Competition And Cooperation Under The Polarization Of "Fruit Chain": Apple Slows Down And Drags Down Its Lineage, And Lichen Follows Suit

The twinkle and smile from apple, a big factory, easily affect the market sentiment of most domestic related components listed companies, especially after the industry's previous pessimistic expectations for some of Apple's product lines.

Wind statistics show that in the first quarter of this year, apple concept stocks experienced a large degree of decline, with leading companies the worst. Star fruit chain companies, including lucent precision, gol shares and lens technology, have all experienced a decline of more than 30% in this range. At that time, Apple was shrouded in pessimism from industry analysts, and the news that the new version of TWS headphones, which was scheduled to be released in the spring, would be delayed due to stock shortage, which constantly disturbed the sensitivity of the market.

In April, fruit chain companies disclosed financial reports in succession, and released the news that Apple was about to launch a press conference in the middle of the year, which pushed these companies to the leading position in terms of growth again.

According to the current financial report, the leading fruit chain companies have achieved good performance under the high demand last year. However, there are also obvious differentiation. Although the leading enterprises such as gol shares, LANs technology and BOE have achieved a profit growth rate of more than doubled, there are also examples such as lichen precision and Han's laser, whose growth rate is only more than 50%, which is considered by some industry insiders to be moderate.

With the further catalysis of the ecological competition between terminal manufacturers, the upstream electronic industry chain companies also show a similar Matthew effect. In this process, the sustainable ecological layout along the upstream of the terminal plant has become a new trend, which further tests the future ecological linkage ability of component companies.

In the first quarter of this year, apple concept stocks experienced a large degree of decline, especially the leading companies. Photo by Zheng dikun

Apple slows down

Since this year, the reason why Lixun precision is easily affected by the fragile mood of the market is inseparable from the development mode adopted by the company. It mainly comes from two aspects: the concentration of income sources and the dependence on terminal plants.

According to the financial report in 2020, Lixun achieved a sales revenue of 92.501 billion yuan, an increase of 47.96% over the same period of last year, and realized a net profit of 7.225 billion yuan belonging to the owners of the parent company, with a year-on-year increase of 53.28%.

Among them, 88.45% of the company's revenue accounted for 88.45% of the business from the consumer electronics industry, and its year-on-year growth rate was the highest among the company's five major businesses, reaching 57.37%.

Among the other four businesses of Lixun, the revenue growth rate of automotive Internet products and precision components was relatively high, but it did not make a significant contribution to the overall performance; the computer interconnection products and precision components, which contributed the second largest source of revenue, accounted for only 3.81%, and the revenue decreased by 14.39% year-on-year.

In contrast, gol shares, in 2020, the company achieved a revenue of 57.743 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 64.29%; the net profit attributable to shareholders of listed companies was 2.848 billion yuan, with a year-on-year increase of 122.41%.

According to the financial report, golfer's revenue sources include four parts, including intelligent acoustic complete machine and intelligent hardware product lines, accounting for 76% of the total revenue, with growth rates of nearly 80% and 107% respectively.

More importantly, customer concentration is quite different. According to the financial report, the total sales amount of the top five customers of Lixun precision accounted for 82.03% of the total annual sales, of which the largest customer accounted for 69% of the annual sales, while the top 2-5 customers accounted for only about 12% of the company's revenue.

However, golfer shares are relatively scattered. The total sales amount of its top five customers accounts for 79.07% of the total annual sales, of which the largest customer accounts for 48.08%.

As a result, the stock price of Lixun fell after industry analysts' expectation that Apple's TWS earphone airpods would decline significantly.

Some people in the industry told the 21st century economic report that Lixun and gol are the first and second largest OEM factories of airpods respectively, and lichen provides nearly 60% of the supply. During 2017-2019, the two manufacturers benefited from Apple's absolute leading market position in TWS headphones, supporting good profit growth performance.

However, with the breakthrough of TWS transmission technology by Android manufacturers in recent years, the camp pattern is gradually changing.

Cai Zhuo Hui, consulting and Research Manager of trendforce group, told reporters that Apple could quickly improve the user penetration rate of TWS Bluetooth headset in the early stage and create a huge market. However, there was no significant change in the subsequent functionality and the development slowed down. The development speed of Android brand in the early stage is slow, but in the process of gradually strengthening investment and learning competitive products, there will be a relatively stable growth rate.

"So what apple is facing now is not a market recession. It is only after the initial outbreak that the growth rate is suspended and the market share is gradually pulled down by the growing Android camp. Of course, apple is also hoping to expand the gap through new products and new features. However, due to the impact of the global economy and the shortage of semiconductor supply and other factors, the pace of new product layout has slowed down, resulting in the market gap being narrowed He continued.

This is an epitome of performance differences. At the industrial level, it is related to the strength of the ecological connection between the industrial chain manufacturers and apple.

Sun Yanbiao, chairman of the board of Xuri big data, told reporters of the 21st century economic report that in contrast, lichen is a relatively complete Apple system in the supply chain system, and other manufacturers have made little contribution to its business.

"Golfer and lance are not very loyal Apple series. For example, gol is Huawei's watch manufacturer. LANs's touch panel business comes from Xiaomi and ov." He added that this also shows that today, Apple's market position can not be called "hegemony".

Sun Yanbiao observed that Apple's sales were weak three months after the release of iPhone 12, which will also affect the subsequent performance support of industry chain manufacturers.

Vertical integration intensifies

On the one hand, the manufacturers of the industrial chain generally regard entering the apple industrial chain as a stage development goal; on the other hand, many manufacturers have gradually abandoned their insistence on supplying apple in the course of historical development?

Some people in the industry once told reporters that Lixun precision should be a more successful and less successful company in the development of the electronic industry chain. Through continuous acquisition and merger, it can digest the relevant business smoothly and become a leading company today.

Under such a path, with the help of Apple's ecological chain system, Lixun is also further improving the integration of vertical industrial chain through acquisition and merger.

Galaxy Securities pointed out that in 2020, through the acquisition of Weichuang subsidiary, it entered into the iPhone and computer assembly business, and officially opened the smart watch and sip business in August. The company is also the MagSafe assembly OEM of Apple's new generation wireless charging product. This is a road around apple to gradually build into an industry-leading precision manufacturing platform.

Looking back on the previous choice of ofight to withdraw from Apple ecology, there is an impact of the international environment, but also with the company's previous entry into the industry link profitability is not enough.

Sun Yanbiao said that because the main supply for Apple by ofI light was front-end cameras, and there was no reasonable business upgrade since then, Apple's business has become a "chicken rib" after encountering external impact. But at present, Lixun and gol are aiming at the relatively high profit part of apple industry.

He stressed that the new wearable product airtag launched during Apple's spring launch is expected to open up new market space. "Whether this technology can be integrated into TWS headphones in the future to make up for the problem that earphones are easy to lose is worth paying attention to." He believes that as the technology matures, it will have a new impact on Apple's headphone product layout in the future.

For industrial chain manufacturers, vertical integration is inevitable at this stage of development. LANs technology has taken advantage of this to achieve a big rise in performance.

According to the performance express, the net profit attributable to shareholders of Listed Companies in 2020 was RMB 4.923 billion, up 99.43% year on year. The company pointed out that the promotion of vertical integration strategy has achieved fruitful results in 2020. The company continues to enrich the product competitiveness in smart phones, smart wearable devices, tablet computers, notebook computers, new energy vehicles and other fields, and continues to improve the product integration of various intelligent terminals.

In the future, the effect of industrial linkage development brought by vertical integration will be more and more powerful, which will further test the ability of electronic industry chain companies to integrate new business and continue to research and develop technology in the future. Otherwise, it may lead to the end of helpless departure.