In this round of Sino-US technology war, DJI, a company from Shenzhen, China, has also been sanctioned by the United States. Compared with Huawei's embarrassing situation of "short of cores", DJI appears to be much calmer.
In August 2017, the U.S. Army required its subordinate units in a memorandum to stop using drones and related products produced by China’s DJI Company because DJI’s products had “cyber vulnerabilities.” . The memo shows that General Joseph Anderson, deputy chief of staff of the U.S. Army, gave instructions: Stop using and uninstall all DJI applications, remove all batteries/storage media from the device, and protect the device for subsequent instructions. DJI stated in an interview with the Global Times that it was very "surprised" and "disappointed" by the memo and would contact the U.S. Army to confirm the authenticity of the memo and understand the specific meaning of "cyber vulnerability."
However, what is funny is that one year after the "Memo Incident", the U.S. Air Force announced the purchase of 35 DJI Mavic Pro drones, openly opposing the U.S. Army. At the same time, a U.S. internal affairs official revealed that U.S. officials bought almost all the drones of DJI’s competitor 3D Robotics to test the company’s drone performance and found that the company’s drones failed to perform comprehensively under various standards. It lags behind DJI drone products from China. Subsequently, the U.S. military’s purchase ban became a dead letter, and various military forces resumed the purchase of DJI drones one after another.
In October 2019, the United States imposed sanctions on a number of Chinese companies, including Huawei, Hikvision, and DJI, and increased tariffs on goods exported to the United States by these companies. On October 8, the sanctioned security giants Dahua Technology and Hikvision applied for temporary trading suspension.
However, DJI counterattacked with a wave of price increases, with an average increase of more than 10%. After announcing the price increase, various models of DJI drones were snapped up by the American people, and some people even walked away. Take to the streets to protest against this policy of the US government. In the end, DJI’s market share in the United States increased instead of falling, with its market share increasing from 75% to 85%.
In the face of US sanctions, DJI calmly faced it, and finally relied on its strong strength to calmly counterattack, which really made the Chinese feel proud.
So what if the United States has nothing to do with DJI?
Behind every arrogant company, there is an "arrogant" leader, so the leader behind DJI is Wang Tao.
DJI was established in Shenzhen in 2006 with only four initial employees, and only founder Wang Tao knew drone technology. The initial business location was in a 20-square-meter warehouse, and the business environment was really harsh. Even under such difficulties, Wang Tao and his team have been sticking to DJI, a start-up company.
In the early days of entrepreneurship, the first-generation DJI drone had been manufactured. At that time, a state-owned enterprise was interested in the product and wanted to buy the first-generation DJI drone. However, what was incredible was that Wang Tao refused. The reason for selling drones to this state-owned enterprise is that the state-owned enterprise mainly purchases drones to demonstrate to leaders. After the demonstration, the drones are shelved and not used in actual work. In Wang Tao's words, this is "easy money." Wang Tao refuses to sell drones in this way because he is afraid that the company will be ruined by this "easy money."
In the middle and late stages of entrepreneurship, DJI under Wang Tao’s rule became straighter. According to convention, companies generally seek capital investment. However, DJI is different. It has developed a "bidding investment" gameplay. In April 2018, in DJI’s new round of financing, it set out detailed bidding conditions, and then waited for investment institutions to bid. Investors need to bid based on DJI’s conditions, and only the one with the highest bid will be qualified to invest in DJI. . Such a financing method was unheard of before.
In addition, during DJI’s financing process, Wang Tao also rejected Xiaomi Lei Jun’s investment because his and Lei Jun’s operating ideas were completely different. Xiaomi pursued the ultimate cost-effectiveness, while DJI relied on Technology is what matters. He believes that technology developed with great effort should be sold at a high price and earn high profits, so Wang Tao did not accept Lei Jun's investment in the end.
Without Wang Tao’s perseverance, DJI would never have developed and grown; without Wang Tao’s decisive abandonment, DJI may be a very profitable company today, but it would never become great; if not Wang Tao's unique values, now DJI may also need to look at the faces of other investors, and they will not be so arrogant. Therefore, the author believes that DJI did not sink in this round of US sanctions and failed to recover. The most important soul figure is their leader-Wang Tao.
Generally speaking, U.S. sanctions against Chinese companies are basically patent sanctions, prohibiting Chinese companies from using certain technologies. Blocking drone technology will have no effect on DJI. From 2014 to 2020, DJI Technology’s number of patent applications has consistently ranked first in the industry. Its global patent applications are about 13,000, including nearly 3,000 PCT patent applications. The BrandZ 2019 ranking of the top 100 most valuable Chinese brands was recently announced, with DJI ranking 50th with a value of US$2.8 billion. About a quarter of DJI’s employees are engaged in research and development.
DJI drones, from appearance design to underlying software and even chips, are independently designed by DJI and have their own patents. As long as companies around the world want to make drones, they can’t bypass DJI’s patented drone technology. Even most of the rules and standards for the drone industry are formulated by DJI. Therefore, the United States is now imposing sanctions in this regard. DJI is just nonsense.
Therefore, DJI pursues the ultimate spirit of innovation from top to bottom, so that Chinese technology companies will no longer be technically "stuck" by the United States. This is why DJI goes further and further. The more chic secret.
DJI made its fortune in Shenzhen. The Pearl River Delta where Shenzhen is located has the most cost-effective electronic product supply chain in China and even the world. The consumer electronics industry in the Pearl River Delta has been developed in the past and is known to many people. Moreover, each city and region in the Pearl River Delta region has its own advantageous industries, so that different industries can complement each other in certain resources and have high delivery times. Cooperate.
Therefore, all parts of DJI are self-sufficient in China, and what China can give DJI is the best, cheapest, and most cost-effective. So in this area, there is nothing like the United States. thing.
Secondly, the United States does have leading university scientific research capabilities. The author believes that American universities and other scientific research units will be able to develop this DJI system, but there is no relevant experience accumulation and relevant industrial chain cooperation. Even if To make a product like a DJI drone, the price must be very high, which is meaningless. If the price is controlled at the same level as DJI, the performance and functions of the product will definitely not be comparable to DJI. Therefore, the United States has no way to make products that can replace DJI, whether in the military field or civilian field, so where to start talking about sanctions? Of course, an occasional sanction turned into a brief appearance like a clown, making people laugh.
The U.S. sanctions against DJI have no effect, just like punching a marshmallow!
DJI, great wisdom has no boundaries! Today, DJI is like a flag, holding high the totem of the Chinese nation, going through hardships and forging ahead. I hope that China will have more Wang Tao and more Dajiang in the future, so that we can complete the feat of national rejuvenation as soon as possible and stand at the center of the forest of nations.