Fighting "Technology"——Interview with Yao Hongbo, President of Swan Group
Like most entrepreneurs, Yao Hongbo, an "audio predator" in his 40s, is full of enthusiasm and energy. The difference is that he emphasizes the power of "wisdom" and does not advocate the "struggle" of "three-shift and five-shift sleep". The key to growing up from scratch to become the boss of a famous multinational electro-acoustic group is that the young boy in our corner. Today, when China's electronics industry still relies on the import of foreign core technologies, Swan is already providing advanced core electro-acoustic technology products to world-renowned audio manufacturers. Sun Tzu said: The superior army is attacking the plot. For Yao Hongbo, "seeking" is the core technology strategy. He said: "Without core technology, we can only earn some fur." The day before yesterday, Yao Hongbo revealed to reporters his "skill" approach to victory in Xiamen.
Q: What is Hivi's position in the audio industry?
A: Swans is most proud that it has promoted the upgrading of products in China's electro-acoustic industry. For example, at the beginning of this year, at the "CES International Consumer Electronics Show" and "THE SHOW Fever Audio Equipment Exhibition" in Las Vegas, the United States, the Swans2.2 ribbon speaker system, the super flagship of Swans, won the "Best of CES" in one fell swoop. "Audio Finalist Award" and "Excellence In Design&Engineering Award" two laurels. At the same time, at the T.H.E.SHOW2003 exhibition, which is famous all over the world for its audiophile sound, HiVi's T600HT also won the "Highest Speaker Innovation Design Award".
In the field of high-end audio, the European and American high-end audio industry usually does not pay attention to audio brands with Chinese background, let alone winning awards. It is not easy to integrate into the fever circle. This award of Swans has further reversed the deep-rooted concept of Chinese audio in the European and American High-End Audio high-end audio industry! It is no exaggeration to say that many of our technologies are world-class.
Swans is also the first Chinese company to acquire a well-known foreign audio company. In 1997, we acquired Swans Speaker Systems.Inc from the United States. Now, Hivi's products have entered the most advanced audio market abroad. Hivi's model is: America's top design resources + China's excellent manufacturing process = super cost-effective.
Q: One of Swan's ideas is: "sell wisdom, not sweat", what prompted you to put forward this idea? For Swans, what is the greatest "wisdom"?
A: More than ten years ago, when I started a business, I wanted to position the business, so I did a lot of market research and found that China is a big country with human resources. At that time, the speakers produced in China accounted for 80% of the world's speakers, but the market value was less than 20%. , Especially in the United States, Chinese products can sometimes only be found in stalls. The price of the same audio products abroad is often more than 10 times that of ours, which touched me a lot. In addition, I was frail and sick from a young age, so I valued outwitness more.
Not long after we started our business, we launched a Swans speaker called "S8", which was very popular among audiophiles back then. Millions of people bought our product, and the speaker sold tens of millions in that year. This is a pot of gold won by selling wisdom. I have tasted the sweetness of selling wisdom, and I have been out of control since then.
For Swans, the greatest wisdom is to develop and master core technologies. I think China's future development should not depend on people transferring those labor-intensive and polluting enterprises to China, instead of relying on the accumulation of working hours and sweat of long-term workers to gain market share, China's miracle should be based on brains , rely on technology to achieve.
Q: How does Swans build a technological highland? On the road of technology, does Hivi have any bumps?
A: After a period of development, Swans gradually felt that it was limited by the domestic environment at that time and its own design ideas, and reached a bottleneck. At that time, we believed that the United States was the center of the world's electro-acoustics, and that the world's most famous electro-acoustic companies gathered in North America, and breakthroughs could only be made in the regions with the most developed audio technology. In 1993, we went to North America, and spent huge sums of money to control and acquire American audio companies successively, and hired foreign audio experts to work for Swans with high salaries, directly turning excellent foreign R&D and design into Swans' resources.
At that time, many people in the industry said that it was not a wise move for Hiway to move overseas at this time, and even said that Yao Hongbo was a bit stupid and wasted the best opportunity to make money. In recent years, some dealers have also said that Swans is a bit silly, focusing too much on technology and not knowing how to produce low-quality and low-end audio products to expand its market share. I also often recall that if Swans did not move overseas in 1993 and invested all its capital and energy into the domestic market, would it have made more money? The answer is yes, because the audiophile market in China was too hot at that time; coupled with the high profits at that time and the popularity of the HiVi brand, it is entirely possible to love more first and become the first "standard king" in China. But at the same time, it may also be like Aido, who has long since disappeared.
In the brutal and fierce market competition in recent years, the reason why Swans has always been in an invincible position and continued to develop steadily should be attributed to Swans' advanced "core technology strategy". Therefore, Swans moved overseas in 1993, which should be a very far-sighted strategic move.
Hivi was very hard at the beginning in the United States. If I wanted to enter the market with dignity and dignity, I could not rely on cheap goods. At that time, I decided to develop something that was different in principle, which was easy to be used by Americans who like to invent. accept. After we made progress in the United States, we thought that the Canadian market would be easier to conquer, but after we went there, we found that it was not the case at all. My marketing manager in Canada said that you must have your own special technology. This technology is yours. The best key to enter this saturated market. We analyzed all the speakers on the market and found that there are not many articles that can be done from the traditional electric speakers, so we decided to do some work on the ribbon speakers. So it took more than two years to develop other magnetic field ribbon speakers, which was immediately recognized by the market. This had a great impact on me, and it made me firmer in my belief in strengthening scientific and technological research.
Q: From wage earners to big bosses, from Shenzhen to North America, and then back to China, in the past 20 years of "selling wisdom", what is your most proud work?
Answer: More and more famous audio manufacturers in Europe and America are using Swans speaker products! Such as the famous Totem company in the United States, the giant Burmester in the German audio industry, the Cliffod company in Canada, the SLS company in the United States, and the BVU company in Germany... They believe that the world-class Swans speaker is a powerful way to keep its brand leading the world's audio trend. guarantee. At an exhibition in the United States, we also found an American manufacturer of counterfeit Swans products. One of them is a listed company in the United States. All of our products have applied for international patent protection, but it also proves the advanced design level of Swans products and the leading technology of the times. idea.
Q: What is the difference between running a business abroad and in China?
A: From the perspective of the whole environment, we have not done enough in terms of the business integrity system. The West acts according to the contract, "honoring the contract and keeping promises"; from an individual point of view, I find that Chinese enterprises pay more attention to "making up for shortcomings", while The approach of foreign companies is to "give full play to their advantages", and promote strengths rather than make up for weaknesses.
Q: What is your opinion on China's electro-acoustic industry?
A: China's electro-acoustic industry is still in a production-oriented situation, and they are reluctant to invest money in research and development. Many people say, why don't you put your funds into market promotion, hype, listing, etc.? I said that even if you do all this well, you don't have a very convincing product on the market that is very advanced, how can you sell the product to customers? Chinese audio can't keep up with research. If this goes on, we can only make a small amount of money, and the main profit must be earned by foreign companies. I feel deeply about this point. The price of a speaker we sold to Germany is 660 marks. If we only sell raw materials and only a few marks, why is there such a big gap? Because you have mastered the core technology he needs.
Q: For us ordinary consumers, what are the tips for buying stereos?
A: Bring your own disc, go to the audio shop, turn up the sound a bit louder, and listen to it several times. The treble should be sweet, the midrange should be accurate, and the bass should be clean and powerful. Trust your ears.
"Grasp the big and let go of the small, you need to look at the general direction. There is a philosophy of people doing business that as long as the selling price - the buying price > 0, they will do it; some people value the future in addition to weighing between buying and selling, so sometimes a loss-making business is also Do. I belong to the latter, which may be the reason why most of the peers who started businesses at the same time as Swans have already "disappeared", and we can still grow healthily. Of course, Swans' success first depends on reform and opening up, otherwise, our intelligence There may be no such development."
"Do a career you like, otherwise it will be a pain. I was originally an audiophile, and I liked to engage in small technologies since I was a child. In addition, don't be impatient, do the basics well, and it will come naturally. Doing business also depends on talent.
