Xiaomi Is in 'War of Life and Death' With Apple (pcmag.com) 56
Apple faces competition from many different brands all offering Android alternatives, but Xiaomi looks to be the most determined to beat it in the high-end phone market. From a report: As the South China Morning Post reports, Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun posted on the microblogging platform Weibo on Tuesday, stating, "[We aim to] fully benchmark against Apple in [terms of] product and experience, and become China's biggest high-end brand in the next three years." Lei Jun isn't classing this as just a competition, though, it's "a war of life and death" apparently. That claim is backed up by some serious investment promises being made by the company. As MacRumors reports, Xiaomi already operates 10,000 retail stores in China, but intends to increase that to 30,000 by 2025. Competing with and beating Apple means producing smartphones that outperform the iPhone in all areas, so Xiaomi is investing $16 billion in research and development over the next five years.
I wish them luck with that (Score:4, Insightful)
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... and a video-chat service like FaceTime, and home accessories like AppleTV and the speakers and all HomeKit stuff, and everything is tightly integrated and backwards compatible with older devices which will al get at least 5 years of updates. ...
If you want a good and supported Android Phone you get a Pixel
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Yep, I was thinking along these lines.
They can do all they want to make a high end phone, but in the end, it will still be running Android and all the problems that come with that.
Lack of updates and longer term support along with less user friendly are the first
back to the megahertz myth (Score:3)
Sigh. I guess people just ownt ever figgure out that faster clock speeds, more ram, or number of cpu isn't everything about performance. Not sure if it's still true but a while back it was certainly true that the Dalvic/Java on androids used far more ram and was slower than Apple's phones. How you handle backround apps memory management is very critical. It's why for example apple has a notification system that can manage the apps business without being resident, and thus keep power and memory use down.
Re:back to the megahertz myth (Score:4, Informative)
This has been a debate in computing for generations.
Why get a PowerPC Mac at 500mhz while the latest Intel has 1ghz
Why get a Sun Ultrasparc system for a server where you can a PC Linux server for 1k less, and it has all the same specs.
Or RISC vs CISC if handling a lot of small actions is better than dealing with an optimized large action.
What is the answer? Well it depends on what type of computing you are doing. The PowerPC was better at image rendering, with its smaller pipeline giving an output faster with less unused actions in the pipeline. However the Intel could crunch numbers way faster, and faster general IO.
The Sun Ultrasparc can handle heavy system loads very graciously where even a maxed out system will run smoothly. While the PC Linux server will process the data and give you are response faster however when under load you are waiting to get your request out.
RISC things can be timed rather well and planned for multiple request. CISC can give you a real optimal result when you use the right instructions.
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One thing of note is that almost all RISC processors are pretty similar, while CISC processors vary tremendously. x86 is actually a pretty terrible CISC design, so in these situations, it's more fair to say x86 performance suffers from long pipelines, rather than CISC in general.
Just for kicks, I'm designing my own hobby CISC processor, and being careful to avoid the biggest mistakes of designs like x86 and 68K (as well as mistakes in RISC designs, like SuperH and MIPS).
Re: I wish them luck with that (Score:2)
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Xiaomi phones are already as good as Apple for build quality. Performance is up there too. Software is a bit mixed, sometimes less polished but always with a lot of features.
They have top notch cameras, regularly matching or exceeding Apple's on tests. They have all the features, turbo wireless charging, high frame rate screen, big battery...
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Especially since high-end consumer products aren't about how much money you invest into them. It's about finding the right designer, the right marketer, etc.
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High-end has never been China's strong point (Score:3, Insightful)
China has done great in low and middle-end markets, but the high-end keeps eluding them. If I were a rich company in China looking to expand, the high-end should *not* be my first choice, based on history. Conquer the middle first, like Honda did, and IT it goes smooth, have an Acura equivalent.
Correction (Score:1)
Re: "and IT it goes smooth", should be "IF".
(Work-memo writing habits leaked in. Why didn't the AI catch that?)
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High End isn't hard, but it requires a marketing push. Just take some extra time in QC, add a few deluxe features and you are good to go. The real trick is marketing to make people want it, vs just comparing price tags and features.
The thing with phones, is that they are rather cheap anyways. Sure 1.5k for a phone is a lot. However for most people (especially with a payment plan) isn't going to break the bank, so one might as well splurge for the top of the line. Because of this, a Smart phone is no lon
Brand Name (or company name) (Score:3)
Maybe they can start with a name that people can pronounce easily.
If I can't read your company or product name, I'm probably not going to buy your product.
Re:Brand Name (or company name) (Score:4, Funny)
I agree, and this is why I will never drive a Koenigsegg.
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On the other hand, if they can't pronounce your brand name, it will make it more difficult to ban you for being totally involved with the chinese communist party's spy department. They eventually got there with Hotwife (Huawei).
Re: Brand Name (or company name) (Score:3)
Not literally stated here but they mainly mean Chinese consumers. Apple has like a 30% market volume here. As more people achieve a higher standard of living, more buy it as a status symbol. Xiaomi's move is basically to brand themselves as a higher status symbol to the Chinese and thus eat part of Apple's share of the market.
They already create some absurd phones, like I believe they have the phone with the highest megapixels of any phone but beyond anything necessary (e.g. can see the composite eye on a f
Re: Brand Name (or company name) (Score:2)
No, not going to buy an Asus either. It's too much like Anus.
They need a name like... (Score:2)
Re:Brand Name (or company name) (Score:5, Informative)
It's pronounced, using more English standards: shau-mee.
Pinyin uses letter that look like English but aren't directly correlated, because there's some sounds in Chinese that aren't the same in English. For example, the "xi-" part of "xiao" sounds like "sh" but put your tongue near the front of your mouth; it's a bit higher pitch and is more like a hiss. "Sh-" in pinyin however sounds like "sh" in English but with your tongue further back; it's a much deeper sound of the "sh".
Re: Brand Name (or company name) (Score:2)
Nobody cares
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Apple isn't very obvious in many places where English common. Japanese doesn't even have an L sound.
It just needs the right marketing.
Re: Brand Name (or company name) (Score:2)
I never said anything about immigrants. I don't care about their names or what they call themselves -
Except the one I married.
Nice try.
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Maybe they can start with a name that people can pronounce easily.
If I can't read your company or product name, I'm probably not going to buy your product.
Cuz you ain't their target market.
Xiaomi is extremely easy to pronounce by their target audience.
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Just call it a "Xi phone"
But who will they copy? (Score:4, Funny)
If they become #1, who will they copy?
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I do have to wonder - why do they have to "beat" Apple? Why can't they just coexists and serve different parts of the market?
Why does it always have to be hostile competition between nations or companies? Why do we have to measure everything in terms of "beating" another group?
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Because honking on about beating Apple makes their cowboy hat look just a little bit taller.
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I do have to wonder - why do they have to "beat" Apple? Why can't they just coexists and serve different parts of the market?
Because Apple's part of the market is where all the profits are.
They already have features that exceed Apples. Cameras being one example. They just want the luxury status, so they can get the luxury profits.
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They don't copy, they innovate. Look at their phones, they are doing stuff that their rivals aren't. Their vacuum cleaners have a better cyclone system than Dyson does. They make a lot of nice gadgets too, they are the first to make a decent electric screwdriver that is suitable for delicate work.
Re: But who will they copy? (Score:1)
Xiaomi Is in 'War of Life and Death' With ... meh (Score:2)
I guess to try and equate the future of something like smart phones with ones own anecdotal experience, is not a good idea... but hell, whatever...
My anecdotal experience is I have seen no reason to upgrade my phone, for the last 4 years.
The only reason I would do so, is if I broke the damn thing.
There are many signs this is the same feeling playing out across the globe - that we reached "peak smartphone" a few years back, that most consumers see no reason to upgrade, because the performance of their mobile
They build Android phones (Score:2)
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They are building for the Chinese market. They can count on the CCP throwing up obstacles to their foreign competition.
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iOS (Score:2, Funny)
How will they get away with using iOS on their phone? There's no way they can compete with that Android shit.
Apple is more than the iPhone (Score:3, Insightful)
which a lot of people and organisations seem to forget.
The Apple Ecosystem is what they should be aiming at however, that takes a lot of time, effort and will to even get close.
Others have tried so I wish them luck.
They might win over Apple in China but there is no way in hell that I'm running an Android device other than the tablet that allows me to control my heating from the kitchen(the thermostat is made by Ring). That device is not used for anything else.
1970's Japenese cars suck! (Score:2)
American dominance in automobiles is assured as those Japanese cars, which are just crappy junk that are cheap ripoff of cars we decided not to produce.
1980's Japanese cars are dominating our market. These fuel efficient and peppy cars are impossible for us to catch up with, and they don't break down so they are keeping them for longer.
I don't like the Chinese government, however don't dismiss Chinese industry just because you don't like the government, or because in the past it created crap.
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The interesting difference between Japan and China is that the Japanese industry was the Japanese industry. Chinese industry is the whole damn globe's industry.
Who the hell would underestimate that?
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The Chinese have decided that the rest of the world doesn't matter and now that they have a lot of money they are acting like they own everything and everyone is nothing more than a Mine or farm they can take and have tried to flex their economic muscle to bully trading partners. https://www.news.com.au/financ... [news.com.au]
The world is noticing and started to re
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It's more like, we doubt their success because their approach is wrong. Honda didn't say, "We need to destroy Ford or we will die!" They didn't declare a massive investment into ICEs all at once, they made incremental improvements and took a good chunk of the market.
Looks and specs will mean nothing (Score:2)
if Xiaomi can't claim the privacy crown as well - even in China! Well, it's an Android phone ... no one will believe any privacy marketing claims. It'll need independent critical acclaim to break through on that front.
Future (Score:2)
The future of phones is foldable. Anyone who has seen the Galaxy ZFold 3 knows that. But then, the future of communication is VR .. but not for a few years they have to eliminate the visible gap between pixels and also increase the resolution to at least 8k per eye (or rather, pixels per degree to 60+.)
Xiaomi is getting into foldable, but appears to be totally ignoring VR whereas Apple is developing it. Apple sees into the future whereas Xiaomi needs be shown the future.
Apple spends more than that on R&D... (Score:1)
Free Peng Shuai! (Score:1)
Remember Tiananmen Square! (Score:1)
Happy customer (Score:1)
Enemy of the State (Score:2)
They need to be careful.. Next thing you know some phone calls and meetings will have happened.. And they'll be banned in the US.
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