327: Chapter 327 Desensitized Rice Flour

"What is it?"

Lei Jun was also extremely interested. He had always held a grudge against Anil's actions, but in the end, this world was about strength, so he could only set aside his petty thoughts.

Now...

"Lei, do you know why Anil hasn't dealt us a fatal blow yet?"

Lei Jun frowned and nodded. Anil had been urging him, asking why he wouldn't move system development and hardware design to India.

He had retorted a few times, but Anil hadn't made any other underhanded moves, which had always worried him slightly...

Watching the puzzled Lei Jun, Lin Bin didn't beat around the bush and handed him a report directly.

"Compared to Reliance Jio, we should be able to call ourselves a true Indian brand."

Lei Jun was taken aback when he saw the report.

Over 98% of Reliance Jio's stock was not produced in the Xiaomi India factory, but imported directly from China.

Anil had found an OEM in China, specifically a manufacturer of knock-off products, to make Reliance Jio phones.

All manufacturing processes were completed, leaving only labeling and shrink-wrapping, with everything else done in China.

Additionally, they had reached a partnership with a domestic public solution provider to launch other mobile phones in the second half of the year, fully benchmarking against Xiaomi.

"Are they doing the same thing as us—importing from the country, assembling in India, sticking on the 'Made in India' label, taking the corresponding subsidies, and deceiving the fans?"

"To be precise, it's just labeling!"

Lei Jun smiled; indeed, the world was never short of talent.

However, this peaceful coexistence was just right.

Anil was indeed smart; he had thought ahead at every step.

The joint venture factory was a tool he used to extract Xiaomi's technology, and also a chain to bind Xiaomi.

After all, the loans were taken out by Xiaomi India, so the bulk of it naturally fell on Dami Company to shoulder!

"Lei, in that case, shall we lower the prices?" Lin Bin suggested. "They use domestic production capacity, why shouldn't we?

They are labeling in India, we can do the same, then swap to lower-tier configurations—he still can't beat our design capabilities!

This way, we can fleece the customers together!"

Lei Jun thought about it. The selling price of the xiaomi note had already reached $149, a drop of $100 compared to the official launch price.

There was less than 300 Chinese Yuan in profit left!

"Do it! Lower it by another $20; sell at cost price."

Xiaomi India began a new round of price adjustments. This time, it wasn't just the xiaomi note; the xiaomi note2 was also adjusted by $30, bringing the price to $199.

Xiaomi used hard cash to express its dissatisfaction with Anil.

On that day, sales of the xiaomi note series returned to 250,000 units, including 150,000 units of the Note2 series.

But that evening, Anil directly lowered the price of the Reliance Jio to $129, and offered even better discounts when bundled with corresponding packages.

Meanwhile, Xiaomi's package prices were further increased, and the subsidy amount decreased accordingly.

Anil had once again utilized his methods!

...

Beijing, Dami Company office!

Lin Bin looked at the news coming from India and stomped his feet in anger.

"Anil is crazy; he must be losing money at this price."

Lei Jun's face was filled with helplessness.

"They can afford to lose. Reliance Group's profits are dozens of times that of Xiaomi's; he could lose money for a year and be fine.

How long can we afford to lose? We wouldn't even last three months, maybe six, before having to leave the Indian market with our tails between our legs."

Afterward, both sides kept a low profile and stopped lowering prices.

Anil didn't need to lower prices anymore; his channel advantage was enough to crush Xiaomi.

Xiaomi's products were pushed into corners. Although the product lineup was rich and the new designs had advantages, no sales staff would actively push them.

Moreover, price was more important for the Indian market!

Most importantly, with the same configuration, Reliance Jio was cheaper and was a true Indian industry—why wouldn't they support it?

...

Aside from the international market, things weren't much better domestically.

Lei Jun had returned to the country this time to host the launch event for the Xiaomi 4 series.

This launch event was originally scheduled for May 18th, implying "I want to get rich" (a play on the number 18 in Chinese), intending to bring good luck, but due to various issues, it had been postponed twice.

Finally, the time was set for June 1st, and the venue was downsized. It was originally planned for the largest hall at the China National Convention Center, which could accommodate 3,000 Mi Fans.

It was eventually changed to the middle hall, with 1,200 seats.

Fewer than 100 distributors showed up, and most of the people there were Mi Fans supporting the event.

Lei Jun stood on stage, trying hard to appear relaxed and confident. Although the Mi Fans in the audience were enthusiastic, the lack of activity in the live stream was very obvious.

The total number of online viewers across the web was less than 2 million, which was a terrible result for a Xiaomi flagship launch.

After all, Xiaomi's base consisted of students, and students had the most time.

Even worse, when he brought out those heart-wrenching stories, the reaction from the Mi Fans in the audience was clearly not as fanatical as before.

They were no longer as sensitive to these things; simply put, they had become desensitized.

After all, while using this tactic could indeed build a fan base if everyone did it, others had now broken the deadlock with technology!

When he first talked about emotions, others brought out designs with larger batteries.

When he continued to talk about emotions, others released their self-developed chips.

...

Finally, Lei Jun could only shout out the faith of the Mi Fans on stage.

Xiaomi 4, five-inch 1080p screen, Snapdragon 801 chip, 3GB of RAM, priced at 1997—not a cent more, not a cent less, exactly 1 Yuan cheaper than Honor.

A round of applause rang out; it wasn't sparse, but it couldn't be called enthusiastic either.

"Lei, 80,000 units."

Lei Jun took the report, glanced at it, and tossed it onto the table.

This was the sales volume for the first 10 minutes of the initial sale. Previously, selling 100,000 units was only because that was all the inventory they had.

Now, selling 80,000 units was all they could manage. Their original biggest advantage, MIUI, was nothing in the face of Taishan 3.5.

Lei Jun didn't say much, but Lin Bin knew what he was thinking.

honor 6's configuration crushed them in every aspect, and sales naturally crushed them as well.

Their sales figures were a fraction of a fraction of their competitor's.

Not only were the new phones not selling, but the old models had also become dead stock.

Xiaomi 3 and Xiaomi 3s had both dropped to the same price point of 1299; Redmi had been discounted to 600 at a loss, but still no one was interested.

What chilled Lei Jun even more was that the distributors had also run off; they had all signed exclusive agency agreements with Honor.

That afternoon, Lei Jun called an emergency meeting, and all Xiaomi executives were present.

"We need to discuss one thing in today's meeting: Can we speed up Xiaomi's smart home strategy, and is there a better plan?"

Before his voice had even faded, the PPT behind him had already changed to the Xiaomi "Human-Car-Home" strategic plan!