Posted on 01/16/2015 11:11:53 PM PST by Swordmaker
Remember when Samsung was the new Apple? Well, that little bit of wishful thinking has run its current course, and now it's time for the next "new Apple." It's a company called Xiaomi, and you may have seen all kinds of coverage on the company's new (supposed) iPhone-killer, the Xiaomi Mi Note.
This device is a sleek beauty with specs that best many of the specs in the iPhone 6 plus. And it's cheap, at roughly $370 in China. The iPhone 6 Plus is roughly a grand.
Here's a promo video for the device:
You Tube of the Xiaomi Mi Note.
Like most of Xiaomi's smartphones, the Mi Note is a great looking device. It's one of the best looking Android phablets on the market at any price, let alone the dirt cheap price point Xiaomi charges.
But make no mistake about it. It's no iPhone-killer, and Xiaomi itself is no Apple. Xiaomi might be a new Samsung, but I have my doubts about even that. Allow me to explain.
Xiaomi got its start in the Smartphone business (like Samsung) aping Apple. The CEO of the company held press events modeled after Apple's, and he dressed like Steve Jobs. The company's early products often (though not always) looked like Apple's iPhones, enough so to get Sir Jony Ive riled up.
In response to a question about this so-called "Apple of China" at the Vanity Fair Conference in October, 2014, Sir Jony said,
I'll stand a little bit harsh, I don’t see it as flattery. When you’re doing something for the first time, you don’t know it’s gonna work, you spend 7 or 8 years working on something, and then it’s copied. I think it is really straightforward. It is theft and it is lazy. I don’t think it is OK at all.
In a word, Sir Jony: word.
Well, two words. Theft and lazy. Those two words cut to the chase. When you're stealing—or at least borrowing—from your betters, you're not an Apple. When you're lazy—when you don't go through the hard steps necessary to invent stuff on your own—you're no Apple.
You're more like a Samsung.
Apples and Oranges
But even there, Xiaomi comes up short. All of the issues between Apple and Samsung and their epic patent war aside, Samsung pays royalties on standards essential patents (SEPs). Of course, Samsung has a vested stake in the SEP system because it owns so many SEPs, but the point is that Xiaomi doesn't yet pay.
That has flown in China, but it's already having problem in other markets. The company got several models thrown out of India, for instance, because it wasn't licensing a variety of patents necessary to be an accredited player in the smartphone market. Things are only going to get worse for Xiaomi as it tries to expand.
Xiaomi's prices (in China) are cheap not because it's magically better at designing and copying than everyone else, but because it's not paying all of its betters who make smartphones possible. I'm not talking about Apple, here, either. I'm talking about the work-a-day industry stalwarts who developed the technologies that become part of wireless standards.
China's IP laws are lax, especially when it's non-Chinese IP. Outside of China, the Samsungs and Ericcsens and Qualcomms and Nokias of the world get paid for their work.
OK, there's also the fact that, like Amazon, Xiaomi doesn't care about margins, but I think that's less important than Xiaomi's IP practices.
Xiaomi is playing a low-margin bottom feeder game of copying where it can, coasting on the rest of the industry where it can, and slapping retreads on a production jalopy and pretending its an Apple Edition Rolls Royce. Heck, Xiaomi doesn't even make its own operating the system. The company's devices run on Android.
That's not how to be an Apple, and the only people claiming otherwise have no understanding whatsoever of how Apple does what it does. To these folks, there's little difference between making something that looks like an Apple device and Apple making the real deal. Such people can't help it. It takes a bit of effort and some contemplation to realize why Apple is unlike any other company out there.
Reality Bites
Xiaomi's reality is that in order to enter most western markets the company is going to have to pony up to the SEP table. That means higher prices on its devices, eroding the company's perceived value outside of China. Again, that doesn't make Xiaomi the new Apple.
Companies like Xiaomi are little more than another flavor of every other Android maker out there. Each new player does something better than the others, gains a little share, maybe makes a little profit for a while, and then is usurped by the next. In the meantime, Apple keeps on truckin’.
Xiaomi can take share away from HTC, Samsung, LG, and every other Android Tom, Dick, and Harry, but that doesn't make it a threat to Apple. As Forbes's Tim Worstall put it, Xiaomi isn’t even in the same business as Apple.
One more thing: I said up front that the Xiaomi Mi Note looks good and has impressive specs. Both are true. But many Apple competitors have had some specs that are better than Apple's at one time or another, at least on paper. Some win here, some win there, but where Apple competes—at the high end of the market—it's about the experience. It's about how the device works as a whole.
There's nothing about the Xiaomi Mi Note that will change this part of the equation.
Xiaomi will enjoy success in China, as long as success isn't measured in profits. If it cleans up its IP act, it will enjoy (some) success in the rest of the world, too. But that success will come at Samsung's expense, not Apple’s.
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The author looks gayer than Tim Cooks. Author wears two hoop earnings. The only reason I looked up his image was this article’s tone made me suspicious//// Xiomi has a good business model for less developed nations beyond patent laws. Like I give a bleep they don’t pay Tim Cooks any royalties.....lol
A £30,000 copycat Rolls-Royce? It must be made in China
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1172635/A-30-000-copycat-Rolls-Royce-It-China.html
It is not APPLE that is suing Xiaomi for patent infringement, Dennis. It is Ericsson, Microsoft, Cisco, Nokia, and a host of other companies. Apple has basically ignored Xiaomi, except for Jony Ives' bitter statement at their ripping off his designs. You aren't paying attention. The author of this story is saying the same thing as a lot of other pundits and analysts as well. Xiaomi cannot compete in the world market without paying the SEP royalties. If they try they will be sued into bankruptcy. The ONLY reason they have been successful so far is the lax IP courts in China. . . and even they are starting to crack down on IP Law.
One saving grace I see for Xiaomi is that they are, for the first time, NOT COPYING their designs from Apple. The Xiaomi mi Note is actually a very nice looking phablet. Up until this year, their designs and even their phone names names aped Apple's models and designs, down to the "skins" they put on their version of Android to make it look as much like iOS as possible.
“The author looks gayer than Tim Cooks. Author wears two hoop earnings. The only reason I looked up his image was this article’s tone made me suspicious///...”
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So, you’re attracted to that sort of thing? Not that there’s anything wrong with it. /s
Apple....official computer of the fruitcake communuity
“This is the beginning of a new day.
God has given me this day to use as I will.
I can waste it or use it for good...”
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So, you’ve chosen to waste this God given day on gratuitous insults of users of Apple products. The founders would be so proud of you.
If you really want to shame me, buy me one of those iMac Retina 5k thingies with an i7 and 16 gig of ram...that would really make me feel bad...
You are likely correct. Right now Xiaomi is bringing lots of cash in a way that is not entirely kosher....With Xiaomi not caring about patent laws. It will invest this money in becoming stronger and better to the point they will sell everywhere in the world and obey patent laws.
IOW operate guerrilla fashion now and legit later. Time is on their side due to Chinese and Asians getting more prosperous. Xiaomi sells in Burma or Thailand? I doubt patent laws are enforced there. Apple is for the status seeking mincing elites of the First World. Like this clown/fruitcake/reviewer with his two hoop earrings.
The rest of the world is more practical
An example of dennisw’s acute knowledge of the Asian market:
“You obviously don’t know how big Manny Pacquiao is across Asia. Billions of Asians are going buy HP’s TouchPad due to him. Apple will lose 98% of their Asian sales. HP is in very very close cooperation with the Taiwanese geniuses producing a superior product. They have torn part hundreds of iPads and know what makes them tick. They know how to make it all work better and the result is the HP TouchPad”
My words were prophetic. Just give Xiomi a few years. Lenovo too
You don’t give a bleep, huh? That is little mind thinking. Do you work for free? Do you give away your IP?
Imagine if IP laws were not vigorously enforced and IP theft were more rampant than it is. What would happen to the incentive to innovate? It would evaporate overnight and risk capital would dry up. New product flow would end. Do you really want that? Or are you just making ignorant remarks to just hear yourself babble?
Lenovo has come along way and Xiami will prolly do the same.
If they come up with some truly outstanding hardware designs, they might do well. And if I were running Android, my preference would be for a vanilla Google install (though I haven’t used any of the vendor UIs much).
The problem is, absent some really compelling hardware designs, they’re competing in a commodified market with razor-thin margins, and if they want to compete in markets where they’ll have to pay for patent licensing, they’ll have to squeeze profits from somewhere else.
So did the HP Touchpad really achieve 98% market share in Asia that somehow no one including HP heard about? Or is there a future Touchpad lurking out there like the 13th imam?
Just give Xiomi a few years. Lenovo too
The iPod/Phone/Pad killer is about 2-3 years away, and always will be.
My Lenovo A9, purchased 3 years ago, killed the iPhone. I.e., for $300 more the iPhone was dead to me.
We got Fire Phones. When we compared prices on our AT&T plan we could've had the latest Android for 200 bucks and a two year plan or an Iphone 6 for 400 bucks and a two year plan or the Fire phone for 99 cents and a 1 year plan. It was a a simple choice for us.
Now our friends who swore by iPhones and were going to upgrade to the six went with the Fire Phone once they saw ours.. They actually ended up getting a cheaper plan over what they had with the iPhone 5.
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