The economic downturn The home appliance industry wants to break the ice with the "Liuyang" strategy

Since the beginning of this year, the home appliance industry has experienced sluggish growth rate due to the withdrawal of stimulus policies and economic downward pressure. The lack of consumption has caused the production capacity of air conditioners, color TVs, and refrigerators to drastically decrease, and the industry's development is almost stagnant. Although another round of new home appliances policies has been introduced, it has not really reversed the trend of the industry. The home appliance industry has always been a competitive industry in Shandong, taking the road of diversified operations, increasing investment in R&D to transform into energy-saving directions, and actively expanding overseas markets. Obviously, Haier, Hisense, Aucma, and Nine Yang are the home appliances in Shandong. Manufacturing companies have already started the breakout fight in the "winter". In this "battle", they firmly believe that the winter is coming and spring is not far away.

We are all very sad that the economic downturn is affected by the decline in domestic economic growth and the impact of weak downstream demand. In the first half of this year, domestic appliance companies were not booming and the industry was generally in a downturn. According to the recent report released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in the January-April 2012 domestic appliance industry, the growth rate of China's home appliance industry has further slowed down. The growth rate has dropped from double digits in the same period of last year to single digits. In the report, the cumulative industrial sales value of the home appliance industry increased by 9.6% year-on-year. From January to April this year, the total profit of the home appliance industry rose by 10.8% over the previous year. The number of loss-making enterprises rose by 17.2% over the same period of last year. At the same time, according to important figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics for the first half of the national economy, the increase in household appliances was 3.3%, and the growth was weak.

“In the first half of this year, neither the household appliance companies nor the home appliance stores were optimistic.” During the interview, Tian Zhanjun, vice president of the Shandong Household Electrical Appliances Association, told the reporter that from the national statistical data, the first quarter of this year, home appliance manufacturers appeared. The decline rate of more than 10% has also seen a nearly 20% decline in exports. In response, Hong Shibin, deputy director of the Marketing Committee of the China Household Electrical Appliances Association, analyzed that a series of rigid demands, such as the cooling down of real estate and the ending of home appliances to the countryside, and the poor international environment such as U.S. debt and the European debt crisis have recently been reduced. The increase in the cost of human resources and other enterprises is the main reason for the decline in the overall growth rate of the home appliance industry.

Our reporter found during the interview that despite the fact that home appliance companies in the province are not willing to mention the word “downturn,” the overall weakness of the home appliance industry in the first half of this year is an indisputable fact. According to statistics, in the first quarter of this year, domestic sales of LCD TVs fell 15.84% year-on-year; refrigerator terminal sales fell 12.40% year-on-year; sales of washing machines and air conditioners shrank more than 20%. “Most branded home appliances have experienced negative growth in the first quarter of this year compared with the same period of last year, and they did not improve until May.” A person in charge of Hisense Group stated that almost all home appliance brands spend the first half of the year in the “downturn”. . And Zhao Yang, a responsible person of Jiuyang Co., Ltd., even said frankly, “The economic downturn has caused everyone to be very sad.” Many home appliance companies have had to find another way to supplement their main business.

To achieve diversification and turn is no longer "stand alone"

Looking at the history of Shandong brand appliances in recent years, it is not difficult to find that diversification has become their unanimous pace. In the face of the downturn in the home appliance market in the first half of this year, many home appliance companies have to find alternative ways to supplement their main business. Diversification has become a new strategy for some home appliance companies in the province to weather the winter. Like Joyoung has already removed the soymilk "single product king" hat, and quietly transformed into a leading brand of Chinese kitchen appliances.

According to reports, Jiuyang's involvement in the field of juicers and food processors is considered to be a diversification based on specialization. It is not difficult to find that from Soymilk to small household appliances, Nine Yang is achieving organic integration in category breakthroughs. Judging from the 2011 annual report, Jiuyang is the industry leader in terms of both sales and sales in these three industries, achieving a total revenue of 3.393 billion yuan. Nine Yang involved in the electromagnetic oven, electric pressure cooker, rice cooker, electric kettle and other fields, in 2011 full force, the growth rate is much higher than the industry.

In fact, the series of diversified expansions of Haier and other home appliance companies in recent years is understandable, and entering the real estate industry is just a strategy that uses the company’s existing resources to revitalize and add value to assets. According to Hong Shibin's analysis, especially during the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, domestic appliance giants are faced with greater competitive pressures and development tasks, and they will continue to grow bigger and stronger on the overall scale and become stronger in the main business. Not only does it require business model innovation, but it also requires the reengineering of industrial competition systems and platforms.

It is not difficult to see that compared with the previous diversified expansion, the expansion of home appliance companies today is a new trend of “mixed blending”. On the one hand, it is a cross-border expansion of hot industries such as real estate, finance, and new energy. On the other side, it is centered on the integration of industrial chains, and the vertical expansion of upstream key core components, downstream online shopping, and franchise stores.

Taking advantage of the New Deal to transform energy-saving innovations Since June 1st this year, the formal implementation of the New Energy-saving Appliances Subsidy has been seen by the industry as a “strengthening” for the home appliance market after the home appliance replacement policy is over. needle". The implementation of this policy is undoubtedly a “timely rain” for the home appliance industry, whose sales volume has shrunk recently. According to relevant departments, the implementation of the new policy will drive consumer demand by about 450 billion yuan. This indicates that home appliance giants, such as Haier and Hisense, which have strong energy-saving R&D capabilities and products, will benefit the most. Promote the transformation of home appliances brand in the province to energy-saving direction.

"The significance of the national government's subsidy policy for energy-saving appliances is not only to stimulate domestic sales of energy-saving appliances," said Tian Zhanjun, vice chairman of the Shandong Household Electrical Appliances Association, which is still changing the consumption pattern of the home appliance industry and providing an opportunity for companies to adjust their industrial structure. Data shows that sales of home appliances have picked up in June. According to the latest statistics from the China National Business Information Center, the retail sales of the 50 key large retail enterprises nationwide in June this year increased by 16.92% year-on-year, the highest growth rate since the beginning of the year. Among them, household appliances and audio equipment were the fastest growing segment of the month, with sales growth of 24% year-on-year, and the first growth this year was higher than other consumer goods.

“Actually, as early as before the country introduced this new policy of energy saving subsidies, we have already proactively introduced some measures to face this new policy. With the arrival of energy-saving subsidies era, keeping pace with energy-saving is also to improve sales for their rapid development. Opportunity," said one of the members of the Hisense Group who is located at the surname. A staff member of the Haier Group, Cui Xing, stated that Haier will continue to improve energy-saving and energy-saving channels through green design, green manufacturing, green operations, and green services.

In addition to the energy-saving transformation of the home appliance industry, insisting on innovation and research and development has also become an important measure for Shandong's home appliance manufacturers to cope with the economic winter. “Intelligent strategy has become a major development direction of the group.” In the interview, a person in charge of Hisense Group stated. According to Zhou Houjian, chairman of Hisense Group Co., Ltd., the era of relying on hardware for home appliances has gone. The next era is the joint development of hardware and software. Under the trend of intelligent household appliance industry, the remaining 3-5 TV companies must have both hard and soft strength. Thus, Hisense and Google are currently working on Smart TV. This year, Hisense Smart TV will break through technologies such as content aggregation, TV community, smart search, situational awareness, voice recognition, and human-machine interaction to simplify humanization and meet the individual needs of customers.

Strive to continue to open up new bases in overseas markets When it comes to Shandong's home appliance companies in the "cold winter" in the breakout campaign, one of the means must be mentioned, that is to force overseas markets. As we all know, Shandong home appliance companies are far ahead in the development of overseas markets. “In the first half of this year, foreign sales did a better job than domestic sales. Overseas businesses doubled from the same period last year.” In the interview, a person in charge of the Hisense Group stated that according to statistics, in the first half of this year, Hisense TV export sales increased by 61.4. %, sales increased 46.9% year-on-year.

Since 1998, Hisense has established a plant in South Africa and has actively explored the local market. Currently, it has a sales, logistics, and after-sales service network covering South Africa and has become a well-known local brand. "In 2006, the Group established its overseas "own brand" strategy and began the road to fully develop Hisense's brand business overseas." He said that the success of the Australian and African brand expansion experiments has accumulated valuable experience for the Group's overseas expansion. Hisense will also accelerate the layout of overseas production bases. In addition to the four production bases in Africa, the company plans to establish a new production base in the Americas to adapt to the huge market growth in North America.

In order to ensure the global market competitiveness of its products, Hisense has successively set up overseas R&D centers in North America, Europe, and Africa to conduct localized design and localization testing for overseas markets, thus ensuring the localization of Hisense products. quality. Under the dual-wheel drive of overseas independent brand strategy and intelligent strategy, Hisense has grown rapidly in key markets in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Last year, brand revenue increased by 51% year-on-year. In the first quarter of this year, its own-brand sales increased by 75.34 years. %.

The Haier Group's acquisition of Sanyo's "R&D production" integration business in Southeast Asia indicates that Haier has fully developed into a "global brand strategy" after undergoing the previous brand strategy, diversification strategy, and internationalization strategy. Deepwater area. In February of this year, Haier Group held a press conference in Tokyo, Japan, and officially launched the new brand AQUA series products. It further placed important pieces in Japan and established Haier’s Asia headquarters and R&D center. This project is another step forward after Haier’s acquisition of Japan’s Sanyo Electric’s white power business last year. From a global perspective, Haier’s newly established five R&D centers in China, Asia, Australia, Europe, and the Americas make it the most rapidly integrated enterprise in global technology resources.

At the same time, many small home appliance manufacturers have not been satisfied with the mainland market and have also extended their tentacles to the global market. For example, 9 Yang Soymilk entered the Taiwan region of China in 2010. It grew by more than 300% in 2011, and retail sales exceeded NT$380 million. And it has expanded to over 2,000 terminals across the island and penetrated into various retail channels such as home appliance 3C chains, supermarkets, and department stores.