SMOK absolutely ran amok with the EcigClick 2016 awards receiving almost three times the votes as its nearest competitor.
With that in mind we thought a kind of company profile was in order so you guys can find out a little bit more about this extremely popular e-cigarette company.
So we were absolutely delighted when Smok agreed to an interview and even the CEO chipped in with answers.
In the exclusive interview Smok reveals the company’s thoughts about TPD and the equivalent legislation in the US as well as many other revealing topics including a message to the world’s vapers.
Following the Q and A session – Smok wouldn’t be drawn into what the company will be releasing next lol – you’ll find a detailed history of Smok’s vaping journey as well as a company profile.
But first the one question I know a lot of people ask – how the heck do you pronounce the name!!!
I noticed that our own TheDevilVaper recently asked that very question over on Twitter.
As you might expect 78% decided it should be pronounced Smok as in shock leaving only 22% opting for Smoke as in coke.
Well I can reveal the company themselves say it should be pronounced as ‘Smoke’ – which if I’m honest is a bit of a let-down as one it sounds far too much like smoking and two I’ve always called it Smok as in shock!!!
Anyway let’s hope that solves the vaping version of the ‘chicken and egg’ riddle!
Now down to business.
Among the topics we covered were the company’s thoughts on the future of vaping and just what they had in store for us lucky vapers.
An Interview With Smok
Q: How many people are employed by Smok?
A: At present, about 200 employees in NanShan office, who are responsible for research and development, marketing, website and vaping tour operation etc.
At the same time, there are nearly 5000 staffs in factory who are responsible for production to meet the needs of the market.
With constantly update of products and expansion of market, the number of employees will follow a growing.
Q: What is Your Annual Turnover?
A: As you know, IVPS expands rapidly. Many products are very popular. Please refer to details on our official earnings reports. Thanks.
[IVPS – the parent company – was recently floated on the NEEQ in China – the National Equities Exchange and Quotations – and it’s reported the company turns over more than $100million dollars per year]
Q: Do you have plans to expand into USA or Europe?
A: Europe and America have always been our main market. We take them very seriously and pay a lot of energy.
At the same time, the bets paid off handsomely.
In the future development strategy, Europe and America are our main market as before, but we will pay more attention to others, such as Southeast Asia, Russia, and China.
As long as the market developed well, we are willing to spend more manpower and capital to maintain and expand these markets.
Q: Has the TPD and in the USA the FDA affected your business model?
A: U.S. and European are always the main overseas markets in electronic cigarette industry, especially U.S.
The FDA’s policy has been discussed from 2 year ago, since then, we have been focusing on it. Last year, we pre-researched many kinds of products and launched to the market to deal with new policy shocks.
As a company focusing research and innovation, we take development of products very seriously.
In future, we will take users’ experience, feedback more seriously, and launch more good products which meet users’ demand under policy.
We believe that as long as our product excellent enough, we will be welcomed in the market.
Q: What is your most popular/best selling model?
A: Our atomizer and mod are very competitive in the industry. From TFV4 to TFV8 are very popular on the market and deeply loved by most vapors.
The recently launched TFV12 has not only the excellent properties of TFV4 and TFV8, but also has made great breakthrough on the basis of them. I believe TFV12 will do much better!
Alien kit meets the needs of all kinds of vapors with the good performance, intelligent interface and high power supported. Besides, its elegant appearance and good touch feeling brought by the use of human body engineering let it own a good market reputation.
Alien kit achieved very good sales performance since it is released on last August.
Q: What is your least popular model?
A: Sales of different products will be a difference, but it isn’t problem of products.
As a company who focus a lot on research and innovation, we have a strict demand for products.
Each product created has its own meaning and value, which can meet the needs and preferences of different users, and has its own specific enthusiasts.
Therefore, difference on sales is only because of different market position.
We don’t go after big sales for every product, but we prefer to provide more abundant products to meet various needs of all types of users, which is our happiness.
Q: What new products are you working on?
A: We never stop to research and develop new products. Like Apple’s research and development system: production, reserve and developing, our research and development system is production, testing, pre-research and exploring, which can be met market demand and space of product development constantly.
Only in this way, we can stay ahead on products.
Q: How do you see the future of e-cigarettes and vaping?
A: First of all, the outlook of electronic cigarettes is pretty good, which accords with the market rules. “Health, fashion, entertainment” of electronic cigarettes conforms to the development of society.
Use electronic cigarette is a kind of healthy lifestyle, which is becoming more accepted.
Second, In the 1.4 billion smokers’ world, a lot of national governments and persons deeply recognized the harm of traditional tobacco and released some anti-smoking laws or measures.
And as a healthier smoking way, vaping has a lot of room to develop.
At last, e-cigarette, as one of “eight secular disruptive themes” by Goldman, has mature technology and experience, which laid very good foundation of e-cigarette industry development.
[The Goldman referred to here is global investment bank Goldman Sachs and the so called 8 secular disruptive themes. What seems a mouthful of gobbledygook is in fact 8 areas of innovative growth that will/should become popular with investors – e-cigarettes being one of them. Others include LED lighting – future cancer treatment – LED lighting and 3D printing. See the full list here.].
Q: Anything you’d like to say to the world’s vapers?
A: First of all, thanks very much for your always support to SMOK.
At the same time, welcome any feedback to us. We will listen to everyone’s opinions and Suggestions as always to improve our products.
We are been trying to research and develop good product. Later, more new products will be released gradually. Stay tuned!!
SMOK our efforts to build a healthy fashion entertainment, life style, also wish you a healthy and happy life.
Hope you guys found that interesting and of course a massive thank you to Smok for taking the time to chat with us.
Smok – A Company Profile
If one vaping company has managed global recognition then Smok has to be it.
The anticipation for the now infamous Smok Alien was bordering on the kind of thing usually seen with Apple products with stores selling out as soon as new stock was replenished.
And of course the TFV series of super-tanks [the Cloud Beast King the latest] has firmly planted Smok as one of the – if not the main player in the vaping vocabulary.
Ok so let’s take a look at Smok – it’s origins – it’s products and what they have in store for us lucky vapers.
BTW we’re hoping this will become a regular feature covering most of the major brands and also taking an in depth look at some of our other award winners.
Watch this space as they say 😉
Smok and Koopor
“Being with you for all great vaping time!”
That would be Smok’s by now well-known phrase and given you voted Smok or SmokTech to give the brand it’s full name – your favourite vape manufacturer I guess they chose well.
However the actual trading name of Smok is rather a mouthful: Shenzhen IVPS Technology Corporation Ltd or IVPS for short.
Founded only seven years ago back in 2010 the IVPS brand also incorporates KOOPOR – makers of the Knight Kit and the latest model the Koopor Primus.
If Smok is mass market vape appeal then Koopor sets itself out as its edgy little brother with the company’s mantra reading:
KOOPOR is an attitude.
KOOPOR is fresh and young. Young is our attitude! We believe that the APV(Advanced Personal Vaporizer) is a revolution, which brings a healthier life for us. We seek the high performance, reliable and affordable APVs all the time.KOOPOR is on the way to design and make great APVs, for everyone, cost-effective and affordable! We firmly oppose extravagant profits, and insist to feed our customers by highly cost-effective ones.
You can’t argue with that however we’re here to learn more about Smok – my digressing gets worse as I get older – pity poor Jonny who has to edit my stuff lol.
So…
Smok eGo Dual Coil
Smok hit the vape scene in 2011 with the release of the very first dual coil cartomizer.
They are still on sale today and still prove extremely popular with vapers who prefer the ego style battery vape pens.
The cartomizers hold up to 5mls of e-liquid and feature a rounded drip tip which at the time was a little ‘out there’ as most of the others were flattened out like an old cigarette holder.
Smok Telescope
Now this little mechanical mod blew the fledgling vaping world away in 2012 with vape legend RipTrippers saying at the time how much he loved it lol [that video is still on YouTube and boy is he quiet haha].
This was indeed a ‘telescope’ design adapting its shape to the size of the battery you were using – cutting edge stuff or what!
Smok VMAX and ZMAX
Smok entered the ‘variable voltage’ scene in 2012 with the release of the Vmax and the Zmax both were ‘compared’ at the time to the hugely popular ProVari.
Just as a side note here it’s with sadness that Provape recently announced its decision to close down.
Its website states this is due to the forthcoming FDA regulations and restrictions – a sad loss to the vape community and hopefully not a sign of things to come.
Anyway I’m digressing…again!
Cottonless Technology
The arrival of 2013 and the by now steady growth of e-cigarette and vape mods users saw what Smok calls an “Erupted growth and technical breakthrough have been gained in terms of new products research and developments…”
This resulted in the company taking a lead in the so called ‘cottonless’ technology which they applied to cartomizers and tanks such as the Pyrex Aro and Tumbler tanks.
These tanks matched perfectly with the company’s Ego Winder battery which with an internal 1100mah battery can still hold its own today.
Smok’s Early Mods
By now the vaping world was turning its attention to mods and in particular were interested in not only performance – but also looks and styling.
It’s fair to say [on the whole] that if any company out there has embraced the look and design of a mod or indeed vape pen it has to be Smok.
We’ve reviewed many of their products [The latest the SMOK Nord 50W and TFV18 Tank ] and have to say it’s rare I’ve marked them down in the ‘Build and Design’ section.
Maybe if I’d reviewed the first generation Alien I might have had to have amended that as reports of flaking and chipping paint are everywhere.
Anyway in 2014 Smok released a bunch of mods that had vapers salivating and not just from the e-liquid they were vaping 😉
Sticking with the pen shaped devices Smok released the quite stunning Silenus mod.
Both variable voltage and wattage not only did this little cutie take an 18650 battery but it also allowed you to use pretty much any cartomizer you desired.
Have to say I’m loving that wood look 😉
The Smok Rocket mod looks for all the world like a light saber to me and was described at the time as a ‘hard hitter’ given it pumped out a whopping 15 watts – boy how times have changed lol.
Released in the same year the Smok Shuttle was I reckon anyway the Rocket’s uglier sister.
That ugly dial knob meant you could switch your wattage from 6 watts to 15 watts – heady heights indeed!
Smok’s final release of the year certainly embraced technology with the BEC Pro not only being capable of a staggering [for the time] 50watts but you could fiddle with the settings via Bluetooth.
Vapers in their droves absolutely loved this device and I can remember coveting one at the time – sadly back then my wallet couldn’t justify the outlay – plus Bluetooth was beyond me haha.
Smok’s Golden Year
With Volkswagen admitting to fiddling its emission stats – Greece on the point of bankruptcy and Cuba and the US becoming ‘friends’ again 2015 was a pretty tumultuous year.
Not so for Smok because this was indeed the company’s ‘golden year’ and hailed the arrival of the by now legendary TFV4 tank.
Our review gave it a respectable 4.6 out of 5 stars with Ratamahatta saying:
The SMOK TFV4 is definitely a beast of a sub ohm tank and you can expect tonnes of vapour and great flavour.
You can also expect to go through juice pretty quick so keep that in mind. Apart from the latter this is an excellent offering from SMOK.
This was the daddy of a whole host of Beast tanks that has followed and firmly kept Smok as one of the leading tank design and builders in the world.
The release of the Smok X Cube was met with audible gasps from the vaping world such was its looks in particular the awesome LED lighting effects.
Again Smok opted to make this Bluetooth compatible and being powered by two 18650 batteries it was capable of pumping out a staggering 160watts – the perfect combination for low builds on the company’s TFV4.
Smok Continues to Produce the Goods
Last year saw Smok release a whole host of devices and tanks including one of my personal favourites the dinky little Brit tank – a real flavour chasers tank.
However it was the release of the H Priv and Alien that captured the vape crowds imagination with both devices bringing in record sales.
The Alien has that out of this world ‘younger look’ whilst the H Priv in my opinion anyway looks like it would be suited to a more mature vaper lol.
As I mentioned earlier the build up to the release of the Alien was something the vape community hadn’t seen before with social media chatter at an all-time high!
On to the early part of 2017 and already the Smok Stick V8 with the Big Baby Beast on top has proved a massive hit and looking at Smok’s earlier mods a return to ‘old school’ mech ‘type’ styling.
I was fortunate enough to review this little monster and absolutely love it – indeed it’s next to me right now.
The company’s latest releases – the cute as a button but with one hell of a bite are the mini Alien kit the AL85 and the Skyhook.
The AL85 is indeed classed as a mini Alien it has the same kind of look as the Eleaf Pico 75 with its single 18650 housed under a screw-off cap.
As to does the Smok Skyhook however the screw off cap on this mod is for a huge juice port and the Skyhook is powered by two 18650 batteries and is allegedly capable of pumping out up to 220watts.
At the time of writing Smok has recently released the sleek ‘n sexy super powered GS320.
This device is capable of pumping out 320watts and with the TFV8 the kit comes with – makes this a cloud chasers dream.
Incidentally Smok’s CEO says the TFV8 is his favourite tank 😉
Smok Final Thoughts
I think it’s more than fair to say that without Smok’s innovation vaping as we know it today would be a very different thing.
They have consistently been at the cutting edge of vape design and more importantly vaping technology and how could we forget how much the arrival of the awesome TVF4 has changed the way we vape.
This was the first tank to offer different coils and therefore different styles of sub ohm vaping and of course the build deck meant more and more vapers were able to build their own.
If the TFV4 had been the company’s only contribution to the vaping world that would have been more than enough.
I’m currently vaping on the AL85 and Baby tank I’m looking at the Smok website and wondering just what this awesome company is going to bring out next.
I have to say the EcigClick viewers choose wisely in awarding Smok the overall vape company of the year 2016 and it’s going to take one hell of an effort – or miracle – from other companies to shift them off the top spot.
And the only winners in that tussle has to be we the vapers!
Vape On!
