Smart Speakers: Once upon a time, now sadly?

From the initial "imported products" to entering thousands of households, smart speakers have not been used for a long time. Nowadays, more and more consumers have gradually become accustomed to adding a smart speaker device at home. According to the "China 2019 Smart Speaker User Survey" released by Strategy Analytics, there are currently about 35 million households in China owning smart speakers, with a market penetration rate of about 10%, of which more than half of the users own two or more smart speakers. .
The good expectations of the consumer market have attracted various giants to bet on the smart speaker track. For example, Internet giants Ali, Baidu, Xiaomi; voice technology giant iFlytek; traditional speaker manufacturers Edifier and other manufacturers have all entered the game. With the entry of all parties, the showdown between the smart speaker industry has already begun... The picture comes from Canva Canvas

former scenery
With the help of many factors, smart speakers once became a hot topic, attracting players from all walks of life. In addition to new entrepreneurial players, there are many companies that are deploying the field of smart speakers through self-research or cooperation. In addition to being optimistic about the prospects of smart speakers, the reason why companies will frequently make efforts in the field of smart speakers, there are other considerations.

On the one hand, smart speakers are an entrance to household traffic that cannot be ignored. According to relevant data, by the end of 2020, the household penetration rate of fixed broadband in my country has reached 96%, and the penetration rate of mobile broadband users has reached 108%. With the continuous increase in the penetration rate of household broadband, household traffic is increasingly valued by all parties. In the debate on home traffic entry, smart TVs, smart routers, and smart speakers all have their own fans. Among many smart products, the voice interactivity of smart speakers is more promising and has become the focus of many players' bets.

On the other hand, smart speakers are also seen as smart home entrances. The Internet of Everything has become the general trend, and the Internet of Things technology has gradually been applied in many fields. The performance of smart homes in the home scene is particularly eye-catching. Data show that from 2016 to 2020, the size of my country's smart home market has increased from 260.85 billion yuan to 514.47 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of 18.51%. According to the forecast of the China Business Industry Research Institute, my country's smart home market will reach 580.05 billion yuan in 2021.

Nowadays, the concept of smart home has gradually been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, more and more home appliances have begun to be linked with intelligence, and consumers' acceptance of smart home products has gradually increased. With the increase of smart home appliances, the smart home scene urgently needs a core to connect these smart home appliances, and smart speakers are just seen as the best choice for smart home entrances, which is exactly what people from all walks of life are competing for The reason for entering.
bottleneck now However, the good times did not last long. After experiencing barbaric growth, the smart speaker industry also ushered in a low ebb. Although the market size of domestic smart speakers is still growing, it is an indisputable fact that the growth rate has slowed down compared with before. According to relevant data, the sales volume of China's smart speaker market in 2020 reached 37.7 million units, an increase of 2.4% compared with last year; in the first half of 2021, the total sales of China's smart speaker market through all channels was 19.16 million units, a year-on-year increase of 0.4%. The reason why consumers' enthusiasm for smart speakers has declined is related to many factors.

First of all, although the low-price strategy has promoted the popularity of smart speakers, it has also made consumers rely on low-priced products. As a new product, smart speakers can quickly open up the market in a short period of time and are accepted by many consumers, which is not unrelated to the low-price strategy adopted. For example, Baidu launched the "Xiaodu Smart Speaker" with a price of 249 yuan and an early adopter price of only 89 yuan; JD.com launched the Dingdong mini with a price of 299 yuan and a starting price of only 79 yuan; Ali launched a price of 199 yuan, after the coupon Tmall Genie Fangtang smart speaker for only 89 yuan: Xiaomi launched the Xiaoai speaker mini, which is priced at 169 yuan and the starting price is only 99 yuan.

With the stabilization of the smart speaker industry, the price of smart speakers has gradually returned to rationality. For consumers, most of their earlier purchases of smart speaker products are driven by price factors. If the product performance of smart speakers is not greatly improved and the sense of use is not satisfactory, consumers will be inhibited from smart speakers. Consumers are also reluctant to pay for smart speaker products with higher prices and little improvement in product performance.

Secondly, the function and intelligence of smart speakers are limited, and the user experience is not good. According to the "2019 Global Consumer Audio Product Use Status Survey Report" released by Qualcomm, 67% of consumers value the low-latency performance of smart speakers and believe that low-latency is very important; 78% of consumers are willing to A smart speaker with its desirable features pays more.

It can be seen from the data that consumers attach great importance to the functionality and intelligence of smart speakers, but due to technical limitations, some smart speaker products are not highly intelligent. Even the main voice interaction function will appear accurate voice recognition. low level. Affected by this, the consumer market's enthusiasm for smart speakers is not as good as before.