yuan respectively, which is 2-3 times the price of ordinary flagship phones.

Koh Dong-jin, president of Samsung Electronics' mobile communications division, declared at the press conference, "I'm sure everyone will need a foldable smartphone in the future." However, according to IHS Markit's forecast, the market size of foldable phones will be about 1.4 million units in 2019, and Aweriver's forecast is more conservative, believing that the shipment of foldable phones will only be 1 million units.

In 2018, the total global smartphone shipments reached 1.456 billion units, and the shipments of foldable phones*** were negligible. Regardless of how foldable phones perform, in the short term, the significance of this new type of phone is not so much to "save" the declining mobile phone industry as to say that leading manufacturers are "flexing their muscles" and looking for new ways out.

2. Seize the opportunity of 5G

Compared with foldable screens, 5G has triggered a "phone replacement wave" and has greater potential to stimulate market growth: if all 4G phones are replaced with 5G phones, this will be an opportunity to drive sales of more than 1 billion mobile phones.

According to an IDC report, 5G mobile phone shipments may account for 7% of total smartphone shipments in 2020, and will account for 18% by 2022; if calculated based on the 1.4 billion monthly mobile phone shipments in recent years, it will be around 250 million units. In another report, IDC stated that in 2019, due to the arrival of 5G, global smartphone shipments will increase by 2.6% year-on-year, ending the downward trend and returning to growth between 2020 and 2022.

During the MWC conference held from February 25 to 28, 5G became the absolute protagonist of major booths, and they hung signs such as "5G ison" and "5G ishere" on the booths.

During the exhibition, Xiaomi released its first 5G mobile phone, MIX 3 5G version. In fact, as early as last October when the MIX3 standard version was released, Xiaomi announced that it would launch this 5G mobile phone and positioned it as the world's first 5G mobile phone, but the launch time was postponed to 2019. After 4 months, the MIX 3 5G version is finally available, equipped with the Snapdragon X50 independent baseband to support 5G networks. In addition, the processor is upgraded to Snapdragon 855 and the battery is upgraded to 3800mAh. It is expected to be available in May this year.

Xiaomi Mi MIX 3 5G

Wang Xiang, head of Xiaomi Group's international business and senior vice president, told the media during MWC that this year is definitely the first year of 5G, and 5G will usher in a wave of phone replacement. Currently, this technology has matured. Wang Xiang made no secret of Xiaomi's expectations for 5G. He mentioned that Xiaomi was founded 8 years ago and had no chance to pioneer 3G and 4G before, but 5G provides an opportunity, and Xiaomi hopes to pioneer the development of the 5G industry.

On February 20, when Samsung released the S10 series, it also released the S10 5G version. Compared with the regular version of the S10 series, this phone has a larger screen of 6.7 inches, and is equipped with a 4500mAh configuration and supports 25w fast charging. It can be said to be the "true flagship" of Samsung's conference. It is expected to be sold first in the United States in the second quarter of this year.

It is worth noting that the 5G baseband currently installed in most mobile phones belongs to the first-generation 5G baseband X50 released by Qualcomm in October 2016, which uses a 10nm process technology.

Newer 5G basebands have appeared. On January 24, Huawei released the 5G baseband Balong 5000, which uses a 7nm process technology. It is smaller than the 10nm process and has a higher energy efficiency ratio. This baseband not only supports 5GSA independent and NSA non-independent networking, but also supports 4G, 3G, and 2G networks. Huawei's folding phone Mate X is equipped with this 5G baseband.

In February, Qualcomm released the second-generation 5G baseband Snapdragon X55, which has similar performance to Huawei's Balong 5000 in many aspects, but has a higher peak rate than the latter, reaching 7Gbps. However, although the commercial performance of X55 is close to maturity, Qualcomm still stated that the baseband will not be commercialized until the end of this year, and all previously released mobile phones equipped with Qualcomm 5G baseband will still use the previous generation X50.

Like foldable screens, the first batch of 5G mobile phones also face the problem of high prices. Except for Huawei Mate X, which has both foldable screen and 5G and costs more than 17,000 yuan, Xiaomi MIX 3 starts at 599 euros in Europe, which is more than 4,500 yuan, the highest price in the history of Xiaomi brand mobile phones. The price of Samsung S10 5G has not yet been announced, but the industry expects it to be no less than 10,000 yuan.

According to China Mobile's prediction, in 2019, there may be more than 30 test and commercial 5G terminals, among which the average price of 5G mobile phones is expected to exceed 8,000 yuan. By the commercial stage in 2020, the price of 5G mobile phones may drop, and 1,000 yuan phones may appear.

In addition, according to the timetable of China Mobile and other three major operators, 5G will be in the pre-commercial stage in 2019 and will not be fully launched for commercial use until 2020.

So far, the 5G mobile phones released by Xiaomi, Samsung, Huawei, etc. have all been launched after May this year. It is not difficult to understand why, in the forecasts of multiple research reports, the shipment volume of 5G mobile phones in 2019 is only about 5 million units. If the forecast comes true, in 2019, for the 1 billion-unit smartphone market, 5G will be just like foldable screens, and it will be difficult to bear the responsibility of boosting the market.

3. Still far from recovery

Since the impact of foldable screens and 5G on the market will only gradually manifest after 2020; in 2019, the mobile phones that are truly used to support sales may be similar to last year, focusing on "local innovation".

In order to make the new mobile phone look different from the previous one, "crazy stacking" of cameras is becoming a concentrated innovation direction for brand manufacturers. "Nowadays, the stacking of mobile phones is too much," Lei Jun admitted to the media after the launch of Xiaomi 9. He recalled that Xiaomi 1 had only one camera, but Xiaomi 9 has a total of 5 cameras, including front, rear and screen fingerprint macro cameras.

In 2018, Huawei's two flagship models, the P20 and Mate20, were both equipped with three rear cameras. With the help of technologies such as "Super Night Scene", they quickly topped the DXO list and dominated the list for a whole year.

As of February 26, 2019, DXO official ranking chart

Stimulated by this, three rear cameras have become the "standard configuration" of flagship phones in 2019. Some leading brands have even more obvious "stacks", for example, Samsung's S10 Plus is equipped with a front dual camera, and Huawei's P30 Pro, which is expected to be released, is rumored to be equipped with a rear quad camera.

Nokia 9 PureView, Image source: Nokia official website

Not only mainstream manufacturers, but even Sony, which has been regarded as a representative of "conservatives" in recent years, has increased the number of rear cameras to three on its latest flagship Xperia 1. In comparison, when Sony released its flagship XZ3 in August last year, it was only equipped with a 19-megapixel, F/1.8 aperture rear camera.

In addition, it is worth mentioning the actions of the veteran manufacturer Nokia. In the latest flagship Nokia 9 PureView released during MWC, Nokia equipped it with 5 independent cameras, becoming the industry's first "5-camera mobile phone", plus a flash, and the back design is close to a "shower head".

Unlike other mobile phones that use multiple cameras to achieve wide-angle and telephoto shooting, Nokia's design concept is quite "non-mainstream". The five cameras equipped this time have the same focal length, two of which are color sensors and three are black and white sensors. Each time shooting, the five cameras capture images at the same time and merge them into a 12-megapixel photo to achieve a richer dynamic range and depth of field effect.

In addition to the camera, another "local innovation" of mobile phones focuses on fast charging, which is also a "compromise innovation" before the battery technology is completely revolutionized.

After Huawei launched the 40W wired fast charging in 2018, Huawei once again announced the technical innovation of 55W wired fast charging when it released the Mate X. Other manufacturers are also following suit. According to the news, the iQOO mobile phone, a high-end sub-brand of Vivo, which will be released on March 1, will be equipped with Vivo's first 44W wired fast charging. In addition, Xiaomi recently announced the technical innovation of wireless 20W fast charging when it released the Xiaomi Mi 9.

Even so, it is still difficult to say whether these local innovations can stimulate consumers to change their phones on a large scale.

According to the Korean media Electronic Times, citing the views of unnamed industry insiders, Samsung has lowered its 2019 smartphone production target to 290 million units, about 10% lower than the target set in November last year. At the same time, Apple's suppliers have significantly lowered their sales forecasts for 2019. Bernstein Research analyst Mark Li said that iPhone shipments in 2019 will decrease by 13% year-on-year.

According to a report by Swiss financial services agency Credit Suisse, the total global smartphone shipments in 2019 were 1.41 billion units, down 3.3% from 2018. In addition, a recent research report released by statistics agency TrendForce shows that the downward trend of global smartphones in 2019 is inevitable.

If the forecast comes true, this will be the third consecutive year of declining smartphone sales.

"The growth brought by 5G will not be reflected until at least next year." A domestic mobile phone supplier revealed to All Weather Technology that they provide RF-related parts to several mainstream domestic manufacturers. "We are not optimistic about the market this year. During the meeting, the estimate of mobile phone sales can be said to be quite conservative."