Chapter 633 New Forces
“No matter what, it is impossible for Apple to monopolize the smartphone market...”
Following Barron’s words, Jobs also looked thoughtful.
As he said, although the sales of touch-screen smartphones from Apple and Honor Electronics have exceeded 10 million units each this year, the current mainstream of the market is still Nokia, Motorola, Samsung and other traditional feature phone brands.
For example, Nokia, the current “overlord” of mobile phones, announced sales of nearly 120 million units in the third quarter, and annual sales of more than 460 million units, accounting for nearly 40% of the global mobile phone share. Like The sales of Apple and Honor Electronics, not to mention Nokia, cannot even be compared to Samsung. As the second largest mobile phone manufacturer in the world at this time, Samsung has a market share of more than 16%.
Apple and Android are the future, but after all, the future has not yet arrived. Therefore, at this time, facing the more powerful traditional mobile phone manufacturers, Apple, Android and even Honor Electronics can be regarded as part of the "new forces" of mobile phones. What Barron means is that he doesn’t want a “new one” to happen at this time. Infighting among "powers" - competing with each other is also something that will happen after "old antiques" such as Nokia, Motorola, and Samsung are driven into history...
In the case of IPhone, after it became " "Arcade", we have to wait until the IPhone4 is launched.
Now, IPhone 3G and Mate series mobile phones have been praised by many users, but their user groups are still relatively limited compared to the entire mobile phone market.
What's more, even among the "new forces" of smartphones, Apple and Android are not the only ones - no matter whether they are more powerful, their share in the field of mobile operating systems is still lower than the two. Microsoft, or Google, which is about to join the mobile operating system chaos, are probably more threatening to Apple than the "newcomer" Android.
It seems that this meeting between Barron and Jobs still has some effects.
Although Apple and Android did not reach any specific cooperation agreement in the end, after that, the two parties had a tacit understanding and would conduct some "collaboration" in the field of touch-screen smartphones, and some aspects of patents would be carried out. Peer-to-peer cross-authorization.
After all, in terms of patents, Honor Electronics, for example, already has patent licenses purchased from Philips at a high price, and has not received many "attacks" from traditional mobile phone manufacturers. But Apple, so far, they It has been involved in many patent lawsuits.
This is also the reason why three years later, they will participate in the group acquisition of Nortel's patents.
……
“The employment situation in Silicon Valley is becoming more and more serious now. Many companies have gone bankrupt due to broken capital chains. Even those that can survive have chosen to close some projects and layoffs to tighten expenditures..."
Accompanied by Ivanta, Barron went to Woaw's headquarters building in Silicon Valley.
Downstairs of the building, Barron looked around. Silicon Valley was still prosperous, but he could clearly see that the expressions on the faces of people passing by in a hurry were much more different than a year or two ago. dignified.
“Compared to large companies, it is more difficult for start-ups, because although large companies like Woaw are subject to many restrictions, they at least still have some financing channels, but those start-ups , it can be said that unless it is a company that is very optimistic and has the potential to become a unicorn, it is already difficult to take out money from the pockets of venture capital..."
Because I manage IC Capital, Ivanta also feels this very deeply. Not only is it a well-known investment company, IC Capital receives countless emails from companies seeking investment every day, as well as visits... …
And the attitudes and requirements of start-ups have become lower and lower with the current economic situation...
"How's Woaw?" At this time, they had entered the building. Barron, Ivanta, and Sage Byrne, the CEO of Woaw's North American company, and a bodyguard were riding in the same elevator, and Barron question, this time directed at Sage Byrne.
“The impact of the crisis also involves many aspects. The most important thing is that our advertisers have become more cautious. Starting from today’s first quarter, our advertising revenue will increase. The growth trend is slowing down, and the situation is getting worse. According to the latest data, advertising revenue in the third quarter has dropped by more than 10% compared with the same period last year. It is foreseeable that the fourth quarter of this year will also be different. Wonderful, although we have used many methods to increase the enthusiasm of advertisers, but..."
Sage Byrne shrugged and said helplessly:
"The general environment of the market In this way, other companies including Google and Yahoo are in similar situations... Yahoo's situation is even worse. They directly fired the previous CEO, and Yang Zhiyuan had to personally save the crisis again. "
Sage is right. After the Internet winter of 2001, seven years later, the Internet industry was affected by the subprime mortgage crisis and once again ushered in a freezing moment.
Woaw's situation is not simply caused by the decline in advertising revenue. On the one hand, in accordance with Barron's requirements, they have invested a lot of manpower in developing the mobile Internet-whether it is Apple's iOS System, or Android system, Woaw is one of the first Internet companies to actively develop and optimize its APP.
But realistically speaking, after all, the current market share of Apple and Android is far from being as high as it will be in two or three years, and the returns it can bring to Woaw are limited.
In addition, in terms of research and development, Woaw has also been investing in the research and development of technologies such as cloud computing and streaming media. In these aspects, the investment is relatively large. It can be said that a considerable part of its previous income has been invested. It is under research and development, and although these technologies have achieved some results, they are still not yet ready to reap benefits.
Finally, there is YouTube. Last year, Woaw acquired YouTube from IC Capital. After acquiring this video sharing platform, Woaw also invested resources in YouTube, including a large number of funds.
Of course, the effect is also significant. YouTube's user growth is very satisfactory, and there is a good synergy with Woaw.com.
But for now, or for a long time, YouTube needs Woaw’s continued investment, and its advertising revenue is far from covering YouTube’s subsidies to content creators - Barron also knows, This is very necessary, and it is these content creators who ensure YouTube's competitiveness in the video platform field.
And as a video website, the operation of YouTube also requires high broadband costs and maintenance costs, which are not small expenses.
In his previous life, after Google acquired YouTube, it also continued to inject blood into it. This continued for many years before it started to make a profit...
"The same sentence, A crisis is not only a danger, but also an opportunity..."
Barron told Sage:
“Now is also an opportunity for Woaw to absorb some excellent personnel, and there are also some start-ups that can complement Woaw and can be acquired.”
Whether it is continuous research and development or support for projects such as YouTube, they are all layouts for the future of Woaw, so it is necessary to continue.
As for funds, Barron will solve this matter when he comes here this time.
(End of this chapter)