Interview with Tianyuan Electronics Co., Ltd. CEO Wu Hong

At present, the automotive electronics industry is moving toward intelligent development. What is its current status? Tianyuan is a company with strong background and industrial experience. What role does it play in the intelligent development of automobiles? Enterprises have encountered in the development process. What is the problem? What will happen to the future development of automotive electronics companies? We will discuss the development of the automotive electronics industry through the opportunity of Pcauto to interview Tianhong Electronics Co., Ltd. CEO Wu Hong.

Q1. What is the status quo of the current automobile intelligent development in the automotive industry? With Tianyuan’s current strength background and industry experience, what role does Tianyuan play in the intelligent development of automobiles?

General Manager Wu: The intelligentization of automobiles has shown a rapid development trend in the automotive industry. In addition to previous years, Fox, Fiat and other car companies have assembled smart car products, sales of 10 million units such a model, at this year's Guangzhou International Auto Show, many brands of car companies including foreign or independent brand car factory , all have outstanding performance in the field of automotive intelligence, such as Cadillac, Audi, Acura, Infiniti, and Changan Automobile, etc., have installed a car smart car system, and in the field of automotive intelligence, voice control will become a normal .

However, I understand that these branded cars are smart cars. Relatively speaking, their functions are relatively simple. Some of them are only one or two voice-activated operations, and some are limited to several applications in the simple mobile internet. Our Zhifengyun cloud computing voice-activated intelligent driving system, which was released in September of this year, has developed one-on-one practical development around vehicle owners' driving safety and commonly used vehicle functions in the driving process. It is sold in our first stage. China and Zhiyun products have been approved by consumers (car owners).

Tianyuan is a leading company in the automotive audio and video electronics industry. We were a leader in CD players, VCDs, and DVD players 10 years ago. Five years ago, we began to deploy intelligent automotive products; after the global financial crisis broke out, we changed The single-market pattern of export-oriented sales has increased the research and development of the domestic sales market, investing RMB 230-300 million in R&D expenses each year, and has formed a strategic cooperation with Microsoft. The development of Tianyuan has gradually shifted from “manufacturing” to “intellectual-made”, from simple product production to platform-based construction and development. In my opinion, the core competitiveness of our company in the future is in the field of automotive intelligence. We are positioning ourselves as a leader in car-intelligence automotive multimedia systems. Judging from our current intellectual-driven cloud development, we have been ahead of the automotive multimedia (hardware vendors) industry for at least one year. At the same time, we are also stocking the development of second-generation and third-generation products. The uniqueness of our products makes it harder for them to surpass their peers.

Q2.: There was a big commercial event in 2012 when Apple announced that it would cooperate with depots into the automotive multimedia industry. However, software giant Microsoft has already cut into this market. For example, Microsoft and Ford launched the SYNC system. Microsoft signed a contract with Tianyuan Company last year to enter the Chinese auto aftermarket. We would like to know what the current situation of Tianyuan's cooperation with Microsoft is. How will the future cooperation development be planned?

General Manager Wu: At present, Tianyuan's cooperation with Microsoft is very smooth. In early November, Carmelo Morgano, global sales director of Microsoft's automotive business unit, visited our company and brought us a lot of valuable information. In the exchange, I showed Carmelo Morgano our smart driving based on Microsoft's MSAUTO technology architecture. The new generation of cloud platform products brought great shock to Carmelo Morgano.

Tianyuan is the first strategic partner signed with Microsoft in the automotive aftermarket (car multimedia) in China. We will integrate various resources to develop MSAUTO locally and follow our development plan. On top of this, we will develop a series of platform products and form "vehicle-level" superior products on each platform, and then feed the market. Products are the primary productivity of market development. In the future development path of Tianyuan, we are committed to providing products with superior experience to meet consumer demand for automotive safety, information and APP applications.

Q3.: Tianyuan has promoted its “Intelligent Cloud” platform products this year. It is understood that the hardware manufacturers in the aftermarket, such as Good Helper, Desai Xiwei, Ouhua, etc., have also launched similar to “Intelligent Cloud Computing”. What differentiates and differentiates the advantages of the product and the product model of Tianyuan Zhiyun and these manufacturers?

General Manager Wu: The intelligent car-developed product developed by Tianyuan Motor Co., Ltd.—intelligence-driven smart driving system, is actually not the same model as walking with the same person. The development philosophy of Zhihuiyun is based first on the driver’s safety priority—emancipating the driver’s eyes and hands—whether under the increasingly stringent state traffic regulations in 2013, can the onboard multimedia system be as wide as possible within its scope? Helping drivers take the initiative to circumvent certain irregularities. This design is very human. In terms of product platform functionality, Zhihui Cloud has the following differentiated advantages.

First, Smart Cloud adopts intelligent speech cloud technology to control car machines through voice recognition, such as voice-activated navigation, voice-activated on-demand songs, radio FM exchange stations, voice-activated calls, voice-activated search for network information, and so on. Voice-activated technology greatly facilitates the driver and changes his control habits. The first generation of our intellectual driving cloud is based on Mandarin. The next generation of products will add several local dialects, making manipulation more convenient.

Second, Zhi-Yi-Cloud is developing based on Microsoft's MSAUTO technology architecture, and its performance is very stable. MSAUTO is the most stable operating system for vehicles; Andriod's development is based on portable devices and terminals, not suitable for automotive multimedia applications. Andriod's instability makes it inherently unsuitable for automotive electronics development.

Third, the application of cloud computing is yet another bright spot in the cloud. Smart cloud adopts cloud computing technology and 3G network. The speed of product operation is very fast. Especially in the MSAUTO environment, the speed of response to the cloud-driven car machine is very fast.

Fourth, in terms of specific APP applications, Zhiyun adheres to the people-centered concept and has developed voice calls, voice-activated navigation, voice-on-demand music, voice control DVD/radio, and listening to network information. Our second-generation products will also add geographically-based voice-activated voice services, flight inquiries, tire pressure monitoring, vehicle maintenance reminders and other very practical and convenient functions.

Q4.: According to our understanding, the supporting business of depots is very demanding for the company's capital. How does Tianyuan deal with this capital issue in the depot business? Is there any capital investment or relevant capital market plan?

General Manager Wu: Tianyuan’s current cooperation with the depot (automobile pre-installation business) has entered a period of rapid development. We have maintained close cooperation with FAW-Volkswagen, Beijing Automotive, Geely, Jianghuai, and Haima and other car companies, and become their spare parts. Supporting partners. Cooperating with depots is a test of the R&D, quality control, production, and financial strength of automakers. This is determined by the characteristics of the pre-installation business.

In the cooperation with the depot, the most critical issue is the allocation of funds. To this end, Tianyuan has done two key things: First, to do technical upgrading of the project, and to automate the upgrade of production equipment. We have obtained technical reform of this project. With the financial support of the state technical upgrading project, the automation rate of the production line in Tianyuan will increase by more than 40% in the future. The second thing is the introduction of investment. At present, we have successfully introduced investors. Tianyuan has gained the recognition of investors in terms of technology accumulation, product development, etc., as well as the entire company's development plan. Next we will further improve our products. Actions.

Q5.PCauto: What are the main threads and directions of Tianyuan’s corporate development strategy, product strategy and business segment in the next five years?

General Manager Wu: In general, Tianyuan will gradually develop from a traditional car maker to a smart car multimedia system in the next five years. We mainly focus on doing three things. First, to be the smartest multimedia product for the automotive industry; second, to make a living in various business markets, make a brand reputation, and significantly increase sales volume; and thirdly, to strengthen business management and achieve the marginal benefits of cost control.

In terms of business development, from the business level, our business area will be advanced in four major areas in the future.

The first is the traditional channel sales business. This is Tianyuan's 10-year market. In recent years, it has maintained an annual growth rate of more than 40%.

This is followed by the 4S store market. The large customer business division that we established in 2010 has started from scratch. Currently, it has strategic cooperation with more than 10 core 4S group companies, and there are more indirect 4S group companies.

The third business is the depot business unit. This is the front loading business. At present, we have a matching cooperation business with FAW-Volkswagen, Geely, Haima, JAC, Beijing Auto and other OEMs. This business is the future core business of Tianyuan Company. one.

The fourth business is overseas markets, which is one of Tianyuan’s core businesses. After the global financial crisis in 2008, the overseas market experienced a rapid decline. Now it is gradually picking up. Our car-specific car audio navigation products have also opened up a good situation in overseas markets. At the same time, we also have some product projects such as automotive communications and Hainan Airlines. .

Each of our business segments has the characteristics of mutual cooperation and complementarity, thus forming a complete business chain of Tianyuan Company.