Editor/Zhao
When COVID-19 hit, all industries were not spared. However, compared with Internet companies that can organize online office, the mobile phone industry has its particularity. From transnational material preparation, production to sales, the long chain tests the pressure-bearing ability of a mobile phone manufacturer under the epidemic situation. This is the characteristic of manufacturing industry, which needs greater coordination ability and risk judgment ability.
Through an anti-epidemic sample of a domestic mobile phone manufacturer, we can not only see the difficulties and fragility behind the manufacturing industry, but also see how a complete industrial chain responds to the biggest black swan incident in history.
In fact, despite such a big industrial crisis, we also saw that mainstream mobile phone manufacturers released new products as scheduled in March. By the end of March, the output of China mobile phone factory had reached the normal level.
0 1
One week before the Spring Festival holiday, OPPO held a huge annual meeting, and more than 1400 tables filled the entire Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center. The atmosphere is harmonious, and tens of thousands of people welcome the arrival of 2020.
It's just that no one knows which comes first, the accident or the surprise.
On June 65438+1October 2 1 day, the epidemic situation in COVID-19 will definitely spread from person to person. The purchasing department of OPPO organized an internal review meeting and urgently started the supplier screening work.
Supply chain is the first to be impacted in the whole process. There is something wrong with the material supply link, and everything behind the production and sales is empty talk. This is a great pressure for Li and his team, who are in charge of procurement execution.
But because the Spring Festival is coming, the purchasing department has only two days left. The initial screening of OPPO procurement team is mainly aimed at Hubei suppliers, and suppliers in other places have also made inquiries by telephone and email. At that time, three high-risk suppliers were identified, all of which were concentrated in the cities around Wuhan.
The biggest influence is a company that produces camera parts in Wuhan, and its equipment is used by the whole industry. The production capacity of this enterprise affects the progress of the whole industry.
After hearing the news that Wuhan was going to close the city, the corresponding buyers immediately called to confirm, and the reply was that the left-behind employees could only support the original 20% production capacity, which means that this component will become a scarce resource in the industry in the future.
Without delay, the OPPO procurement team quickly activated the certification of the second and third echelon suppliers. "In the end, when resources were tight, we actually communicated with suppliers in advance."
The night before New Year's Eve, suppliers in Wuhan called to inform them that they had received a notice from the government to block the internal park, so that people could not move and they were isolated in the dormitory. An hour later, another mobile phone manufacturer called the supplier. "This judgment is very important in an emergency." Communication in advance bought them some time.
65438+1On October 28th, the OPPO supply chain held another meeting. At this time, the epidemic has exceeded everyone's estimate years ago. At the beginning of the epidemic, they were more concerned about Hubei.
After that day, Li's purchasing team began to hold a regular meeting at 8: 00 every morning to report the supplier's situation and the personnel's return to work the day before. This state lasted until mid-March. "Many colleagues in the procurement team have never returned to their hometown until now."
When the domestic epidemic reached its peak, a thorny problem faced by OPPO purchasing department was that the flagship model Find X2 was stuck in the critical stage of mass production, and all the raw materials were ready, just waiting to be finally sent to OPPO factory to complete the final process.
Find X2 has many new processes, such as ceramic battery cover, which is not widely used in previous models, which means that more technicians are needed, otherwise it will have a great impact on the yield.
Li revealed that passive components are usually stocked about 16 weeks in advance, while structural components such as ceramics are 6~8 weeks in advance. When the epidemic broke out, it was not chips but structural components that had a longer shelf life.
However, the supplier's engineers are trapped at home. Compared with internet companies, they can make up for it by telecommuting. Many jobs in manufacturing industry are special, such as sample making and process debugging, which must be completed on site.
Fortunately, many structural parts suppliers are concentrated around Dongguan, and OPPO has also sent its own engineers there. "If their people can't come back, our people will leave." In two or three weeks, the progress was basically reduced by the development engineers inside OPPO.
"In the end, it did not affect the production of our whole machine, but the inventory was relatively not so abundant." By the end of March, the domestic mobile phone supply chain basically reached the level before the outbreak.
Find X2 didn't delay its listing due to production problems, and everything went as planned.
In addition to engineers, production line workers also experienced a month-long labor shortage. There was a survey data at that time. At the beginning of February, the return rate of employees in the supply chain and production line of the whole mobile phone industry was only about 30%.
"We will be affected by 20% production capacity in February." Lu Zeng, president of Xiaomi China District, said in an exclusive interview with AI Finance and Economics, "The biggest problem today is that many workers can't get out, even if they arrive, they still have to be isolated. This will definitely have an impact on production. But we still have some basic reserves there. "
In addition to the labor force, the factory needs to meet certain prevention and control conditions. OPPO purchased some epidemic prevention materials, including masks, disinfectant and temperature measuring gun, and distributed them to suppliers. Li still remembers that the purchasing team even contacted suppliers in Dubai to help them buy masks and send them back to China.
"We also give our suppliers some financial and accounting support appropriately, so that the other party can have capital flow as soon as possible." Li said to him.
However, after the domestic epidemic situation stabilized, the procurement team had little chance to breathe. At the end of March, the overseas epidemic began again. The number of overseas suppliers accounts for nearly 30% of OPPO.
The problem of overseas supply chain mainly lies in freight logistics. Countries are preventing the spread of the epidemic by limiting flight capacity. This puts forward higher requirements for the accuracy of material procurement.
Li revealed that after booking the cargo hold, if the cargo is delayed and the flight can't take off, it will also compensate the airlines for their losses and even bear certain customs risks.
An overseas logistics team was immediately set up within the OPPO supply chain, and it was repeated every day to predict the capacity of the next day and the next week according to the policies and freight rates of the countries where the overseas supply chain is located.
"So far, logistics can barely meet our needs." Li said that Vietnam was the only country that completely banned freight transportation, but it only lasted for two or three days and then reopened.
Li has worked in OPPO for more than ten years, from functional machines to smart machines, and has experienced ups and downs in the supply chain. The latest supply chain crisis occurred on 20 16, and the lack of memory caused the whole industry to face a supply crisis.
At that time, Samsung's production capacity could only meet 55% of customer demand. For some time, the price of memory rose sharply, which was in short supply, which affected the production and sales of new machines. It took six or seven months for the whole industry to ease down.
"This is the first time because the impact of public health events is so great." Li also recently reflected on the impact of the epidemic on the entire supply chain.
"But from this point of view, when the scope of diffusion is larger than we originally expected, it is impossible to completely control this matter just by making a diffusion from this area." He is thinking about how to balance the substitutability of domestic and overseas materials. "The thinking of the supply chain needs to be re-examined."
02
When Li Wei was too busy to ensure the supply of goods, Lin Caigui of OPPO support service system found that colleagues they sent to purchase epidemic prevention materials such as masks came back to give feedback. Masks were more expensive and cheaper, "not a long-term solution".
This problem was very common at that time, and both upstream suppliers and surrounding enterprises faced similar problems. A manufacturing boss in Zhongshan, Guangdong, once told Ai Caijing that in order to resume work in February 10, they specially prepared mask consumption for one month. At that time, the contradiction between supply and demand of masks had eased, but they still bought them from the market at a high price in 3.5 yuan.
However, as a mobile phone manufacturer, OPPO is unique in that it is the peak period of new machine sales after the Spring Festival. In March, flagship machine Find X2 will be released soon, which is the most important new product for OPPO to hit the high-end market in recent two years.
Mobile phone companies have a more urgent need to return to work than other industries. Every year, the manufacturer keeps a group of workers in the factory to prepare for the production of new machines. Thousands of people in OPPO's factory stayed in Dongguan for the New Year this year.
And these people have become the most valuable resources during the epidemic. Dongguan is actually a major producer of masks, but when the epidemic is tense, many mask factories are in trouble, because workers have returned to their hometowns, and mask factories have materials and equipment, but they are short of people. On the third day of New Year's Eve, OPPO sent dozens of technicians and production personnel to the local mask factory for support, which lasted nearly 2 months.
At the same time, OPPO also decided to produce its own masks. At the end of June of 5438+0, we began to make corresponding preparations, such as planning the site, purchasing mask machines and raw materials, applying for production qualification, and understanding the quality standards of the industry. At that time, the epidemic had been going on for some time, and the mask machine was already a scarce resource.
Lin Caigui's team made great efforts and finally bought the first mask production line, which lasted nearly half a month. "I finally have a mask line." Lin Caigui is still very excited to mention this matter now.
On February 10, the first batch of masks produced by OPPO went offline. Only a few thousand masks were produced that day, and then it gradually increased to 40,000 to 50,000 and 70,000 to 80,000 pieces a day until it reached more than 100,000 pieces a day. This is the law of manufacturing industry, and all new things need to go through the process of mass production climbing.
The mask looks simple, but many factors will affect the operation of the production line. For example, the replacement of the mask machine should be done every hour. If there is any deviation, it is necessary to stop and re-debug, which often takes several hours. OPPO has specially optimized the tools for refueling, and trained the technicians accordingly, groping for some time.
OPPO bought four mask machine production lines before and after, but they belong to three different brands. The design technology and accessories of each brand are different. "This process is still very painful and it takes one to two weeks to run in." Lin Caigui said.
Masks were a very humble industry before the outbreak of the epidemic. Mask machine is a highly automated equipment. In addition to the packaging process, there is more demand for workers, and the debugging and maintenance of equipment in the front-end mask production process depends more on equipment technicians with corresponding experience. Therefore, when the demand is blowout, the few technicians in the factory become very popular, and the information of recruiting technicians with a daily salary of several thousand yuan is circulating on the Internet.
At this time, OPPO is also faced with equipment technicians who lack corresponding experience. In addition to trying to coordinate the factory technicians to provide on-site support and remote video guidance, Lin Caigui also arranged full-time engineers and technicians to explore for themselves. At the same time, the technicians sent by OPPO to support the local mask factory also brought back valuable experience for their own production.
In addition to technicians who have experience in debugging the mask machine, consumables and accessories of the mask machine are also problems. Consumable parts, such as nose knife, panel knurling knife, panel knife, ear scissors, etc., need to be replaced frequently. Different brands of equipment are different, and mask equipment manufacturers themselves are already very busy. Lin Caigui decided that at this time, he could not wait for the manufacturer, arranged for the engineer to measure and draw by himself, and found the corresponding processing factory to make it.
At the same time, in order to ensure that the production problems can be quickly solved internally, the team determined in advance the parts that are easy to wear due to the high-speed operation of the equipment, including ultrasonic welding, cylinders, gas pipes, bearings and throttle valves of various specifications. , and made corresponding measures and purchasing reserves in advance.
This is the advantage of manufacturing enterprises and the real economy in the face of the epidemic. They have workers, equipment and technicians. When there are no parts in the market, they can quickly organize their own production.
OPPO's four mask production lines can produce more than 300,000 pieces a day. OPPO distributed its own masks to employees, front-line promoters and some suppliers. At the same time, after self-production, OPPO also donated N95 masks purchased overseas in the early stage. "Knowing each other far and near, Wan Li is still a neighbor." On March 15, OPPO began to donate 300,000 yuan raised before to countries with serious epidemics such as Italy, Spain, Germany and France.
03
After manufacturers overcame many difficulties to produce mobile phones, sales became a problem because shops could not open their doors for business.
Everyone is saving themselves.
Zhang Yajing is a sales consultant in Huainan, Anhui Province, and has worked in OPPO for nearly 10 years. In previous years, this was her busiest period of the year, but the sudden epidemic disrupted all this. Her shop closed on February 5, and for a time she was very anxious and afraid of losing her job because of closing.
Zhang Yajing decided to sell his mobile phone through the "private domain traffic" in his circle of friends, which is adopted by almost all offline stores. Customers who place an order in a circle of friends will deliver it to your door. Zhang Yajing is usually busy with shop work and has no time to make friends. However, due to the particularity of the epidemic, she began to pay attention to online channel sales, and she became active among community owners.
A dealer in Fujian revealed that they did not open in February and all their income came from old customers. Because of the demand of online learning, the sales of mobile phones and tablets have been promoted.
"After the epidemic has eased, I intend to continue to expand my online business. The contact of offline customers is always slow, but online customers are mostly recommended by friends, and they have gained half of the trust when they meet for the first time. In addition to sending a circle of friends, I am still wondering if I can open a live broadcast. " Zhang Yajing said.
At the same time, OPPO also encourages promoters to sell through online means such as friends circle, and requires that the salary of front-line promoters will not be reduced due to the epidemic. A special epidemic subsidy of 1 10,000 yuan was given to 70,000 promoters nationwide.
OPPO knows better than anyone. It is with the full blossom of the offline channel that it finally develops and grows. This is their core asset. Stabilizing the hearts of these people is extremely important for restoring sales. In fact, offline dealers have always had a good reputation for OPPO and vivo. Manufacturers have enough profit margins and are willing to take risks together.
Wu Qiang, vice president of OPPO, once revealed in an interview with AI Finance and Economics that due to the COVID-19 epidemic, mobile phone sales in February dropped by about 50% compared with last year, and the whole mobile phone industry was severely impacted. Since the end of February, the whole market has gradually recovered to the same level as last year.
"The sales structure needs to be further optimized." Wu Qiang said that in the past, most of OPPO's sales came from offline. Although offline promoters are trying to reduce the loss of the epidemic, Wu Qiang, as the top of the company, has to consider something higher, just like the risk management of the supply chain. Reasonable sales structure will also be an important weight to deal with the next crisis.
At present, with the change of consumption habits, OPPO is also actively optimizing the old, small and remote stores with limited conditions, choosing the core location of the core business district along the street, and entering more shopping centers to enhance its image and experience. At the same time, promote service transformation, promote the integration of sales and services, continue to build digital capabilities, and gradually implement new measures to improve user experience and accurate user management.
With the gradual easing of the domestic epidemic, workers have returned to their jobs one after another, the supply chain has also returned to the level before the epidemic, the sales of offline stores have restarted, and the sales volume has also rebounded rapidly. Finally, we see the signs of spring coming again.