Is Yamada's TV launch with Fire TV the first step in Amazon's living room flat screen TV strategy?

Amazon and Yamada Holdings will release Japan's first smart TV with Fire TV on February 17th.

Amazon and Yamada Holdings (hereinafter referred to as Yamada) will release Japan's first smart TV equipped with Fire TV on February 17th. The flat screen TV, as a brand of FUNAI, will be sold in stores of Yamada Group across the country and online shopping of Yamada Web and Amazon on March 5. [looking at all the photos] Amazon and Yamada at first glance feel a distinctive collaboration, which is also an established route from the point of view of Amazon's foray into living room flat screen televisions. First of all, let's take a look at the newly launched smart TV with Fire TV. The "F340" series of 4K LCD model launches 3 models. Type 43: 109,780 yen 50: 120,780 yen 55: 142,780 yen and HD model 32 54780 yen. By the way, the 4K model is on sale in the Amazon.co.jp pre-sale scheduled for March 4th. According to the specification, ground data / BS/ 110 degree CS broadcast, 4K model is equipped with 4K tuner. It has a built-in Fire TV function that displays video distribution services such as Amazon main video, YouTube and Netflix on the same UI as terrestrial television broadcast channels. The remote control and TV operation buttons such as channels are equipped with Amazon Alexa buttons. Can be linked with Amazon Echo series and so on.

Two companies that are competitors in home appliance sales

The scheduled broadcast of TVCM was also made public at the press conference.

So far, Yamada's TV has the FUNAI brand TV, which is carried out in cooperation with Funai Motor. This time the product is also on its extension line, why is there a new model on Fire TV? Behind it is the struggle for hegemony around the big American science and technology living room. Now, the protagonists of image-centric AV entertainment are YouTube, Netflix, Amazon prime video and other network services. Although the main battleground of audio-visual devices is smartphones and tablets, video services are also watched in a large proportion of living rooms around the world. For big American technologies such as Amazon, Google and Apple, entering flat-panel TVs is a common theme for all companies. That said, flat-screen TVs have long been considered a thorny area for big American technology companies that value direct-selling stores because of the fierce price competition in home appliance malls. For living room viewing, Amazon and Apple focus on external devices such as Fire TV and Apple TV. Google doesn't have its own TV, but we've been providing Android TV/Google TV's own platform for flat-screen TV makers to enter the living room (and also sell external devices, Chromecast). The smart TV with Fire TV under the Yamada / FUNAI brand should be understood to mean that Amazon has also participated in Google's leading living room flat screen TV with its own platform. Amazon began to launch its own brand "Fire TV Omni/4-Series" in the United States in September 2021 (by the way, the American legal person of TVS REGZA, which is famous for the Toshiba brand, launched the product), when it entered the Japanese market. The combination of the first bullet products and the first Yamada in the Japanese home appliance store became the FUNAI brand and obtained the backup of sales. Jasper Chan, president of Amazon Japan, often mentioned the existence of more than 1000 Yamada stores and tens of thousands of sales engineers at the press conference. Indeed, if it is Yamada, when setting up the service, you can also provide support such as Wi-Fi connection and Amazon account opening. You can see the popularity strategy of consumers who are difficult to reach in online shopping, and the purpose is easy to understand. The names of Amazon and Yamada appeared in the previous release, also because the FUNAI brand is not very strong, so it is easy to learn from the side. And Yamada is also the detonator for TV sales of the FUNAI brand, which has exclusive sales rights. Therefore, it can be regarded as a form of cooperation in which both sides share the same ideas. In terms of home appliance sales, there are two companies that are in a competitive relationship. Yamada, chairman of Yamada, answered the reporter's question at the presentation. He accepted the suggestion of "more cost-effective cooperation with Amazon" from around and discussed it at the level of practitioners. As a result, cooperation was reached through "what we put forward." Of course, Amazon's service has reached more families. When the reporters from these two companies published, there was almost no mention of the previous use of Amazon accounts, etc., so I will refuse first. It has become a matter of course, watching online videos on TV. And if you can get the viewing experience of the Fire TV series, the most influential device, through one piece of TV, it is undoubtedly an attractive device for consumers. With the domestic sale of Yamada's Fire TV TV, Amazon's strategy for living room flat screen TVs will also accelerate in Japan.

< interview article / Faiyuan Yi Yi >