html November 13th news, recently, NIO officially announced that it will hold the NIO Day 2022 press conference on Hefei Binhu International Convention and Exhibition Center on December 24th. It is reported that NIO will release two new models on this NIO Day, one of which is the facelifted NIO ES8, and NIO's first smartphone will be released in the first half of next year.
(Picture source: NIO official website)
As a new front-line car manufacturing force in China, NIO announced its plan to enter the smartphone market as early as the beginning of this year. In August this year, NIO also registered NIO Mobile Technology Co., Ltd., and it is not difficult to see that NIO is preparing to enter the smartphone industry. Judging from the latest changes in industrial and commercial information, the project is progressing smoothly, which also indicates that NIO's first smartphone will be unveiled soon.
In fact, new energy vehicle companies cross-border mobile phone manufacturing is no longer a new thing. The leading new energy vehicle Tesla has also expressed its entry into the smartphone market. Of course, these car companies have the capital and strength to do a good job in this field. After all, compared with making cars, making mobile phones is undoubtedly simpler and not that difficult. However, NIO does not really want to achieve high sales in the smartphone market, because the " inverter " in the mobile phone market is too serious at this stage, and it is difficult for NIO to gain a greater advantage when entering the market.
(Picture source: NIO official Weibo)
The original intention of NIO to make mobile phones is actually to improve user experience and make NIO's intelligent ecological layout more perfect. You should know that as an important device for connecting to a car, many functions of smartphones can be completed by smartphones, such as the "digital keys" and "contactless opening of car doors" that car companies focus on research. Therefore, NIO is thinking of launching smart devices to realize many linkage functions.
In addition, NIO makes mobile phones to prevent them from being "bottled" by smartphone manufacturers. According to the car owner survey report released by NIO Auto , 50% of NIO users use iPhone, and Apple is unwilling to open the UWB permissions, which leads to NIO being very passive, and many highly practical functions can only be delayed. Therefore, NIO will deploy the mobile phone industry to build a smarter and more complete ecosystem. Objectively speaking, NIO still has the ability to make mobile phones, but whether it can create a highly competitive mobile phone remains to be discussed.
(Picture source: NIO official Weibo)
Of course, Will NIO mobile phone arrive as scheduled? There is still a big question mark now. After all, NIO has not achieved profitability so far. Judging from the third quarter financial report released by NIO, every time you sell a car, you will lose 130,000 yuan. Not long ago, NIO planned to launch several mid- and low-end sub-brands in 2023 to seize the market and spread the costs equally. From this point of view, next year will be a very critical year for NIO. As for whether it will free up time and energy to explore new areas, such as releasing the first NIO mobile phone, or displaying the concept products of NIO life at fashion week, it remains to be verified.
(Cover image source: NIO official Weibo)
