China’s major phone makers eye smart home potential
24 September, 2018
Mobile phone manufacturers including Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO, vivo and OnePlus are moving into the television sector, in hopes of expanding into smart homes and the Internet of Things, International Financial News reported.
Liu Zuohu, CEO of OnePlus, announced that starting with smart TV, the company will devote more effort toward entering the smart home market. However, its competitor, Xiaomi, has already made the move and now occupies a large chunk of that market.
Xiaomi boasts that its television arm, Xiaomi TV, has achieved omni-channel sales champion status in Q2, as its global sales increased by a staggering 350%. The company has also entered the lucrative Indian market.
Insiders think TV is closely linked to the smart home sector, which is considered to be the stepping stone to entering the Internet of Things.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the scale of China’s Internet of Things industry reached 750 billion yuan (US$109.79 billion) in 2015. By 2020, its expected the overall size of the market will exceed 1.8 trillion yuan.