HANGZHOU, China, Jan. 14, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Dangbei, China's largest app distribution platform, community media, developer services platform and advertising alliance platform focused on big screen products, officially announced smart projection hardware as its new business focus.
Big screen products cover smart TVs, android TV boxes and smart projectors. Their compatibility with android OS and Internet access support allow users to download and install apps depending on their preferences and operate more flexibly. By adding Internet access support to traditional TVs, these products cater to modern home entertainment needs with highlighted shareability, intelligence and flexibility and is giving rise to a new home entertainment style in China.
According to the data presented in the Big Screen Ecosystem Operations Big Data Blue Paper, smart TVs, which are the core Internet devices for domestic households, have experienced fast growth since 2013 in China. In 2016 when the "living room economy" driven by apps, video content and advertisements was becoming a business model, the proportion of shipments of smart TVs increased by nearly 90%. The inventory of big screen smart terminals (including smart TVs, android TV boxes and smart projectors) reached 310 million in 2018 and the number is expected to exceed 410 million in 2020. Over 70% of Chinese households watch programs on big screen terminals. Therefore, the core app by Dangbei - "Dangbei Market", a tailor-made appstore for smart TVs and TV boxes and a leading TV app distribution channel in China with several thousand high-quality authorized TV apps, shows great potential.
Dangbei was funded by Suning Holdings Group, a domestic home appliance retail giant and China's second largest private-owned enterprise in 2016. Yang Yang, vice president of Suning Investment Group commented on the investment this way: "The dilemma confronted by an investor is 'sufficient capital against scarcity of good projects'; in terms of our investment criteria, a good project should be one with a pretty clear vision, a strategic goal and roadmap with detailed steps and that is able to create and share more value; in terms of our investment scope, we not only focus on physical products and services but also on media platform and home-targeted projects." Dangbei was chosen from many home-targeted projects. This move signaled Suning's intention to penetrate the big screen market. The parties may strengthen their partnership in the future in a mutually beneficial way.
With its smart TV appstore taking the largest domestic market share, Hangbei is also engaged in strategic partnerships with the TV segments of Sony China, Konka, Skyworth, CVTE, Suning, Gome, Storm, Haier, etc. Meanwhile, Dangbei ranks as number 1 in terms of media community, content integration, advertising traffic and developer services based on big screen terminals, which demonstrates a strong Matthew effect. Dangbei has also developed several tools and content apps for big screen terminals, which have served over 300 registered million Chinese users. Its big screen smart device advertising alliance covers over 220 million big screen smart hardware terminals and its professional big data analysis capability enables a precise grasp of industry trends. The enterprise also received billions in investment funds from Shunwei Capital founded by Leijun, Haitong Leading Capital Management and Suning Group and has been recognized as a national "high-tech enterprise".
According to Jin Linglin, CEO of Dangbei, consumption upgrade has given rise to the emergence of smart TVs and the big screen smart ecosystem represented by smart TVs (including smart projection and Android TV boxes) will be an essential focus of smart home products. Dangbei will build a complete eco-chain containing big screen software + hardware + system + contents relying on its closed-loop business formed by its organic traffic, product matrix and brand reputation to provide professional and featured services for big screen smart terminal users and facilitate industry breakthroughs and innovations, thereby leading industry growth and transformation.
Dangbei has a wide and precisely targeted potential user group and brand awareness in China, which has everything to do with its high traffic and content integration capability. Choosing smart projection as a new business area is based on two considerations: First, projection combines big screen smart entertainment and smart audio speaker functions; Second, the domestic projection market is highly profitable with massive potential. By integrating intelligence, entertainment, practicality and multi-functions into one mini device, the projector is becoming a household device instead of solely having a business function. Its application scenarios are no longer limited to classrooms, offices and conference rooms; instead, it may also serve entertainment purposes when people are watching TV, singing karaoke or playing games. Smart projection has great potential. The sales volume of domestic smart projection products grew by 300% from 2015 to 2018. Additionally, the new business can create a synergy effect with the existing business by building Dangbei's software development and content integration capabilities into its own hardware to offer consumers a better user experience. Meanwhile, Dangbei conducts precision marketing to a wide group of people based on its organic traffic and media resources, which saves on consumer acquisition costs and improves profitability with value-added services. Dangbei aims to build a core hardware product for "smart living room" and use AI+IoT to empower high-tech lifestyles in the future.
Currently, education, health, fitting, entertainment and Karaoke are areas with high potential for big screen terminals except for video content, which has basically had a stable industry layout and Dangbei has superior community resources, traffic and distribution capability. Dangbei is now conducting R&D on multiple types of content products for big screen terminals. The domestic big screen content and advertising industry is expected to scale up to more than USD 40 billion in the next three years.
