Marketing Strategy of Chinese Smartphone Brands – A Case Study of Xiaomi

• Main Authors: Hsieh, Chin Yu, 謝沁妤
• Other Authors: Chiu, Hung Chang
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/y9at4v

碩士 === 國立清華大學 === 經營管理碩士在職專班 === 103 === In 2007, Apple launched the first generation of “I-Phone”, and there were thousands of Apple Fans in US queued for buying in front of the Apple Store and AT&T for days, even some of the media called it “Jesus Phone”. Apple not only raised the fanaticism of smart phone, but also initiated the technology revolution in the mobile phone industry. Afterwards, the legacy global mobile phone brands, such as Samsung, LG, Sony, and HTC, also the China local brands, like Hua-Wei, Lenovo, ZTE, and CoolPad, even including the emerging brands, XiaoMi, MeiZu, ViVo, OPPO, and Gionee, were all jumping into the smart phone industry, and starting the war of industrial standards and business model. It rises and falls so dramatically in those smart phone brands, however, the China makers are growing rapidly through the tremendous domestic market demand, the government’s subsidies and supports, the complete supply chain, and the intensive innovations. There were 6 of the top 10 worldwide smart phone makers were China brands in just 6 to 7 years by 2014. Most of them were appealing their customer values by the product differentiation, but XiaoMi caused the so-called “XiaoMi whirlwind” by its innovative business models and marketing strategies. It ranked the world’s sixth largest smart phone makers in 2014, after the release of their first generation of smart phone in just two and a half years. This research starts with the external environmental analysis and “Porter’s Five Forces Model” to come out a general industry overview, and extends with XiaoMi’s innovative business models and marketing strategies to verify their core competence thoroughly. Also, we benchmark with the leading smart phone brand, Apple, to generate XiaoMi’s SWOT analysis, and finally propose the strategic recommendations for how to win more customer trust to enhance the market share, brand image and influence.