Editor’s Note: Shanghai native Jacqui Zhou manages the Direct2Dell Chinese blog. This is the first of a two-part post in which she gives Your Blog readers a glimpse into a marketplace that can be starkly different than our own.
Natalie blogged about some of the world’s most expensive cell phones the other day. While the newly rich in China are all over everything brand-name, there is an emerging trend in the world’s largest cell phone market that goes in the opposite direction.
The phenomenon is called Shan Zhai Ji, which I would like to translate as Bandit Cell Phone. It refers to white box cell phones manufactured by unauthorized or small-scale factories on the southeast coast of China.
Though the popularity of Shan Zhai Ji has been building for some time, the buzz only surfaced after recent news coverage from China Central Television, the national television station. Shan Zhai Ji has since generated tons of discussions in the Chinese blogosphere. I won’t be surprised if one day people around me think it is cooler to carry a Shan Zhai Ji than an iPhone. Shan Zhai Ji is apparently becoming a unique sub-culture with dedicated Web sites promoting it.
As background information, you might want to know that with the fierce competition from global brands like Nokia and Motorola, most Chinese brand name cell phones have seen better days. So how does Shan Zhai Ji manage to survive and even acquire 25% of China’s handset market?
Shan Zhai Ji copies the designs of popular products such as iPhone and BlackBerry. At the same time, they throw in a lot of other useful functions that mainstream companies do not. For example, extra-long stand-by time of up to one month, dual SIM card support, quadruple cameras and speakers, radio, GPS, touch screen, extra large screen, handwriting recognition, and compatibility with all types of media files.
Shan Zhai Ji even has a lot of functions that you never dream of, such as analogue TV reception tuner, taser, ultraviolet laser for testing counterfeit bank notes and even fortune telling programs. These highly localized functions with Chinese characteristics are not usually on the radar screen of a multinational company’s design team.
Don’t assume all Shan Zhai Ji are mere imitations. Sometimes you will be amazed by the imagination of those Shan Zhai Ji designers.
This is not a pack of cigarettes. It is a cell phone. Yet you can insert as many as seven cigarettes into it.
It has micro SD card slot.
It even has a 1.3 mega pixel camera.
Adding a couple of more bucks, you can get different covers.
A cell phone with Beijing Olympics mascot.
This watch-like cell phone incorporates four microphones, metallic rim and a camera.
It is not a Ferrari toy car. Turn it around and you will find a cell phone key pad and screen.
Hopefully I’ve given you a good overview of Shan Zhai Ji. In my next post, I would like to walk you through some of reasons why Shan Zhai Ji has attracted such a big following in China, as well as Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Stay tuned!
June 24th, 2008 at 9:17 am
Ultraviolet Laser sounds interesting, I wonder how that would be on a laptop for business. Very interesting stuff Jacqui.
June 24th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Other than the “coolness” factor, why would you want your cell phone to look like anything besides a cell phone. I think in a bar, your pack of smokes are more likely to get stolen than your cell phone. Maybe they could design a killer cell phone to look like an out dated one. Can they make my iPhone look like a Motorola DynaTAC 8000X?
June 24th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
I love gadgets…. the Car Phone and the Cigarette Pack Phone both look good.
Too bad I can’t have either, as I don’t smoke and my son would probably get the car
Thanx for sharing.
.
Peace
June 24th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
I could think of a lot of cool designs I wouldn`t mind having. I wonder if they take orders!
June 26th, 2008 at 7:35 am
robin hood‘s
July 1st, 2008 at 1:53 pm
These were most wonderful articles - my sincere congratulations and warm regards, Boris Petrov
July 16th, 2008 at 8:02 am
厉害吧
July 16th, 2008 at 10:53 am
Sugarbear, try the site here if you read Chinese. http://search1.taobao.com/browse/0/t-95—————–g,zg65ll537i—————-40–commend-0-all-0.htm?at_topsearch=1