People's Tribune | Demand-driven promotion of electronic information manufacturing industry upgrading - Songdian Technology to break the micro-inspection of the situation

Source: People's Tribune 

Author: Yu Xiaoyu

As a strategic, basic and leading industry of the national economy, the electronic information manufacturing industry is a key area for stabilizing industrial economic growth and maintaining national political and economic security. Among them, the digital camera and precision optics as the representative of the imaging industry, not only is the consumer electronics products, and is the depth of the fusion of optoelectronic sensing, microprocessors, precision machinery and image algorithms and other cutting-edge technologies, "hard core" manufacturing high ground. Domestic digital imaging enterprises how to break the technological blockade, to catch up, has become China's electronics manufacturing industry in the transformation and upgrading of the urgent need to crack the reality of the subject.

In recent years, the domestic emergence of a number of "new power" brands, such as Songdian Technology, by keenly capturing the blind spot in the demand of market segments, to achieve a breakthrough against the trend. The exploration of its late catching up course, for China's electronics manufacturing enterprises how to break through the barriers, promote the industrial value chain leap, provides a micro sample.

I. SongDian Technology's Breakthrough Practices

Aiming at a Blue Ocean: "Image Affirmation" Takes Over the Entry-Level Market

From the perspective of the theory of disruptive innovation, mature enterprises are often caught in the predicament of "technology oversupply" due to the blind pursuit of high premiums, which has left a valuable gap in the market for latecomers. In recent years, in the imaging industry to occupy a dominant position in the market, the Japanese manufacturers are deeply involved in the fierce "parameter scrolling", and constantly pile up full-frame, high-speed continuous shooting and other extreme performance. Although this objectively promotes the evolution of technology, but also significantly pushed up the product price, resulting in mass consumption, especially the entry-level market, there is an obvious demand gap. At present, the young group represented by "Generation Z" and "Student Party" has undergone a structural shift in their demand for imaging equipment, which not only needs to record their lives, but also values "high value, easy operation, affordable" and the emotional impact of the products. They not only need to record their lives, but also value products with "high color value, easy operation, affordable price" and the emotional value they bring.

Based on the market insight, Songdian Technology has put forward the concept of "Image Affirmation", which is dedicated to breaking down the price and operation barriers of high-end cameras. By launching a series of cost-effective entry-level "Card Camera" and "Vintage Microslice", the company has accurately penetrated into the hinterland of young people's consumption. Since 2014, SongDian has continued to cooperate with internationally renowned cultural IPs, launching a variety of co-branded theme cameras to enhance the cultural identity of young people. In addition, its 2025 Photo Contest has attracted more than 320,000contribute sth.The company has been able to realize "broken circle" dissemination through massive user-generated content (UGC). It can be said that by virtue of the "precise focus" on the segmented blue ocean market, SongDian Technology has completed the double accumulation of original capital and user scale, and stabilized itself well in the entry-level market.

Open innovation: accelerating technological "asymmetric catch-up"

When the latecomer enterprises have gained a firm foothold in the basic market, moving towards the mid- to high-end professional market is a must for realizing the leap in the value chain. If local enterprises choose to independently develop mount systems from scratch, not only is the R&D cycle long and the cost of trial and error high, but it is even more difficult to establish a rich lens group to support high-end cameras in a short period of time.

Matsuden chose to integrate into the international mature technology ecosystem, and promote the "asymmetric catch-up" of core technology with "open innovation" strategy. 2026 February, Matsuden officially announced that it has joined the international M43 (Micro Four Thirds) System Alliance, enabling it to directly share the world's large and mature M43 professional lens group and cutting-edge underlying technology. In February 2026, Matsuden officially announced that it had joined the International M43 (MicroFourThirds) System Alliance, enabling it to directly share the world's huge and mature M43 professional lens group and cutting-edge underlying technology, marking a substantial leap towards the professional imaging market. As seen from domestic and international practices, this open sharing mechanism can help enterprises to cross the long period of fumbling with the bottom deck and significantly share the huge hardware R&D costs. With the help of external mature technology base, Songdian focuses its energy on localized market insight, color algorithm tuning and optimization of user interaction experience. Through secondary innovation based on mature ecosystems, late-starters can shorten the cycle of moving into the high-end market, giving them the ability to compete with international giants in terms of core technology and brand tone.

Twin-city linkage: Deeply connecting to the supply chain of the Greater Bay Area

In the underlying logic of manufacturing upgrading, the rise of high-quality national products must not only rely on "light assets labeling" and "heavy marketing", but must be rooted in the physical base of heavy assets. Relying on the advantages of regional industrial clusters, Songdian Technology has built a dual-city linkage model of "Shenzhen R&D and marketing + Shunde scale manufacturing", internalizing the external economies of scale into the supply chain barriers of the enterprise.

In January 2025, Songdian Technology spent 350 million RMB to build a modern manufacturing headquarters in Shunde District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province. The base covers an area of 30,000 square meters and is equipped with international first-class automated production and R&D facilities, with an annual production capacity of over 10 million units. The reason why Songdian has set up its manufacturing headquarters in Shunde is precisely because of the advantages of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area's complete industrial support in the world's leading fields of electromechanics, plastic injection molding, dies and microelectronics, and so on. Through the deep integration of Shenzhen's cutting-edge innovation tentacles and Shunde's strong manufacturing genes, Songdian has successfully transformed the "supply chain dividend" of the Greater Bay Area into its own ultimate cost control capability and rapid product iteration capability. This kind of strategic determination of rooting in entity manufacturing and plowing into regional clusters not only provides a solid physical support for its disruptive innovation, but also gives it a certain degree of strong delivery toughness to cope with market fluctuations.

II. Lessons learned and policy recommendations

Songdian Technology's journey to enter and realize the value chain leap from the niche market provides valuable micro-inspiration for China's electronic information manufacturing industry to catch up. In the face of high barriers and asset-heavy industry attributes, to promote the electronic information industry to realize the new quality, enterprises, local governments and the national level need to promote strategic synergy and joint efforts.

Enterprise level: Insisting on demand orientation and open innovation, realizing value chain upgrading by "asymmetric catching up".

Local late-stage enterprises should focus on fully utilizing the advantages of China's mega-market, and be good at capturing the unmet hidden needs and emotional values of niche audiences (e.g., young groups and the sinking market). Focusing on business model innovation and applicable technology research and development, they should quickly realize the accumulation of original capital and user base, and establish a "base" suitable for their own development. In the stage of leaping to the high-end, enterprises should take the initiative to integrate into or even dominate the international and domestic technical standard alliance and open source system, and effectively share the trial-and-error risk and R&D cost of the underlying technology through secondary innovation. At the same time, they should focus on building an independent and controllable product development platform, continue to precipitate core algorithms and underlying architectural experience, and realize the leap from pure hardware assembly to core standard setting, so as to move substantially into the middle and high end of the global value chain.

Local level: Cultivate special industrial clusters according to local conditions and plant new productivity bases with supply chain networks.

The rise of high-quality national brands is essentially the externalization of regional industrial chain maturity and manufacturing heritage. Local governments can learn from the advanced experience of the Greater Bay Area, around the regional resource endowment and industrial base, according to local conditions to create distinctive characteristics, supporting the perfect electronic information industry clusters. At the same time of stabilizing the traditional manufacturing industry, keenly discover and vigorously support the "hidden champion" enterprises with "chain master" potential. In terms of land space planning, financial guidance, the introduction of high-end talents and the docking of industry, academia and research, etc., to do a good job of elemental protection and precise drip irrigation. At the same time, we will build a highly efficient logistics network and a platform for scientific and technological innovation, and promote upstream and downstream enterprises to realize in-depth coupling and collaborative innovation. Through the two-way running of government and enterprises, we can further reduce the systematic transaction costs and supply chain synergy costs of enterprises, and transform the potential energy of regional supply chain into the industry chain's winning potential in international competition.

Industry level: Strengthening top-level design and bottom-level technology research, and building security for the leap of industrial value chain

In the face of the intensification of the global game of science and technology, it is recommended that the advantages of the new national system should be further utilized to strengthen the image sensors, high-end optical lenses, image-processing chips and so on.
(c) "Necklace" link technology research and development. Study the establishment of major scientific and technological special projects and industry guidance fund, encourage patient capital to implement long-term, stable investment. At the same time, should attach great importance to the top-level design of industrial standards, encourage and guide the local leading enterprises, research institutes, joint research, and actively participate in or even lead the development of international standards in related fields, to enhance China's international discourse in the field of photoelectric information technology. In addition, it is necessary to continue to optimize the fiscal, tax and financial support policies for the high-end manufacturing industry, improve the application and promotion mechanism of the first (set) of domestically produced equipment and key components, and provide a strategic depth for the iterative trial-and-error and ecological construction of domestically produced cutting-edge technologies, relying on the vast hinterland of the domestic macrocycle.

(Author: Yu Xiaoyu, Associate Research Fellow, Institute of Industrial Economics and Technological Economics, China Academy of Macroeconomic Research)