Rebirth 2010: I taught Mr. Lei how to make a mobile phone

Chapter 923 What's Wrong?
"I started this company to change the world, not to make your stinking money."

Whether the sea before us is red or blue is not important to us; what we are gazing at is the sea in the distance.

Perhaps sensing something amiss, Luo Yonghao uttered these two sentences before the press conference ended.

"Luo Yonghao is finished."

This was Jia Yueting's most direct conclusion after watching the live stream.

Because he knew perfectly well that Lao Luo was repeating his mistakes.

Being half a step ahead is genius; being a full step ahead is madness.

TNT, on the other hand, is probably more than a step and a half ahead of its time.

Recalling the extravagant hype before the press conference, Jia Yueting couldn't help but laugh at himself.

I never expected that I would be fooled like this, and I almost thought that I was not alone and that there were successors.

But relying solely on words, passion, or even attempting to use "pyramid scheme-style" enthusiasm to get die-hard fans to willingly pay—this path has long been proven to be a dead end.

The business logic of Smartisan phones lies in the fact that customers mainly come from Luo Yonghao's personal fans, the so-called "fan conversion rate", but the conversion rate is less than one in a thousand.

To put it bluntly, they cultivate a group of fans and then collect "intelligence tax," but when they're about to collect the "intelligence tax," they suddenly realize that there aren't many die-hard fans.

Luo Yonghao may have only learned Lei Jun's passion in his speeches and the superficial aspects of Xiaomi's marketing, but he overlooked the solid product matrix, the highly competitive price-performance ratio, and the ever-expanding and continuously running supply chain behind it.

Before even establishing a foothold in the mobile phone market, they rashly switched to the computer industry, hoping to redefine the future of personal computers with a "rough engineering prototype"?

Learn from the fan economy in the entertainment industry, learn from Xiaomi's marketing model, and learn from LeEco's ecosystem crossover strategy?
Ha~ How could that be?

The name "Hammer" is really well-chosen!

Jia Yueting ended the live stream, somewhat regretting it. He had deliberately stopped broadcasting for a day to watch this live stream, thinking that he could have used that time to sell products instead of watching this stand-up comedy.

He has now paid off more than half of his debts (130/251). In terms of earning power alone, he found that this industry is much more profitable than his previous business with LeEco phones.

He was in debt when he was involved with LeEco, but now he's making a fortune through live-streaming e-commerce.
Sometimes, when Jia Yueting looked at the inflow of funds in the backend, even someone as determined as him would be dazzled by the constantly fluctuating transaction amounts.

Manufacturing cars? There's no way to make money as fast as this business; even drug trafficking would be more difficult.
As Jia Yueting predicted, after the Smartisan product launch, the greater the expectations, the greater the disappointment.

Many tech media outlets were quick to criticize, using headlines that expressed their pessimism about the prospects of Smartisan's upcoming product launch.

"A Turning Point for Smartisan: The Bird's Nest May Become Luo Yonghao's Downfall"

TNT was discovered, but it turned out to be a dud.

TNT, which was highly anticipated, was heavily criticized, and Luo Yonghao angrily confronted netizens.

Luo Yonghao, who wanted to make others wet their pants, finally did it.

Tech media outlet 36Kr published an article,
Despite the huge controversy surrounding TNT, Smartisan's innovations at the software level are still commendable.

For example, "Bullet Messenger" once sparked a download frenzy after its release due to its efficient communication features. Although it ultimately failed to challenge WeChat's position, it still reflects the Smartisan team's attention to detail in user experience.

Interactive concepts such as "infinite screen" also demonstrate a certain level of imagination.

Hammer does have some distinctive features in terms of industrial design.

Looking back at this Smartisan Technology launch event, just like the personality of its founder Luo Yonghao, it was high-profile and full of idealism, but it was also accompanied by huge controversy and the harsh reality.

The TNT workstation is the ultimate embodiment of this characteristic: a grand vision, a less-than-satisfactory debut, and the ensuing huge debate.

For Smartisan Technology, this year is an important year for it to try to break through the bottleneck of its mobile phone business and explore diversified development, but it has also exposed its shortcomings in supply chain, financial strength and market execution.

These product launches not only showcased the products, but also profoundly revealed the difficulties and helplessness of a niche brand surviving in a red ocean market dominated by giants.
As for Lao Luo?

Supporters admire its idealism, design pursuits, and courage to challenge industry giants;
Critics, however, argue that it is overly sensationalized and unrealistic.

This polarization became even more pronounced after TNT was ridiculed by the public.

To some extent, his image has shifted from that of a "disruptor" and "technical craftsman" to that of a "tragic hero" or a "lonely idealist."
The future of Hammer Technology is not optimistic.

The high-profile statements made earlier, such as "subverting revolution," "scared to death," and "Apple copied us," now seem more like an absurd farce, drawing widespread ridicule online.

"The entire press conference seemed to be creating pain points just to address existing pain points."

"At first glance, I thought I was operating a karaoke machine!"

"Because Sister Li used TNT all day, she had to take the next day off from work to go to the hospital to see an ENT specialist."

"It was late at night, and in the Smartisan building, only Luo Yonghao was shouting at TNT: 'Peace! Peace!'"

"Quiet down, you're disturbing my TNT use!!!" "A giant leap for Luo Yonghao, while humanity stands still."

"As long as everyone is happy, that's all that matters. Anyway, I don't spend money to watch crosstalk."

Some netizens even left comments under Luo Yonghao's previous promotional Weibo posts, such as, "What do you think about the girls in your office shouting 'bolder' and 'bigger'? Oh right, I meant she was using TNT."

One comment below read, "While the language may be rough, the logic is sound, but this is just too much!"

In the end, Luo Yonghao responded, "Of course I choose to forgive them, because they don't know what they are doing."

Smartisan then announced that it would begin developing its next-generation OS within six months. This OS would not be based on Android and would not be limited to mobile phones.
In late May, Chen Mo came across reports about Smartisan during a break from work, which sparked some reflection.

Marketing is merely an amplifier of traffic; ultimately, it is the product that speaks.

In his opinion, the TNT work platform is not as bad as netizens jokingly say.

Its core problem is not that the concept is completely wrong, but that it forcibly implemented a "futuristic" interaction concept with "present-day" technology and ecosystem, resulting in a disastrous user experience and market response.

In Chen Mo's view, TNT for Luo Yonghao is like "ecological synergy" for Jia Yueting—both are radical explorations "born at the wrong time."

However, the former is more like a desperate battle with no way out.

In fact, Chen Mo knew exactly what Luo Yonghao wanted to do. The core of TNT was "touch + voice + AI prediction", which is exactly the general direction of human-computer AI interaction development today.

Later smart car cockpits, smart home control systems, and even Windows 11 and macOS have all been heavily integrating voice assistants and AI prediction features.

TNT is ahead of its time in terms of concept; it attempts to break the monopoly of keyboard and mouse and provide a more natural and efficient interaction.

Moreover, TNT's model aims to present the results from multiple information sources to users simultaneously, which is similar to a basic concept of "meta-search" or "information aggregation." This is also similar to the idea of ​​AI tools providing multiple answer sources for users to refer to at the same time.

With Chen Mo's current perspective, he could immediately spot several fatal mistakes Lao Luo had made.

First of all, the technology is seriously immature. Whether it's speech recognition or AI prediction, it simply cannot solve the core pain point that Luo Yonghao wanted to address; instead, it creates new pain points.

Secondly, there is the issue of ecosystem isolation and dependency. TNT is essentially a feature phone, which is extremely dependent on its own specific SmartisanOS system and cannot run the vast ecosystem of Windows or macOS software, resulting in limited user scenarios.

This is like a courtesan going to a temple to promote the practice of dual cultivation; she will definitely face the awkward situation of being unable to communicate effectively.

Unless the abbot of that temple is named Yongxin.
Furthermore, its positioning is rather awkward. It is neither a complete computer (it needs to be connected to a mobile phone) nor a standalone tablet. Users need to spend nearly 10,000 yuan to buy a monitor, but still have to rely on the computing power of their mobile phones.

This positioning is very awkward, has extremely low cost-effectiveness, and ignores the user experience in the usage scenarios.

This was the result Chen Mo could come up with in just a few minutes after reading the relevant news.

I don't know if Luo Yonghao knows these things, maybe he does, maybe he doesn't, but these things are no longer important.

In Chen Mo's eyes.

TNT was a failed product, but it was a very interesting "thought experiment"—a pioneer's demo.

Luo Yonghao was a martyr full of idealism, but wasn't he also one, only with different pursuits?
Based on this, Chen Mo still felt some sympathy for Lao Luo, but that was all he could say.

He was willing to make an exception for Jia Yueting, but as for Luo Yonghao, who was considered Jia Yueting's disciple and grand-disciple, he had no intention of extending an olive branch.

Chen Mo thought it was a good idea to have Lao Luo go with Lao Jia to sell goods and pay off debts. Perhaps he could give Yi Ming a heads-up later.

After all, Huanhuan also needed a Consort Hua.
The atmosphere at Smartisan's headquarters in Chengdu was somber.

Because the employees here all have internet access, there's a lot of criticism of Smartisan, Luo Yonghao, and TNT online, and they know they've become pariahs.

"We were clearly following Xiaomi's path, so where did we go wrong? Why is it so difficult?" Luo Yonghao was unwilling to accept this, but he was at a loss.

The latest 6 million yuan was spent on Smartisan phones and TNT, and most of it has already been used up.
He knew what the market expected, and he also knew what Hammer fans wanted: the Smartisan T3 phone.

But as Steve Jobs once said, something to the effect of "Users don't really know what they want, but I do!"

Lao Luo actually shares this view. Now he even feels like he's the only one who's sober while everyone else is drunk. Why doesn't anyone understand him?
Looking at the pitiful sales figures of TNT, the product has already failed halfway, and most of the funds have been wasted. How to break the deadlock is the key for the second half of the year, otherwise he may follow in Jia Yueting's footsteps. Therefore, he has no choice but to transform again.

I've decided on the next direction: smart home appliances.
Having made up his mind, Luo Yonghao deleted all TNT-related content from his Weibo account.

At the management meeting, he said in a deep voice, "Let's finish up the work and prepare for winter ahead of schedule. Now I'll assign some new tasks."

A few days later, Lao Luo was surprised to find that the public pressure had suddenly decreased.

He was lucky—his savior arrived.

The best way to cover up an event is always to have another, bigger event.

On May 20th, the shoes finally landed.

Ant Group has made an official announcement.
(End of this chapter)