“A Walmart company in South America has just placed an order for 3 million VR glasses with a Shenzhen company.†Recently, the general manager of a VR glasses OEM company in Baoan, Shenzhen, informed that Shenzhen VR equipment shipped at least 5 million units a month. There are 200,000 units exported every month.
In stark contrast to the enthusiasm for shipments from Shenzhen Huaqiang North, China's largest distribution center for electronic products, investment in the VR industry appears to have entered a low point. Statistics show that from June to August only four or five VR start-ups in China have successfully raised funds. In the first quarter, 18 VR startups have obtained investment. This low tide makes people think that VR is not a concept that is excessively demonized. As for how many media began to sing?
However, in the game field, the application of VR and AR technology has been highly anticipated. The new experience will bring a revolution to the game industry. This has become the consensus of the industry. The recent popular Pokemon game is a clear proof.
Research firm IDC's data also continues to be positive for VR prospects, and the agency predicts that the global VR market will grow from 5.2 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 to 162 billion U.S. dollars in 2020. It looks like this is a promising market, but why did capital's attitude to VR change so much?
Huaqiang North VR equipment sales hot
In the Huaqiang North Economic Building, there are many VR equipment stores crowded with only a few square meters. The reporter visited the scene and found out that there are retail sales of VR mobile phone boxes up to 1000 units/day during the peak hours of the stalls, and the number of channels distributed to them can reach 10,000 units/day. These devices are mainly Shenzhen brands, and the origins are distributed in Shenzhen Baoan, Longgang and other places.
At these stalls, most merchants sell mobile VR devices. The structure uses a plastic spacer and a pair of lenses. The phone is inserted directly into the box for viewing. In terms of selling price, the lowest transaction price is around 20 yuan. There are also a small number of VR all-in-ones, such as ants or big friends, each selling for about a few hundred dollars.
After the outbreak of the VR market, many Tablet PCs and feature phone OEMs in Shenzhen transformed the production of VR glasses. In addition to VR devices such as storms, big friends, and ants, the grassroots brand was more of a brand name. Relying on Shenzhen's supply chain and production capabilities, and mature distribution and export sales channel capabilities, Huaqiangbei is already the largest market for VR shipments in the world and is crowded with VR commercial shops. Foreign traders are constantly asking about prices.
The aforementioned general manager of an OEM company producing VR glasses in Shenzhen Baoan told reporters that VR terminal shipments continued to climb in the first half of this year, Shenzhen OEM factory can achieve more than 500,000 units in monthly shipments, and medium shipments in 200,000 units. 300,000 units.
“Huaqiangbei is not only a centralized place for domestic distribution of channels, but there are also many orders from overseas markets. Wal-Mart in South America has just placed an order for 3 million VR devices at an OEM company in Shenzhen, and the factory's VR production has obviously exceeded the level of production. The computer predicts that VR equipment in Shenzhen will reach 5 million units per month, said the general manager of the above-mentioned OEM company.
According to IDC analyst Zheng Xi, 95% of the VR devices on the market today are similar to the cardboard boxes produced by Huaqiangbei. Because of their low prices, the VR industry has played an objective role in nurturing users. However, this kind of cardboard product does not have any electronic components and touch technology, and has poor experience and low profitability. It only solves people's primary experience of VR. The current sales are booming, mainly due to price advantages, and channels play an important role in promoting the popularity of new things such as VR. In the second half of the year, Huawei, Xiaomi, and Samsung will launch a series of VR devices worth about 500 yuan. A good experience and a suitable price will enable the market to usher in an inflection point. Cardboard's hot sales may not last long.
VR project valuation shrinks seriously
Compared with the high VR investment sentiment in capital in the first quarter of this year, VR startups have been on the brink of financing since May.
Statistical data from the ultra-dimensional planet shows that from June to August, only four or five VR startups in China have successfully raised funds, which is in marked contrast with the VR market in the first quarter. From January to March of this year, 18 domestic VR startup companies have obtained investment. Among them, the B-storm of the storm mirror on January 21st raised 260 million yuan, and the cloud cloud software purchased VR companies with a total investment of 460 million yuan, both domestically. Record.
Wei Xu, investment manager of Hejun Capital's VR Fund, said that the valuation of VR startups has generally been reduced by 3 to 40% compared with January to March. “The main reasons are threefold. First, since May, the China Securities Regulatory Commission has strictly controlled the cross-border of listed companies. Increased acquisitions or raised funds are invested in the VR industry. Listed companies have previously been the main capital raising valuations of the VR industry, and the market has lost major players. Second, the economic slowdown is expected, VC funds are generally expected to increase the difficulty of the second half or the next year. As a result, funds are becoming more cautious; third, after a period of investment boom, the VR industry has recently lacked good investment targets."
VR practitioners are more sensitive to capital temperature changes. Last year, Dianchi served as the CEO of the Fireworks Workshop from the transition of science and technology reporters to VR. The Fireworks Workshop received the first round of 10 million yuan financing in the second half of 2015. The company has a valuation of over 100 million yuan. Dianchi Lake said that since May, the capital's pursuit of cooling VR is very obvious, but at the same time, the VR financing is still hotter than other Internet entrepreneurial projects.
Dianchi believes that VR financing has a good side to the market during the winter period, and it can eliminate VR companies with weak technical strength and temporary intentions, so that companies with stronger technology and market capabilities can win, but the VR industry will not appear like the group buying market. The big shuffle.
IDC predicts AR turning point next year
Although in the short term the capital investment in VR is affected by policies and the environment, investment enthusiasm has cooled, but analysts are still optimistic about the prospects of VR industry.
IDC's latest AR and VR data reports are still screaming much more. IDC predicts that global AR and VR industry revenue will increase from 5.2 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 to 162 billion U.S. dollars in 2020.
According to IDC's forecast, the year-on-year growth of software revenue in the AR and VR market will exceed 200% in 2016, and half of the total revenue will come from hardware revenue. IDC believes that VR systems will have revenues higher than AR related revenues in 2016 and 2017, such as viewers, software, consulting services, and system integration services. This is mainly due to the consumption of games and paid content. However, after 2017, AR revenue will grow by leaps and bounds, especially in the areas of medical services, product design and management.
Zheng Xi said that the current downturn in investment in the VR market is affected by policies and the environment, but it does not constitute an obstacle in the long term. The reason why the investment is cautious is mainly because the investment in the hardware field has been sufficient and competition has been saturated in the past year, but there is no killer application in the content and industry markets.
Zheng Xi believes that in terms of content, the explosion of "Pokemon" has brought a lot of imagination to the VR and AR markets. In games and video content, there will be a breakthrough in the second half of the year or next year, and killer applications will rejuvenate the investment boom. In the industrial market, VR will have a breakthrough in the construction, medical, education, tourism, and display markets.
"At present, many VR technologies have solved some problems. For example, in education, VR technology has theoretically been able to achieve virtual imaging in the teaching process, but to really achieve the need to open the industry chain." Zheng Xi said, "Now we have performance With powerful smartphones and low-cost VR headsets, mobile phone companies entering the field of VR will provide the market with more experience and cost-effective VR products.The recent developments in the medical industry show that augmented reality headsets can have a profound impact on the industry. In the next five years, we expect that the same situation will occur in education, tourism, display and manufacturing."