Ecovacs begins to block domestic robot vacuum cleaners in Vietnam

Ecovacs is one of the most popular robot vacuum cleaner brands in Vietnam. Like other Chinese robot brands such as Roborock and Dreame, Ecovacs robot vacuums are also divided into two types: domestic version and international version.

Domestic robots are sold by these companies exclusively for the Chinese market, and are not exported to other countries. Therefore, domestic robot models often have specific features for the Chinese market, such as the Chinese language, the application requires an account with a Chinese phone number or must go through a Chinese server to manage.

Meanwhile, international robots are exported to many other countries around the world, so they will support many different languages ​​(including English and Vietnamese). The process of connecting with the robot is also very simple, when users only need to download the official application on the App Store and Play Store and register an account with the owner’s phone number, instead of having to use an Ecovacs account with a number. Chinese phone as domestic version.

Although Chinese domestic Ecovacs robot models bring a certain inconvenience to users, they are still imported by a small number of small traders to Vietnam for consumption due to their cheaper prices. However, realizing that this model offers a suboptimal user experience, in early November, Ecovacs announced that it would start blocking the application from working with illegally imported robot models from the date of application. December 1, 2022.

The time of this ban has come, and as reflected by some users, their Ecovacs robot is no longer controllable via the app. In place of the usual controls is the message in Chinese: “The application of this machine version cannot be used in the current region, please contact the official authorized sales channel”.

It is known that this situation occurs when users update the Ecovacs application to the latest version. Because this update was only released in the last days of November 2022, plus this is the first day the Ecovacs ban took effect, so the number of people affected is still not widespread. However, in the next few weeks, when the new application begins to be deployed more, the impact is also expected to be much larger.

Some merchants advise their customers not to update the application to avoid being locked out of the robot control. If you missed the update, Android users can downgrade to an earlier version via the APK file. However, this is only a temporary solution, because the other popular mobile operating system, iOS, does not allow installing external applications as easily as Android. In addition, Ecovacs is quite likely to come up with new measures to force users to update the software in the future.

In fact, Ecovacs is not the first brand to create restrictions for domestic robots when used outside of China, as both other major brands, Roborock and Dreame, have made similar moves.

In early October, Dreame also announced that it would block the application when using a domestic robot vacuum cleaner in Vietnam. The company said the material as well as the cleaning efficiency of the domestic robot “not suitable for Vietnamese market”thereby causing discomfort to customers as well as affecting Dreame’s reputation.

[Box thông tin shop] – GK Ecovacs