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"The past three years have been a life-changing experience for me and Xiaomi."

On the evening of July 19, 2024, in the "2024 Lei Jun Annual Speech" with the theme of "Courage", Lei Jun, founder, chairman and CEO of Xiaomi Group, shared the ins and outs of Xiaomi's car manufacturing, and released new products such as Xiaomi MIX Fold 4, Xiaomi MIX Flip, Redmi K70 Extreme Edition, Xiaomi SU7 Ultra Prototype, etc.

Behind this is Xiaomi’s “rebirth”.

Right now, China's hardcore technology companies are challenging the "old gods of war" in all walks of life. Under the saturation attack, the industry's competitive landscape is shifting from the old order to a new order, and "vanguards" of technological innovation such as Xiaomi, Huawei, BYD, and CATL have emerged.

There is no doubt that China's hardcore technology companies are on the fast track.
01
Only by hitting the high end can we become a benchmark

Hard-core technology is the foundation for Chinese brands to move towards the high end of the global value chain.

As early as 2020, Lei Jun reflected on his ten years of entrepreneurship in his speech on Xiaomi's tenth anniversary, and made it clear that the basic tone of "technology-based, cost-effective as the guideline, and making the coolest products" would not be changed. Xiaomi would evolve from an Internet company to a hardcore technology company, and for this purpose issued a call to start a business again.

"In the next decade, smart manufacturing will further boost the rise of Chinese brands, and Xiaomi will become an emerging force in China's manufacturing industry that cannot be ignored." Lei Jun described the future at that time.

That year, Xiaomi mobile phone entered the high-end market for the first time, and since then high-end has become Xiaomi's core appeal.

As the saying goes, it is easy for high-dimensionality to defeat low-dimensionality, but it is not easy for low-dimensionality to surpass high-dimensionality.

Xiaomi mobile phones are no exception. The road to capturing consumers' minds and moving towards high-end is not smooth. Fortunately, with strategic patience, it did not expect to completely win the high-end market with just one or two products.

Now, after three years of high-end exploration and two years of leapfrog growth, Xiaomi has indeed undergone different changes.

On the one hand, Xiaomi 14 Ultra has become one of the benchmarks for high-end mobile phones.

With each step, Xiaomi's imaging capabilities have become increasingly profound. The Xiaomi 14 Ultra has ushered in the "large aperture dual telephoto era" of mobile phones, expanding the advantage of "one step ahead, one step ahead at every step".

Even better, Xiaomi has become a leader in mobile phone innovation.

For example, Xiaomi MIX Fold 4's indicators such as lightness, imaging, performance, reliability, and experience are all comparable to Xiaomi 14 Ultra, solving the industry problem of the incompatibility between lightness and performance; Xiaomi MIX Flip is a watershed work of small foldable phones, solving the industry problem of the impracticality of external screens.

Xiaomi Mi MIX Fold 4

Digital blogger "Smart Cat" said: "MIX Fold 4's comprehensive and balanced product strength is of great benefit to the expansion of the foldable screen market to more user groups. Foldable screens can also have the features that ordinary flagship phones have, and can even do better."

On the other hand, Xiaomi SU7 redefines high-end cars.

The so-called high-end does not mean high price, nor does it mean high configuration, but rather it means having excellent product strength, thus reshaping the consumer's mind by using smart driving, ultimate driving control, industrial aesthetics, etc. as the value scale.

As a result, Xiaomi Auto received 88,000 orders and delivered 7,058 vehicles in the first month, becoming a phenomenal product.

Public data shows that 28% of female users chose Xiaomi SU7, 29% of BBA car owners, and 52.5% of Apple users.

For a time, Xiaomi Auto became a "good example" for its peers to learn from.

02
Leading technology leads to leading products

When it comes to competing in hardcore technology, the underlying logic is to see whose core technology is more advanced.

Lei Jun has a deep understanding of this: "When I started my business 14 years ago, I started with model innovation. Although I grew very fast at the beginning, my foundation was not solid, and I encountered many setbacks later. So, this time, I made up my mind from the beginning not to take shortcuts, not to acquire, not to do OEM, to start with core technology, invest ten times more, and seriously build a good car."

In short, Xiaomi chose to "practice martial arts first".

To this end, Xiaomi has invested heavily in building a smart car factory. With the help of more than 700 robots, the six major workshops have achieved 100% automated generation of key processes and 100% automated high-precision inspection. When production capacity is fully utilized, a Xiaomi car can be rolled off the production line every 76 seconds.

Xiaomi Automobile Factory

In addition to automobiles, Xiaomi has also made up for its shortcomings in high-end mobile phones.

In July 2024, the new generation of Xiaomi mobile phone smart factory in Changping, Beijing was officially put into use, with an annual output of 10 million flagship mobile phones. Xiaomi MIX Fold 4 and Xiaomi MIX Flip are both produced here.

In fact, although the heavy asset model faces challenges such as huge investment and slow time to take effect, it is easier to master core technologies and thus build a high "moat".

If we want it to become heavier, we need to increase research and development continuously.

In order to develop Xiaomi SU7, Xiaomi Auto invested 3,400 engineers, with a total R&D investment of more than 10 billion yuan. The R&D investment in the next five years is expected to exceed 100 billion yuan, laying a solid foundation for the continued leading product strength.

Xiaomi Group's financial report shows that R&D expenditure in the first quarter of 2024 was 5.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 25.4%. The number of R&D personnel reached 17,421, accounting for 49.2% of the total number of employees, adhering to the technology-driven background.

In this way, Xiaomi has the confidence to challenge the "New York Nord".

The Nürburgring Nordschleife is the world's legendary racetrack with the longest lap, the most bends and the greatest height difference. It was by conquering the "Nürburgring Nordschleife" that Porsche was able to ascend to the highest level of the automotive industry.

Xiaomi SU7 Ultra Prototype announced that it will officially conquer the "Nürburgring" in October 2024. Its goal is to become the fastest four-door electric car in the "Nürburgring" within ten years, with a clear attitude to challenge Porsche.

The problem is that it is more difficult for a pure electric car to challenge the "Nürburgring Nordschleife" than a fuel car. It requires strong power, good endurance, stable control, and high speed, which tests Xiaomi's technical foundation.

Xiaomi SU7 Ultra Prototype rose to the challenge and solved its worries through innovations such as self-developed Xiaomi super motor V8s, optimized body weight, reconstructed thermal management system, and adopted high-power battery pack specially designed for racing tracks.

In this way, it is only a matter of time before Xiaomi seizes the last technological high ground in the automotive industry.

03
AI empowers and big models create an intelligent ecosystem

It is important to note that AI has become a new interpretation of hardcore technology.

At present, the AI ​​revolution is in full swing. Big models are reshaping thousands of industries with advanced productivity, and well-known technology companies are entering the market to seize strategic commanding heights.

Xiaomi is no exception.

As early as April 2023, Xiaomi established a large model team and developed its own MiLM-6B large model with 6 billion parameters, which attracted attention as soon as it was unveiled.

Xiaomi’s AI development experience

On the authoritative C-EVAL list, the MiLM-6B large model ranked first in the same parameter level, and also ranked first in the CMMLU Chinese large model test.

In addition to technological competition, Xiaomi is more concerned about the implementation of large models.

In the mobile phone market, Xiaomi uses "lightweight and local deployment" as its technological breakthrough and takes the path of "end-cloud collaboration". The end side is a self-developed large model with 1.3 billion parameters, and the cloud side is connected to the large model of ecological partners.

As a result, the terminal side responds quickly and the cloud side has strong computing power, which maximizes the potential of AI.

In the automotive sector, intelligent driving has entered the "end-to-end" era. As it understands people better, recognizes roads better, and recognizes objects better, it has become one of the important car-buying decisions for consumers.

In this context, end-to-end big models have become the technological high ground that automakers are competing for.

Xiaomi SU7 is the first mass-produced end-to-end large model in China. It can park in extremely narrow parking spaces with an accuracy of 5cm and achieve valet parking at a cruising speed of 23km/h. It is as fast, accurate and stable as an experienced driver, and has successfully entered the first echelon of "end-to-end".

More importantly, Xiaomi will use AI to re-do all categories.

For example, Xiaomi's imaging brain has been upgraded to the AI ​​large-model computational photography platform Xiaomi AISP, which achieves the goal of deep coordination of imaging capabilities between software and hardware, pushing computational photography to a new dimension.

After AI reconstruction, Xiaomi can enhance the core competitiveness of its products, create a differentiated user experience, and further improve the super-intelligent ecosystem centered on the three major scenarios of people, cars, and homes.

From the above, we can see that Xiaomi is on the path of comprehensive AI empowerment.

As of December 31, 2023, Xiaomi has more than 37,000 authorized patents worldwide, including more than 1,500 in the field of artificial intelligence, more than 210 in smart driving, and 30,000 patents are pending.

In short, Xiaomi has evolved from an Internet company to a hardcore technology company. Although it has encountered setbacks and challenges in the process, it has completed the high-end "transformation" with a firm belief in miracles.

Then, Xiaomi will continue to move forward. (Editor: CDX)