Why do individuals and institutional investors love mobile phones so much?

An outsider claims to make the best mobile phone in the world? Luo Yonghao's dream may not be empty talk, at least the investors behind him think so.

Recently, Zheng Gang, who is certified as the founding managing partner of Zihui Investment Fund on Weibo, said that he would increase his investment in Hammer by 100 million yuan. He had invested 40 million yuan in Hammer in the angel round. Looking at the mobile phone camp that has emerged in the past six months, it is not difficult to find the shadow of capital behind them. For example, Meitu Software and Blue Magic Tablet received nearly 10 million US dollars in investment from investors when they were preparing to enter the mobile phone field.

Why is capital so fond of the mobile phone industry? Perhaps there is something else besides the "trend" effect.

Mobile phones are also a capital game

As early as the era when counterfeit mobile phones were rampant, businessmen from all over the country with a keen sense of the market began to enter the mobile phone industry.

An industry insider familiar with the situation said that in the era of feature phones, influenced by the telecommunications reform and other factors, the copycat community in South China was mainly dominated by people from Fujian. However, after the reform of the telecommunications industry, especially in the process of transitioning from feature phones to smartphones , the influence of Chaozhou businessmen began to gradually emerge. They have experienced the most complex industrial changes and formed the most powerful basic force to date.

In addition to this, there is another force coming from Wenzhou businessmen.

"Wenzhou businessmen have a natural sense of investment." Zhou Dewen, president of the Wenzhou Small and Medium Enterprises Development Promotion Association, told the reporter of the First Financial Daily that in the past, a group of merchants who made counterfeit mobile phones gathered in Pingyang, Wenzhou, and a certain industrial chain had been formed locally. "Most of them have no brand and are sold very cheaply, usually only 400 to 500 yuan for a mobile phone." Zhou Dewen told the reporter.

What is not known to outsiders is that in the late 1990s, many people in Shuiting and Shitang, Pingyang, Wenzhou, were engaged in the processing of mobile phone parts and accessories. At that time, they mainly produced mobile phone leather cases, pendants and other peripheral products. Later, this group of people gradually moved to Shenzhen to develop and got involved in the processing and production of mobile phone parts and accessories. At that time, as the largest sales distribution center for mobile phone parts and accessories in China, more than 70% of the dealers on the Electronic Street of Shenzhen Huaqiang North Road were from Pingyang, Wenzhou. The mobile phone parts and leather cases they produced were in short supply.

In the past four years, Wenzhou funds have begun to shift and enter the smartphone field, but this batch of funds focuses more on channels and terminals.

"When this industry matures, it enters the game of capital. This is related to the operational characteristics of the Shanzhai clusters in South China." The above-mentioned industry insiders believe that the essence of Shanzhai lies in the efficiency of capital operation, that is, the account period, and of course there is also a spirit of contract involved.

However, since last year, for Wenzhou people who have been suffering from the collapse of usury, the slashing of the property market, and the guarantee chain crisis for two or three years, the mobile phone supply chain crisis is no longer a term in the publications, but a reality that must be faced every day. Previously, this newspaper had reported on the problems in Dongguan Zhaoxin's supply chain. The delayed payment mentioned in it is a common phenomenon in the mobile phone industry, but once a problem occurs, it will affect the upstream and downstream companies in the entire chain. For a period of time, many companies with broken capital chains had Wenzhou capital background.

"We have also tried to help some companies transform and move towards branding, but it is not easy," Zhou Dewen told reporters.

When the mobile phone industry is no longer just a game of hardware and supply chain, investors and institutions that are better at playing with Internet models have begun to rise to the top, and what they focus more on is the "hot spot" position of mobile phones in the future.

Gambling on the “trend”

According to the forecast of IDC, a research organization, the shipment of smartphones in China in 2014 was 420 million, up 19.9% ​​year-on-year; in 2015, although the shipment of smartphones in China will reach 450 million, continuing to be the world's largest smartphone market, the growth rate will obviously decline to 7.8%, the first time the growth rate has dropped to single digits since 2009. However, even so, it has not dampened investors' enthusiasm for the mobile phone industry.

Why is capital so fond of the mobile phone industry? Industry insiders have concluded that the industry chain of smartphones and mobile Internet represented by Apple is still optimistic. Capital first values ​​the accessories and supporting industries with growth potential in local brands and copycat phones, secondly, high-end industries such as chip design supported by national policies, and finally, asset-light opportunities such as mobile Internet application development on mobile phones.

"The mobile phone market has a huge capacity and is a necessity. Although the competition is fierce, there are still great opportunities." Xia Zuoquan, one of the founders of BYD and an investor of Blue Magic, told the reporter of China Business News that mobile phones also have the pressure to make profits. Blue Magic is currently conducting in-depth strategic cooperation with BYD. 70% of the work on Blue Magic's first product, including technology research and development, hardware, underlying software, and assembly, was completed by BYD.

Xia Zuoquan is one of the three core founders of BYD and is still a non-executive director of BYD. According to information disclosed in BYD's previous financial reports, Xia holds about 120 million shares of BYD, ranking third after Wang Chuanfu and Lv Xiangyang as its third largest natural person shareholder. In the 2014 Forbes China Rich List, Xia Zuoquan ranked 220th with a fortune of 6.12 billion yuan.

As an investor in Meitu mobile phones, angel investor Cai Wensheng publicly stated that he did not place Meitu mobile phones in such an important strategic position and only regarded them as a complement to Meitu software.

"The core of Meitu is not the mobile phone, and a beauty phone cannot replicate Xiaomi 's success. But the Meitu software can be used by people all over the world, including users of Apple, Samsung , ZTE, and Huawei. We have always wanted to use the Meitu software to change the world and capture more than 1 billion users. The mobile phone is just a supporting tool," said Cai Wensheng.

However, some industry insiders have commented that, looking at the development of the mobile phone industry over the past few years, when an industry enters a mature stage and starts competing on price and hardware, its reliance on the capital chain becomes more and more serious, and the investment of capital itself is more like a gamble with little chance of winning. As a new player in the mobile phone industry, you should be clearly aware of this.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.