Rebirth of England

On October 15, Dopod, a subsidiary of Honor Electronics, launched their first smartphone powered by Android system, Smart 1. This phone only has an 8GB version, is made of all engineering plastics, and comes in black. Its price is only $349.

You know, before October, Apple reduced the price of its iPhone by $100, so at this time their 4GB version of the iPhone 1 is priced at $399, and the 8GB version is priced at $499.

The Smart 1 launched by Dopod only has an 8GB version, and its price is even $50 cheaper than the 4GB version of the IPhone 1 at this time, which can be said to be very cost-effective.

And although the public price of Smart 1 is US$349, contract phones launched by operators such as O2 Telecom and T-Mobile need to be bundled with a package for at least two years, so the price is even only US$299—— The operator has reached an agreement with Dopod on the price and will compensate them part of the amount themselves.

The reason why the price of Dopod Smart 1 can be reduced to such a low price and there is considerable profit is not only because the material of its body is made of engineering plastics, which makes the relative cost lower, but also because the internal parts of Smart 1 are large-scale. It uses products from Chinese domestic manufacturers. Compared with the two models of mobile phones, IPhone and Mate, the cost is significantly reduced.

As we all know, at this time in 2007, China's supply chain for counterfeit mobile phones was already very complete with Shenzhen City as the center.

Well, the reason why they are called "copycat mobile phones" is that after the mass production of MediaTek mobile phone chips, the era of copycat phones in Huaqiangbei, Shenzhen City began to arrive - at that time, MediaTek chips integrated camera, video, and MP3, and the factory As long as the casing and battery are made, they can be sold. Therefore, many factories do not put the factory name on the mobile phone. Instead, they often use the letters SZ instead, indicating that they are produced in Shenzhen. Later, they were pronounced as "copycat".

But even though it started to rise in 2003, by 2007, the manufacturers of these accessories were still mixed.

After HTC was acquired and renamed Honor Electronics, they dedicated a part of their funds to screen some mobile phone accessories manufacturers near Shenzhen City, selected those that were more standardized and had better quality control, and conducted funding Support, list them as their partners, and help them improve their technology - after all, the Philips-related patented technology purchased by Honor Electronics is relatively advanced.

At present, Dopod's Smart 1 has begun to use accessories from these manufacturers to reduce the cost of the product. When its quality can be further improved, subsequent mobile phone models of the Honor brand will gradually increase the use of accessories in this process chain.

Of course, for example, for mobile phone touch screens, currently none of China's domestic products can meet the standards. The mainstream suppliers in the market are still Sharp, Samsung and LG, and Dopod Smart 1 is still only one of them. Choose the slightly more cost-effective LG touch screen instead of the Mate 1's Sharp screen.

It is also worth mentioning that after the price of the iPhone was reduced, hundreds of consumers who bought the iPhone 1 at the original price sent emails to Apple to express their dissatisfaction, which forced Jobs to hold a press conference in which he addressed these consumers. The consumers apologized and compensated these consumers with $100 Apple Store vouchers.

In this regard, Honor Electronics went a step further and announced that its Mate 1 has also been reduced in price by US$100, and users who have purchased it before can go directly to the experience store or operator where they purchased it to get a US$100 refund. This directly increased the favorability of its users.

At the same time, Honor Electronics announced that it will release the latest Mate 1S mobile phone before Christmas on December 20.

Compared with Mate 1, Mate 1S mobile phone will only have a 16GB version, which adds support for 3G networks.

And the Mate 1S mobile phone will be equipped with a front-facing camera for the first time. They will provide a 50-megapixel front camera and a 2-megapixel rear camera.

Yes, both the previously launched IPhone 1 and Mate 1 only had a 2-megapixel rear camera, instead of the front + rear dual cameras that became popular later.

The price of Mate 1S is set at US$599, and the price of their contracted phones with mobile operators will be lower - after all, the 3G package itself is not cheap.

But even at $599, compared to the 8GB version of the IPhone 1 released at that time, one is that their memory was expanded to 16GB, a 3G network was added, and there was a front-facing camera, which can be said to be very attractive.

As soon as this news from Honor Electronics is announced, I am afraid that it is not just Apple that wants to curse, but also mobile phone manufacturers such as Samsung, Motorola, and Sony Ericsson. Looking at the configurations and prepared pricing of their upcoming Android phone models... …

I'm afraid that when the time comes, I won't be able to compete with Mate 1S at all...

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On the operating system side, Android companies also announced the launch of their Android Store after Apple launched the Apple Store, and cooperated with Klarna to provide online payment functions in the Android Store.

Users can use Klarna Pay built into the new version of Android to purchase apps and related paid items in the Android Store, such as paying for props in some games.

Prior to this, Android Company had invested in Klarna and obtained 15% of the company's shares.

Klarna also launched their mobile version Klarna pay in early October, providing users with mobile payment functions. This in itself achieves the goal of making it easier for users to place orders on their mobile phones after Argos Retail Group launched the Argos app.

However, the previous IPhone and Mate mobile phones did not support 3G network functions, so users used the mobile APP to shop on Argos. The network was not ideal, and their pictures were loaded too slowly. As we all know, such as Argos.com Scale, when users browse, the number of pictures they need to view is very large.

Therefore, at present, there are not many users of Argos APP. This situation will only improve after the launch of mobile phone models that support 3G network.

Amazon currently operates in the UK, France and Germany. These three countries are also the largest markets for European e-commerce.

However, because Amazon's main focus is still on North America, the market share in Europe is not high and is suppressed by Argos.com.

But Barron has always been very wary of Amazon, so he will not relax the development of Argos.com and has continued to invest in the e-commerce industry of Argos Retail Group to maintain its advantage over Amazon.

Especially heavy asset investment in logistics and warehousing, which can be said to be the biggest moat in the e-commerce field - some start-ups may be able to gain attention through special sales methods at the beginning, but in the long run, users are using e-commerce for shopping The experience at the moment is the most important, and a complete logistics and distribution system is a very important part of providing users with a good shopping experience.

Currently in the UK, Ireland, France and Germany, Argos Retail Group has initially established a complete distribution network, covering most of their areas - of course, in some sparsely populated areas, the delivery time will definitely be relatively longer. Being able to get home within a week is considered fast.

However, in big cities, delivery within three days has basically been achieved, and in key cities such as London, Paris, and Berlin, same-day delivery is already normal.

Of course, this refers to Argos' self-operated products, and it will take much longer for the merchants they open to settle in.

Because Argos’ self-operated products are stocked in various warehouse centers, and the shipping locations of settled merchants are not necessarily...