Two days ago, Tesla reported delivery figures for the third quarter of 2022, with deliveries of 343,000 vehicles, below Wall Street expectations of about 358,000. In China, it is a different scene: recently, new car manufacturers like to use the word "curve" to refer to some of the problems encountered, especially Weilai and Xiaopeng Motors, although Li Xiang did not say it, but from a practical point of view, the ideal car is also in what they call a "curve".
In the past, "cornering" was a term preferred by Internet companies, and it was generally referred to as "overtaking on a curve". In fact, "overtaking on a curve" is a bad driving habit, and it is not worth promoting, because accidents are prone to occur, and normal traffic management requires you to slow down when crossing a curve. From this point of view, the "curve" mentioned by the newly built cars is closer to reality.
In 2020, starting from NIO's successful financing from Hefei, the new car force has just crossed the line of life and death. In 2021, the representatives of the three new car-making forces, Weilai, Xiaopeng Motors, and Ideal Auto will almost reach the threshold of 100,000 vehicles per year. Behind the seemingly prosperous, why did they collectively enter the corner in 2022?
Both ends of the curve: No take-off sales, user complaints
Porsche is the benchmark of the fuel era, and Xpeng G9 is the benchmark of this era, and it is also the last generation of smart cars before they move toward driverless cars. In 2023, it will achieve monthly sales of over 10,000 units, surpassing the Audi Q5. The G9 is the best SUV under $500,000.
On the evening of September 21, He Xiaopeng, chairman of Xpeng Motors, made rhetoric at the launch event of the fourth model Xpeng G9, but he did not win applause. On the contrary, in addition to the greetings and blessings, he heard more complaints - "The configuration is complicated, I can't understand it", "Since the basic model does not have any intelligent configuration". The next morning, in an interview with the media, the question he was asked the most was also related to the doubts of these users. At that time, he patted his chest and said, "Xpeng Motors can complete the optimization of SKUs in two days."
After staying up for two consecutive nights, Xiaopeng Motors has indeed completed the optimization of the SKU, which does not look so complicated and makes it difficult for users to understand. At the same time, it also relied on "increasing the volume without increasing the price" to quell some doubts. This is a rare scene in the history of Chinese automobiles - a car company made changes to the SKU and increased the configuration of the vehicle just two days after the flagship model was launched. This scene happened to the new car-making forces, both lucky and unfortunate.
Fortunately, Xiaopeng Motors was able to recognize the problem immediately, and then quickly corrected it, and won back the goodwill of some users, still making the same mistakes that happened before. Feats are often a combination of luck and lessons.
Xpeng Motors is not the only one. Before Xpeng Motors, Weilai and Lili had encountered various problems more than once. For example, Weilai was questioned as "lagging behind in sales", "weak new products", and "large losses"; while Lili, from the launch of Lili L9 to the discontinuation of the ideal ONE, and then the release of the ideal L8, appeared in just three months, making many old car owners dissatisfied, "thinking that they have been cut leeks".
These voices are even more acute at a time when the sales of the three leading car manufacturers have not achieved step-by-step growth with the market. According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, from January to August 2022, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in my country will be 3.97 million and 3.86 million respectively, a year-on-year increase of 1.2 times and 1.1 times respectively.
Xpeng Motors delivered 90,085 vehicles in the first eight months of 2022, a year-on-year increase of 95.87%. Among them, in July and August this year, the sales of Xiaopeng Motors continued to decline month-on-month. "It is almost impossible to achieve the annual sales target of 250,000 vehicles," said an employee of Xpeng Motors.
From January to August 2022, Li Auto delivered a total of 75,396 new vehicles, an increase of 66.89% from 45,176 in the same period last year. The most disappointing performance is NIO. In the first eight months of 2022, NIO delivered 71,600 new cars, a year-on-year increase of only 28.3%.
In contrast, BYD's sales growth in the same period reached 164.03%. The sum of the deliveries of the three companies is not as good as the sales of Tesla's Model Y, which increased by 248.5% in the first eight months of this year.
Sales are just one of the most intuitive manifestations. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the National Passenger Vehicle Market Information Association, believes that the product layout of the new car-making forces is still in the early stage, and it is not a particularly complete pedigree layout, and there will be some detours in the process of adjustment, "They need to re-plan, Sort out the production system." Compared with traditional car companies, new car manufacturers have not had sufficient buffers to survive these pains.
From an objective point of view, Cui Dongshu believes that the current industry chain of new energy vehicles is still incomplete, and the power of new car manufacturers is still relatively small, so the bargaining power of the industry chain and the ability to guarantee the upstream are relatively weak, so it will also lead to the production of new vehicles. The new car forces are in a relatively passive situation.
And a person who used to be a middle-level person in a number of car companies and a new car-building force bluntly said that today's "curve" is more like an excuse for the new car-making force to adjust its own rhythm.
In an interview with Sina Technology, He Xiaopeng bluntly said that Xiaopeng Motors is still in the corner, and the first generation of the new forces is in the corner. "Products and technologies are going to enter the next generation, but the needs of customers are changing, so how to control the speed on the corners and turn the corners too fast is a current challenge."
Increasing sales is still the top priority
Sales are a sign of entering a corner, as well as exiting a corner. On August 26, the Chengdu Auto Show opened. Qin Lihong, co-founder and president of Weilai, said that in the past year, with the rapid growth of the terminal market, Weilai did not catch up with the dividend. In 2022, NIO will deliver three new cars and deploy popular brands. It is as if NIO is the first to enter the corner on the racing track, and the product replacement is the first big corner. The speed will be adjusted in the corner, and the speed will rise again after exiting the corner. Now Weilai is going out of the corner quickly.
Correspondingly, Weilai's delivery volume in August 2022 reached 10,677 vehicles, which is the second-best monthly delivery performance in history, and returned to the top three new car-making forces on the list.
NIO's deliveries in the first eight months were less than half of its full-year target of 150,000 units. "In the last 4 months, Weilai will sprint with all its strength, and there will be a big breakthrough in sales," said a Weilai employee. After ET7, NIO's other two new models, ES7 and ET5, entered mass delivery in the fourth quarter of this year. However, there are still great challenges for NIO to achieve its goals.
Sales are also the primary goal of the other two leading car manufacturers. Especially Xpeng Motors, the aforementioned Xpeng employees who were interviewed talked about Xpeng Motors' hesitancy on the G9, "The P5, which is positioned as a mass-market model, failed to meet expectations. If the G9 is not enough, then Xpeng The car is easy to enter a stage where the product is not connected, so there is a lot of pressure on pricing." He said.
Even, in order to gain an advantage over other rivals on the G9, Xiaopeng Motors has carried out cost reductions on the battery. The Ningde era is no longer the first choice of Xiaopeng, but turned to second-tier power battery manufacturers such as China Innovation Airlines, and compressed the highest endurance to 702km. "While the price of this car still needs to be raised, it also needs to be sold in volume," said the Xiaopeng Motors employee. He Xiaopeng's goal for the G9 is also very high. "Monthly sales will exceed 10,000 units in 2023, surpassing the Audi Q5." This is the standard he proposed at the G9 listing ceremony.
Li Auto has advanced the release time of Li Li L8 by more than a month from the "November launch and delivery" announced on September 1 to September 30, just over a week after the launch of Xiaopeng G9 The time is quite open to grab potential users. In June 2020, He Xiaopeng, Li Bin, and Li Xiang met once, and then He Xiaopeng posted a group photo of the three in his circle of friends, with the text "Three hardships, remembering hardships and thinking about changes."
From then until the beginning of 2021, it has been a sweet period for the three new leading car manufacturers. Whether it is using word of mouth or in the capital market, it is relatively smooth. Now that he is in a corner, he has finally entered a reincarnation of "thinking change". Whether it is Li Xiang, who has been controversial on the Internet, He Xiaopeng, who supports Xiaopeng Motors with real money, or Li Bin, who is leading the executives to explore the European market, they all have their own feelings.