Domestic mobile phones kick off a new competition, and those who "don't rush to be the first" emerge victorious.

Ten years ago, the Chinese mobile phone market was in an era of "a hundred schools of thought contending," similar to the Warring States period. ZTE, Meizu, Coolpad, Lenovo, LeEco... The endless stream of brand names witnessed the fanaticism and bubbles in the industry. They competed in marketing, distribution channels, and brand ambassadors. As long as the momentum was "hot" enough, they could capture market share.

At that time, the competition was like scrambling to "enclose land" on a known map. However, there would always come a day when the map was fully explored. As the market dividends faded, the growth pointer mercilessly shifted from "incremental" to "stock," and a more brutal and challenging competition that tested the underlying strength began.

When the Chinese mobile phone industry officially entered the era of "system competition," mobile phone manufacturers are no longer competing in the speed of product iteration but in the depth of the technical system and the exploration of the industrial chain. They no longer only pursue short - term highlights but return to the foundation of the industry and jointly innovate with multiple dimensions such as chips, algorithms, systems, and ecosystems.

In the third quarter of 2025, this industrial restructuring reached a climax. Leading brands such as vivo, Huawei, and Xiaomi took turns to release new flagships. Vivo, which fired the "first shot" of domestic flagships in October, launched the vivo X300 series on October 13, globally debuting the Dimensity 9500 chip, with comprehensive upgrades in performance and imaging capabilities. Under the high popularity, it can be seen that a new pattern of domestic mobile phones from chips to imaging, from systems to AI ecosystems has finally emerged.

From extreme involution to value return

The latest data from Counterpoint shows that as of September 28, vivo (including iQOO) topped the Chinese mobile phone market in the third quarter of 2025 with a market share of 18.4%. Meanwhile, vivo also ranked first in the first three quarters of 2025 with a share of 17.2%.

In the high - end market above 4000 yuan in the first eight months of this year, vivo (including iQOO) ranked second, with Huawei in the first place. Vivo accounted for 22.14%. In the global market, vivo and Xiaomi have ranked among the top five in sales for five consecutive quarters.

These data indicate that the Chinese smartphone industry officially entered a new pattern of domestic flagship camps led by Huawei, Xiaomi, and vivo in 2025.

What is more worthy of attention than the rankings is the reason and way for the formation of this pattern. As the competition in the smartphone industry evolves from "single - point leadership" to "system leadership," the market is testing the ability of brands to build closed - loop systems simultaneously on the three fronts of technology, experience, and ecosystem.

The imaging field is a microcosm of the evolution of the mobile phone market path. This track, which was once deeply involved in "involution," is experiencing a value return. It has shifted from competing in hardware stacking back to the essence of "taking good photos." Pixel count and sensor size are no longer the ultimate goals, and the ability to solve real - world scenarios has become the core competitiveness.

The success of the DJI Pocket 3 confirms this trend. This pocket camera with only 12 million pixels has become popular against the trend in the era of content social media. It just shows that users are willing to pay for solutions to pain points such as "not having to carry a camera while traveling and being able to take great photos casually."

The vivo X300 series also targets this market logic and reconstructs imaging as a systematic project. The "Zeiss 200 - million - pixel APO super - telephoto" and the "Sony LYT - 828 gimbal - level main camera" on the X300 Pro are not just hardware upgrades on the surface but actually integrate a travel photography gadget, a stage photography tool, and a video - shooting device into one.

What is even more worthy of attention is vivo's underlying innovation path. Vivo conducts tri - party joint research with MediaTek and Arm, achieving collaborative optimization from the chip instruction set to imaging algorithms. This means that the X300 series is not simply "using" the chip but is involved in the definition and co - creation of the chip at a deeper level. This "co - research" innovation is becoming the core of vivo's efforts to build differentiated advantages.

In the aspect of imaging semantic understanding, vivo further deepens the involvement of AI, enabling the algorithm not only to recognize objects but also to understand the scene. Through the dual - core collaboration of the self - developed imaging chip V3+ and the Dimensity 9500, an imaging ultra - energy - efficient NPU area is defined. The X300 series can comprehensively judge light, the subject, and the direction of movement in milliseconds, achieving almost "predictive" focusing and blurring effects.

What this system finally outputs is not just a clear picture but a visual expression full of narrative and cinematic qualities. What vivo has achieved is to let technology actively understand the user's creative intention rather than making the user adapt to the cold logic of technology.

The self - developed chip is responsible for scheduling and computing power, optical co - research ensures hardware performance, the AI algorithm understands the creative intention, and the system - level optimization improves response and energy efficiency. This closed - loop explains why the vivo X series can continuously stand out in diverse scenarios such as travel photography, night scenes, concerts, and vlogs. Because it meets the core demand that has been long - neglected in the content era: lightweight professional creative ability.

Instead of making users understand technology, it makes technology actively understand people. This R & D approach starting from user needs has become the logical starting point for a new round of innovation in domestic mobile phones.

When the "long river" brings compound interest effects

In the same market environment, Huawei, Xiaomi, and vivo have taken three completely different development paths.

Huawei is like a high mountain - its goal is to "break through the limits," constantly pushing the boundaries with chips, operating systems, and AI infrastructure.

Xiaomi is like a forest - it weaves a network of touchpoints between "people - cars - homes" through scale and ecological synergy.

And vivo is like a long river - it represents patience and accumulation. For thirty years, this brand has been deeply involved in consumer electronics, continuously investing in four long - term tracks: design, imaging, system, and performance, with "user orientation" as the source.

In this process, vivo has gradually built a more systematic innovation method, initiating the "third paradigm." Driven by the dual wheels of "self - research + co - research," it accumulates systematic strength over time and gathers innovation through openness.

Vivo not only conducts in - depth self - research at the chip, algorithm, and system levels but also gathers the "whole industry" through co - research and co - creation. From jointly defining the Dimensity architecture with MediaTek and Arm to co - researching imaging standards with Samsung, Sony, and Zeiss; from exploring new - generation display technologies with BOE to jointly developing high - energy - efficiency battery systems with CATL.

These "co - research" partners of vivo form an ever - expanding innovation network, supporting it to explore further boundaries and future - form devices. On the occasion of its thirtieth anniversary, vivo announced its entry into the MR industry. Through mobile phone AI, imaging, and MR capabilities, it will meet users' demand for a large - screen immersive experience in the short term. In the long run, as the eyes and brain of robots, it will solve the "perception - decision - making" problem in unstructured home scenarios and build a bridge for future home robots to enter thousands of households.

Facing the future, whether it is MR spatial computing, robot interaction systems, or the popularization of AI edge - side computing power, vivo is exploring the next curve of intelligent terminals in a way that combines software and hardware.

Different from the breakthrough of the "high mountain" and the wide distribution of the "forest," the power of the long river comes from time. Vivo does not pursue short - term highlights but builds reusable systematic capabilities through long - term investment.

The "Blue Technology" system is the result of this methodology. The "Blue Crystal Chip Technology Stack" connects the computing power logic at the chip's underlying level. "Blueprint Imaging" focuses on the integrated innovation of optics and vision. The "Blue River Operating System" ensures the fluidity of the system and interaction experience. The "Blue Heart Large Model" gives AI understanding a human - touch to technology. The "Blue Ocean Battery System" guarantees overall stability with energy efficiency and battery life.

It runs through the complete link from chip computing power, imaging optics, system interaction to AI understanding and energy - efficiency management, forming a self - evolving technological ecosystem. These five elements are coupled with each other and co - exist in a cycle, creating a "technological compound interest" unique to vivo. Each innovation can accumulate potential within the system, providing a foundation for the next breakthrough and making vivo an ever - evolving "long river."

Behind this "Blue Technology" system network lies the most crucial step in vivo's strategy - co - research. Co - research is not just resource exchange but a common - definition ability. Whether it is vivo's co - construction of optical standards with Zeiss, co - determination of imaging specifications with Samsung and Sony, or joint definition of the Dimensity architecture with MediaTek and Arm at the SoC level, in essence, it is to make the upstream hardware logic align with vivo's product philosophy.

At present, as the wave of AI mobile phones is just emerging, the value of this system is being verified. The biggest challenge for edge - side AI lies in the contradiction between "limited energy consumption and infinite computing power." The stronger the AI model, the higher the power consumption and heat generation, while the size and battery of mobile devices cannot be infinitely expanded. In the past, the mainstream approach in the industry was "cloud - based inference," but it brought problems of privacy, latency, and cost.

Therefore, vivo has chosen a more difficult but forward - looking path: to truly implement AI capabilities on the edge side. This means that the chip's underlying layer must be reconstructed. Through the Blue Crystal Chip Technology Stack, vivo conducts in - depth co - research with Arm and MediaTek, designing new "channels" for AI computing at the architectural level. In cooperation with Arm, the two parties developed an AI - oriented SME2 matrix acceleration capability based on the C1 CPU cluster. Through vivo's self - developed computing acceleration platform VCAP, the CPU, GPU, and NPU dynamically divide labor in different AI tasks, achieving heterogeneous collaboration for high - load tasks.

As a result, vivo has achieved an average of 20% improvement in performance and energy - efficiency optimization in real - world scenarios such as voice recognition, image translation, and text - to - image generation, making AI responses faster, battery life longer, and the experience more stable. The significance of this kind of underlying innovation goes far beyond performance improvement. It makes AI a basic ability that can be used on every mobile phone, truly realizing the popularization of AI.

This open innovation model is the key to differentiating vivo from its peers. Self - research makes the core experience controllable, and co - research makes industry standards closer to user needs. This dual - track mechanism of "endogenous" and "symbiotic" allows vivo to maintain flexible innovation while ensuring the robustness of the system.

The value of the "long - river logic" lies here. It does not chase after trends but accumulates systematic potential over time. When it "takes root" deep enough within the system, innovation will have the ability to generate more social value.

In this process, vivo has always focused on the high - frequency needs of the broadest range of users. It has customized a professional mode for food delivery riders, developed offline communication for scientific researchers, and created a concert - shooting gadget for young people. This brand's technological innovation never floats in the air but always addresses the real needs of people and scenarios.

In vivo's cultural heritage digital dissemination project, the "Digital National Treasures Project," vivo's imaging technology is used to photograph cultural relics such as those in Sanxingdui and the Forbidden City, allowing the textures that are difficult to distinguish with the naked eye to be preserved in the digital space. In primary healthcare stations, a portable slit lamp co - developed by vivo and an optical team enables doctors to assist in fundus diagnosis with mobile phones, completing shooting, uploading, and analysis, making professional medical care more accessible.

This is sufficient proof that when an enterprise has enough systematic potential, it can give technology a human touch. When innovation no longer only serves efficiency but can also benefit society, its compound interest goes beyond technology itself.

This is the ultimate direction of the "long river." Beyond the hustle and bustle, it flows forward slowly but steadily, reshaping a better world with technology. This mindset of not rushing to be the first but aiming for continuous progress has created a unique charm for the vivo brand.

What is the end - game of long - termism?

If the high mountain, forest, and long river represent three different competition logics, then a deeper question is what this differentiated competition means for the entire Chinese mobile phone industry. It tests not only speed but also who can find a sustainable growth logic. It defines not only the competition pattern but also the spiritual background of Chinese innovation in the next decade.

In the past twenty years, Chinese mobile phone manufacturers have experienced a transformation from imitation to self - research and from a single market to a global layout. At the same time, mobile phone manufacturers have also emerged from "involution." They have shifted from competing in scale and speed to competing in direction and method, entering a new stage of diversified innovation and co - prosperity.

The "harmonious coexistence with differences" among Huawei, Xiaomi, and vivo is essentially a parallel experiment on "how to succeed." The competition between brands is no longer just about the ebb and flow of performance but is distinguished by values. The coexistence of the high mountain, forest, and long river symbolizes a "re - differentiation" of Chinese manufacturing in the late industrialization stage.

Technology - driven enterprises define the future through breakthroughs, ecosystem - driven enterprises expand boundaries through synergy, and value - driven enterprises take users as the origin, bringing innovation back to people's lives. This differentiation of paths is a sign of maturity. Chinese manufacturing is moving from "homogeneous expansion" to "diversified growth." Different paths all point to the same proposition - how to make innovation truly sustainable.

As vivo enters the "final stage," the significance of the long river is revealed here. It symbolizes the power of time. When an enterprise is no longer in a hurry to prove itself but is willing to spend time on accumulation. When an enterprise is willing to invest time in users and build up within the system, the value it creates goes beyond the product itself