Catalog action cameras GoPro be drastically reduced, from models spring will be less. The reason?The company believes it is necessary to release fret ways: firing people and changing managers, also focusing on fewer models, but these products more competitive. Somehow we can say that “cheap” Chinese cameras have hurt them last season.
The drop in revenue presented in the latest financial results is quite large. In the last quarter of last year, collected 436.6 million dollars with little cameras and accessories, it sounds good until you know that that amount is 31% less than the same period last year. Christmas 2014 was a pump with Hero 4 bars selling like hotcakes.
The other data indicator that the future is not great for them is the income projection with 2016: between 1,350 and 1,500 million. The cumulative revenue 2015 already exceeds that figure, 1,600 million, i.e. that they do not expect to have a better year in this regard.
Hope so in benefits, and well, we know that these accounts are quite conditioned by the product renewal cycle. Although action cameras are not changed every year – it seems that this only happens to the phone – it is very important to have a new Hero X in the period to the accounts look better.
Speaking of units sold, they have been put into action more than 6.6 million GoPro during 2015, which is 27% more than in 2014. The problem was found in the fourth quarter sold 2 million, a figure flashy but well below 2014. The logic says that at Christmas time sold more, or at least, there has been the expected growth in recent quarters.
The cameras are coming out of the catalog + LCD Hero, Hero + and Hero. But we must not be alarmist, the year does not look too bad in news: we have a new Hero 5, and see how GoPro gets into the world of drones with their project Karma, which can share a new video in fantastic 4K.
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Chinese Chambers as guilty? Here are some alternatives
We must also take into account that competition coming from China is very large, it offers valid and very affordable solutions. We are not talking about they killed GoPro growth, but they have done enough damage. Other major companies in this consumer electronics suffer in their flesh sales of Chinese models, we can talk about Sony and TomTom.
They each have their weapons, and in some cases may behave better than a GoPro, but I did not make any to sell particularly cheap. Among the avalanche of Chinese products we found cameras that record fine and cost much less, so it’s normal that people think twice.
A few months ago we present a guide with some tips and alternatives, and to separate the wheat straw is quite complicated with such a wide range of little cameras. If you stick to the recording quality, battery, and accessories as the main points when buying a camera action, we can recommend some models:
Camera Xiaomi Yi
First I would like to introduce the option of Xiaomi. May be a model that not only takes care of the external appearance, but also offers a decent picture quality.
It has weak points such as battery overheating when using WiFi connectivity or image stabilization, but we cannot ask the impossible. If you want to learn more about the model, I leave you with the analysis we perform.
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Models SJCam
The other big bets of the Chinese market, we can almost see as much as GoPro are the SJ5000 and SJ4000 Plus. With a fairly powerful hardware, in 5000 we can record a high quality -1080p 60fps, some model 4K – also note the price is approaching a GoPro. Its a little mess determines the exact model that we provide, and changing processors and sensors easily.
4000 is on a lower rung, but also offers good quality for less. They have become so famous that even have fakes. Finally remark that there is a cube-shaped model called M10 – everything copied – similar to the Polaroid camera action or last GoPro to hit the market.
We may extend the alternatives with names like Blackview or SOOCOO; they have pretty decent proposals on autonomy and quality. But we must always bear in mind that do not reach the levels of a GoPro or the like, are a small investment that by use we can meet guarantees, but hopefully never amazing recordings with them.
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