With MIUI lacking innovation, how long can Xiaomi's high valuation last?

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At Xiaomi's autumn conference on August 13, MIUI 7 was released as scheduled, while Xiaomi 5 was delayed again, replaced by Redmi Note 2 and Xiaomi Router Youth Edition. At the conference, Lei Jun said that MIUI has a 750-person R&D team, and the number of global networked activated users has exceeded 150 million, with users distributed in 156 countries and regions around the world. In addition, Lei Jun described the changes in MIUI 7 as more beautiful, faster, and more economical.
MIUI 7 lacks innovation

It is reported that MIUI 7 adds four sets of system UI for different groups of people, designs a new global large font, and releases new features such as baby album, caller show, and Xiaomi roaming. In addition, MIUI 7 also optimizes the system response speed and background power saving. Xiaomi said that after the optimization, the system response speed is increased by more than 30% and the battery life is extended by more than 25%.

Frankly speaking, MIUI 7 released four official personalized system UIs, which are more like a theme, targeting goddess version, girl version, boy version and light luxury version. Designing a theme for each user segment and allowing users to freely choose when booting the phone, can this be considered innovative? Recalling the time when Lei Jun offered a reward for a wallpaper for MIUI, Xiaomi's continuous investment in UI is no longer innovative.

If we talk about innovation, the baby album is still a good innovation. As for the caller show and Xiaomi roaming, these can be said to be the leftovers of other manufacturers. From the functional point of view, Xiaomi roaming in MIUI 7 is exactly the same as Huawei's Skylink. A year ago, Huawei had already launched an overseas data roaming service for domestic mobile phone users, and Xiaomi launched this service a full year later. Can such innovation be called innovation?

As for the faster running speed and longer battery life of MIUI 7, whether it can be regarded as an improvement needs further verification. As we all know, Android 5.0 has made significant improvements in running speed and battery life, and MIUI 7 is a deeply customized system based on Android 5.0.

In order to show off the fast running speed of MIUI 7, Lei Jun did not run the test as usual, but tested it by grabbing red envelopes. Could it be that Lei Jun has no confidence in the running score of MIUI? In terms of battery life, it competed with its competitors. How the actual battery life will be improved remains to be observed.

From the perspective of some functions, MIUI 7 has no innovations that will make Mi fans scream compared to previous generations. Innovations such as Xiaomi Roaming are already a year behind its competitors. MIUI 7, which once made Xiaomi proud, is now facing a crisis of lack of innovation. Frankly speaking, the innovation crisis encountered by MIUI 7 is also a natural law after MIUI has gone through multiple version upgrades.
Xiaomi's mobile phone advantage is gradually losing

Four years ago, Xiaomi phones could indeed be called "born for enthusiasts", and high cost performance became the core competitiveness of Xiaomi phones. Under fierce competition, the high cost performance label of Xiaomi phones has been torn off bit by bit. Putting aside the Xiaomi Note, a high-end product, the Redmi series, which was once known as a price killer, no longer has the edge to kill its competitors.

After the MIUI 7 conference, Redmi Note 2 was released as scheduled. According to the information released at the conference, Redmi Note 2 is equipped with MediaTek's MT6795 octa-core processor, 2G memory and 16G storage space, and is priced at 799 yuan. At the end of last month, Meizu launched the Meizu Blue 2, which has almost the same configuration except for the processor, and is priced at only 599 yuan. Considering that Meizu Blue 2 is also equipped with MediaTek's octa-core processor, it is difficult for ordinary consumers to feel the difference. With a price difference of 200 yuan, the advantage of Redmi Note 2 is not obvious.

In addition to Meizu, the Dashen Note 3, which has been on the market, has a mobile version with fingerprint recognition and is only priced at 899 yuan, which undoubtedly puts the Redmi Note 2 in a very embarrassing position. From the perspective of cost performance, the price of Redmi Note 2 is not the highest in the industry, and its configuration is not the most powerful in the industry.

Compared with Lenovo's Lemon and Honor 4X, the Redmi Note 2's advantage is not too obvious. At least, the Redmi Note 2 is no longer worthy of the title of "price butcher". Without the halo of cost-effectiveness, the biggest advantage of the Redmi Note 2 is that there is no need to rush to buy it, and you can directly buy it in large quantities.

In the high-end product line, Xiaomi Note has no cost-effectiveness. In the high-end market with many competitors, Xiaomi Note can only hold press conferences to show its presence, which is unprecedented in Xiaomi's history. Xiaomi Note has been released 8 times, which is a signal that Xiaomi's mobile phone advantages are gradually losing.

How can Xiaomi compete with Honor, Meizu and other big brands when it loses its advantage in the low-end and high-end mobile phone markets? Meanwhile, LeEco tries to make its mobile phones free by using the annual membership fee to offset the cost of mobile phone purchases, which completely crushes Xiaomi's price advantage. Of course, LeEco's current mobile phone volume is not enough to compete with Xiaomi, but LeEco is definitely a strong rival that Xiaomi cannot ignore, because LeEco's mobile phones are imitating Xiaomi's strategy of using low prices to occupy the market.

Written in the latest: With its low price, Xiaomi mobile phone has subverted the domestic smart phone industry and made Xiaomi the most cost-effective mobile phone brand in China. After a few years, Xiaomi's high cost-effectiveness advantage has been subverted by its competitors with low prices. In addition, how to maintain the viscosity of MIUI 7, which has not escaped the law of lack of innovation, is also a test for Xiaomi. Among Xiaomi's three pillars, mobile phones and MIUI have encountered development bottlenecks in their progress. Does this mean that Xiaomi's high valuation of 50 billion US dollars is also in jeopardy?