Xiaomi unveiled the new CIVI series on September 27th, 2021, in China and launched the first product CIVI. It is the vendor second trail toward young female segment.
Roughly two years ago, Xiaomi launched a brand-new female-oriented CC series catering specifically to young female consumers. CC series was endorsed both by Meitu and by celebrities. The sales of the product however were not satisfying, and it did not win the competition with Huawei, OPPO, or vivo on the female segment. From Mi fans’ perspective, CC series was lack cost-to-performance ratio advantage as a Xiaomi device. From female users’ perspective, the new device was lack of brand equity and its offline presence was not strong either. Not far from the launch, Xiaomi’s partnership with Meitu ended. After the launch of CC 9 Pro in November 2019, CC series stopped the refreshment.
Roughly two years later, CC series kind of come back again, but with the new name - CIVI. The first CIVI device is developed by the product team of CC series. Same as CC series, CIVI series is positioned as a mid-tier to high-end fashion device targeting to female users. It complements the existing premium Mix series and Number series, both of which have more male-oriented marketing approaches. We expect that the launch of CIVI series will strengthen Xiaomi’s offering in mid-tier and high-end segment.
Different from CC series, CIVI series hopefully will have a better chance to survive. First, Xiaomi has grown in previous years with successful brand lift and offline expansion. Second, Huawei’s nova series is suffering from 5G chipset shortage, which in turn has weakened the competition in the female segment. Third, CIVI series is likely to receive more internal resources in the future, according to the company’s CEO.
But challenges remain. It remains to be seen whether young female users will get and buy the story of CIVI. Outstanding selfie capability, blingbling and light-weight design, long battery-life are great features. How to effectively convey these messages to targeted audience? Then on the pricing side, the starting retail price of CIVI series is over 40% higher than that of CC series. It is roughly on par with Redmi K40, but the latter one was launched in February 2021 and has much stronger hardware specification. So, for existing Mi fans who widely believe “value for money” as Xiaomi’s brand gene, it remains to be seen how Xiaomi is going to persuade them on the pricing of the new CIVI.
