According to the Financial Times, China's top five domestic brands have spent the year showing off tools that help users escape iOS or run their Chinese phones alongside Jobs’ Mob’s kit, which is quite something given how viciously these firms usually scrap with each other.
Their push comes after China’s internet regulator dragged its feet on approving Apple’s AI functions, thanks to souring geopolitical relations with the US.
Omdia analyst Lucas Zhong said: “Chinese smartphone vendors are clearly moving faster and with greater openness in AI development. While conversions might take time, these tactics will undoubtedly add pressure to Apple’s operations in China.”
Counterpoint Research said the market is cut-throat with no outfit controlling more than 20 per cent. Job’s Mob, once on top, was knocked off last year by Vivo, which took 18.5 per cent of sales in the third quarter.
Apple, Honor, Oppo, Xiaomi and Huawei each sat between 13.6 and 16.4 per cent during the same period.
Chinese brands have long struggled to crack Apple loyalists because Job’s Mob makes it absurdly easy to move data between its own devices.
Domestic manufacturers reckon their AI features and flashy foldable phones make switching less of a faff for Apple diehards.
Oppo’s latest AI assistant can track spending from screenshots and give real-time gym guidance through the camera. Honor’s new models compare coupon sites, summon taxis more efficiently and bang out short videos.
Honor’s Magic operating system AI product director Xiangdong Li told the Financial Times: “Apple is a truly great company, and it’s one our entire industry should learn from, benchmark against and even surpass. If Apple moves slowly, that presents a great opportunity for us, right?”
Honor, split off from Huawei in 2020, has updated its Device Clone app so users can shift photos, messages and contacts from an Apple phone using a simple QR code. Its Honor Connect tool swaps files with iOS gear much like AirDrop.
Li said 37 per cent of online buyers of the Magic V5 had switched from Apple devices using these tools and claimed “we’ve been effective in attracting high-end Apple users.”
At a September launch, Xiaomi founder Lei Jun invited Apple users to jump ship while bragging about file transfer, screen sharing and notification syncing between his phones and iPhones. Oppo’s October software update lets people answer calls, reply to messages and view notifications from their Apple devices directly on Oppo kit.
Job’s Mob still offers its Move to iOS app for Android refugees. Its China sales dipped four per cent year on year in the quarter to September, although Tim Cook said on an earnings call in October he expected the outfit to “return to growth” this quarter.
Counterpoint reckons China sales climbed 22 per cent in the month after the iPhone 17’s mid-September release, suggesting punters are not panicking about the phone’s lack of AI features.
Analysts say the new tricks have not made a noticeable dent in Apple’s dominance of the premium segment outside China. Xiaomi, the top Chinese brand in Western Europe’s premium bracket in the second quarter, held a weedy three per cent according to IDC.
IDC analyst Will Wong said slower global smartphone growth means these Chinese attempts to poach users pose a real threat and that the strategy is “allowing the Android phonemakers to really break the barrier of Apple’s closed ecosystems,” he said.