PEAK CEO Xu Zhihua: Stick To The Original Intention Of Your Brand

After Anta announced the signing of NBA China in a high-profile manner, the first time reporter interviewed PEAK sports CEO Xu Zhihua after joining PEAK as NBA's official Chinese partner.

Xu Zhihua is very calm: we will still insist on the original intention of our brand: basketball core, professional positioning and the global market. Through signing international stars, we will create Star products with core competitiveness and strive to become the forerunners of Chinese brands going to the world.

Talking about losing NBA China: sticking to the core position of basketball

Reporter: 7 years ago, PEAK signed a contract with NBA and achieved some results. Now, why did it not make NBA China's choice?

Xu Zhihua: there is no banquet in the world. It is impossible to cooperate forever. Every cooperation has a stage goal and purpose.

7 years ago, PEAK was building up its brand in the country to create a stage of influence.

PEAK grasped the opportunity and, at the right time, chose to cooperate with NBA China to strengthen the core and specialization of the basketball brand and enhance the brand influence.

Today, PEAK has achieved a phased goal: PEAK sports has been among the leading sports brands in China, and has won the first place in China's basketball shoes Market in 6 years.

But enterprises have different strategies at different stages, and it is rational to announce the end of cooperation with NBA China.

Now, for PEAK, the goal is to further enhance the international influence and further enhance the technology, professionalism and comfort of the product.

Under such circumstances, we will certainly choose partners or institutions that are more in line with our strategic positioning.

In the future, we will further strengthen our cooperation with NBA top stars and cooperate with globalized tournaments, such as FIBA's top events, to meet PEAK's international demand.

Here, I want to emphasize that not renewing NBA China is not equal to losing NBA.

NBA is a very three-dimensional system. The three main interests are NBA alliance, teams and players.

NBA China belongs to the NBA alliance, which is stationed in China. The partnership is only a small part of it. Before we made the layout, we could make a three-dimensional marketing mode.

In the future, we will work closely with the NBA alliance worldwide, including star endorsement, team sponsorship and youth development.

Interviewer: but how can you think of PEAK becoming your NBA competitor and Anta as China's official market partner?

This is a relatively normal business behavior.

There are many opportunities in the sporting goods market. These opportunities are not only for one person or one enterprise.

Maybe they see PEAK doing well, and they want to come in.

It's like buying a stock. Someone buys someone to sell it. Some think it's worth it. Of course, everyone is willing to buy it low.

Besides, in China, basketball and even the whole sports market are an incremental market. Our sports industry is only 313 billion 600 million yuan, accounting for GDP 0.6%.

The annual output value of the sports industry in the United States is US $441 billion, which accounts for about 3% of GDP and 5 times that of China.

China's consumption per capita in sports is less than 1/10 in the US.

From this we can see that the sports industry will have great potential in China.

For PEAK, under the guidance of the international goal at this stage, we need to match resources and objectives, and we will not be too unreasonable to grab a resource.

More is to evaluate its performance price ratio.

Sometimes, although the resources are good, but the price is out of the way, that's not the ideal choice.

We will always adhere to the original intention of our brand: take basketball as the core, advocate professional positioning, and aim at the global market.

Next, as long as we make good products of our brands and go our own way, I believe we will create our own world.

Reporter: what kind of strategic adjustment will PEAK make after its close cooperation with NBA China?

Xu Zhihua: our strategic adjustment is not due to the end of NBA China's cooperation, but also because of the phased goals and strategic needs of the whole brand.

In the future, PEAK will launch the "star strategy + star competition + star product" star strategy.

The industry has been debating the practicality of signing stars and sponsoring agencies.

For PEAK, through years of sales figures and online market research, it is confirmed that stars can resonate with consumers and directly drive product sales.

Therefore, NBA will sign at least 1 NBA All-Star players or the American dream team star players before the start of the new season of the NBA.

In order to drive sales through more influential stars, strengthen brand professionalism and internationalization.

In addition, in order to achieve the goal of internationalization, PEAK has set its sights on the world, with "brand output" as its strategy.

Choose to cooperate with FIBA, WTA and other strong international sports resources and their top international competition resources, actively expand overseas markets, enter multiple potential and blank overseas markets, and accelerate the pace of internationalization.

At the same time, in the next few years, PEAK will invest 200 million yuan in product R & D and design, and launch the "Star" products of technology, professionalism and comfort of the globalized products to meet the needs of the global market.

Through the above strategies, we will achieve the perfect layout of PEAK's internationalization channel, strengthen the communication between consumers, and keep the professional attributes continuously built.

Reporter: each enterprise has its own gene and development logic. What is the biggest difference between PEAK and the sporting goods industry? What is PEAK label?

Xu Zhihua: we have always focused on internationalization and specialization. If there is any label, I think it is basketball core, specialization orientation and internationalization strategy.

In 2005, PEAK launched the internationalization strategy. It was not optimistic at the beginning. But with our untiring insistence, we have begun to accept it slowly.

PEAK has its own position and strategy. No matter what others do, we only do our own things. We will not change our goals or abandon our direction because of other reasons.

Reporter: Anta launched a product attack with a price difference of 299 yuan and 399 yuan. Now it is making joint products with NBA.

So what is the advantage of PEAK products? How does PEAK maintain its first basketball market in China for six consecutive years?

Xu Zhihua: first of all, specialization is the most important gene of PEAK, and it is also our advantage.

In 2013, we invested about sixty million R & D expenses, and did some work in terms of product comfort, protection and improvement of sports technology.

After several years of efforts, PEAK's products have also been praised by many basketball enthusiasts.

In the future, we will also increase the 200 million, in the design and development, and strive to better meet the changing needs of consumers.

In addition, PEAK products are like a Pyramid, the Star Wars boots are located in the tip of Pyramid, and Volkswagen basketball shoes are listed in the middle and the bottom in turn.

For star money, there should be more added value, such as function, technology, materials, technology, rather than price.

To this end, the star money is more to create value for consumers, to gain additional value and enhance the brand.

At the same time, PEAK also has 200 to 300 yuan price positioning in the low end of the Volkswagen basketball shoes, from the product mix, this is satisfied.

Through our research and understanding of consumers, the performance of stars can more easily trigger the emotional resonance of fans, and directly drive the sales of star products.

Other types of cooperation are more intellectual property, and labeling itself does not mean anything.

Therefore, in the future, star products will also become the focus of our products in the future.

Reporter: 200 million of the R & D investment, this is a small number, so how will PEAK use the 200 million yuan to upgrade products?

Xu Zhihua: these 200 million are mainly used in design and technology research and development.

In order to carry out the design and research work more effectively, we have made a more professional subdivision of R & D. Our four R & D centers, Beijing specializes in basketball, Quanzhou research and Development Center for running, Guangzhou sports life.

At the same time, in the future, PEAK will invest more in four ways:

First, we should create an athlete's ecological tracking system, develop a system of tracking athletes' Sports for many days with professional athletes as samples, collect relevant data and understand the needs of the human body, so as to enhance research and development technology and apply them synchronously to new products.

Second, hire top foreign designers to participate in the design of products to meet the aesthetic needs of different regions of the world.

Third, cooperate with the top bodies, such as aerospace science and engineering group, Beijing Sport University, etc., to strengthen the innovative and technological sense of PEAK products through biological laboratories and new materials.

Fourth, integrating 3D printing technology into the future design and development, shortening the product design and production cycle, and will make new attempts in materials, technology and other aspects, in order to meet the changing demand at home and abroad.

Reporter: in the first half of this year's financial report, in the international market, PEAK's share accounted for more than 20% of the total sales. This year's cooperation with NBA China has ended.

Xu Zhihua: do not regard domestic and foreign as a contradiction or a seesaw. They are a whole.

Traditional marketing thinking is two yuan, and the ratio of marketing and budgeting to various expenses is separated from domestic and abroad.

Under the influence of market integration, PEAK believes that all marketing and budgeting are not required at home and abroad, because whether China or overseas, its media costs are the same, media and information are global in the whole, so we should consider the overall marketing.

This is the biggest difference between us and traditional marketing thinking.

For the expansion of overseas markets, in the first stage, we should take into account the influence of China when looking for resources in the world, and use China's marketing budget to measure the effect of overseas marketing.

At this stage, there is no need to invest overseas marketing expenses at all. It is based on China's marketing budget as a global expenditure.

We choose to need China's influence and cover China's overseas resources.

In the second stage, we choose resources with global influence, so we do not necessarily have to consider China's influence alone.

With the gradual growth of our overseas market at this stage, the pressure of overseas production can also be alleviated.

Reporter: do you think PEAK will regard internationalization as a goal? Is this strategy inconsistent with China's national brand?

Xu Zhihua: in my view, there is no contradiction.

On this issue, thinking must be opened, and the brand from China can of course become a global brand.

First of all, our foundation is in the Chinese market, not that we do international renounce the Chinese market, and that the Chinese market is global.