In 2021, China's new energy vehicle sales exceeded 3 million, and in 2022, the figure of 5 million has been shouted, but under the rush of sales, production capacity and product bottlenecks are also prominent
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From January to November 2021, according to the data of the Association, the wholesale sales of new energy vehicles reached 2.807 million units, an increase of 190.7% year-on-year, and it was a foregone conclusion to break 3 million for the whole year.
Among the top 15 new energy manufacturers in terms of cumulative sales, there are 7 companies whose growth rate has outperformed the market, 8 that have lagged behind the market, in the increase of 1.61 million, only BYD and Shangtong Wuling have contributed 600,000, and the top four sales have contributed half of the increment, the concentration is very high, and the heat of the new energy vehicle market this year is actually contributed by a small number of manufacturers.
As for why most manufacturers can not contribute more in this round of new energy vehicle sales carnival, according to the characteristics reflected in the data and the information learned by "Finance Eleven" from manufacturers, suppliers and dealers, the bottleneck of production capacity and the unreasonable product structure are the main reasons hindering the sales growth of some new energy manufacturers, and in the next 1-2 years, these two major problems will become the main obstacles to the rapid growth of new energy vehicle sales.
Capacity bottlenecks
Production limitation, production cuts, and suspensions are common keywords in this year's auto news, and the shortage of key components such as chips and radars has led to a global reduction in automobile production, and auto giants such as Volkswagen and Toyota have suffered heavy losses. New energy vehicle manufacturers have not been spared.
After the reduction of delivery, replacement of chips, and delay of delivery, after entering the fourth quarter, a number of mainstream brands of new energy vehicles have broken out news related to insufficient production capacity. For example, the Great Wall Euler good cat replaced the Qualcomm 8155 chip advertised at the beginning of the listing with Intel's 4-core chip, which was exposed by CCTV and other media, and the general manager of Euler publicly apologized and gave the affected users up to 10,000 yuan of charging rights compensation.
In fact, Euler's chip supply has always affected the supply of products. The person in charge of a major dealer in North Europe said helplessly: "The manufacturer said at the beginning of the year that the next quarter can be delivered, April and May said that the second half of the year is good, in the second half of the year, said that the end of the year can be delivered, now ask again, has not said the time." ”
Many of Euler's dealers have large orders that cannot be delivered, with a minimum waiting time of one month for delivery, and three months for some models and colors. Such waiting time makes 4S stores very painful, because Euler has many competitors with a price of about 100,000, and once the delivery time exceeds one month, the probability of customer loss is greatly increased.
In order to ensure the delivery of vehicles, Xiaopeng and Ideal have launched a reduction delivery plan. Xiaopeng P5 and Ideal ONE, if consumers want to pick up the car as soon as possible, they can choose to reduce the delivery plan of radar, and then reload after the radar supply is sufficient. The reloading of the ideal ONE begins at the end of the year, and the Xiaopeng P5 begins in March 2022. Consumers who opt for the "de-allocation" option can receive compensation such as points, lifetime warranty, free premium driver assistance features, and more.
Delivery delays are a common phenomenon among new energy manufacturers, but the severity varies. In September this year, The sales volume of the Weilai brand exceeded 10,000 for the first time by selling out the exhibition cars in the showroom. During the National Day period, it is common for the exhibition car door in the exhibition hall to be locked and labeled with the label "this car has been sold", and some cities even have extreme situations where there is no exhibition car and can only be put on the car model for the sales staff to introduce.
During the National Day, a Weilai automobile showroom replaced the exhibition car with a car model Image source: Che dongxi WeChat public account
In the following October, NIO brand sales fell to less than 4,000, and the capacity constraints caused by the combination of production line suspension and upgrading and supply chain problems were the main reasons. In November, Weilai's sales returned to more than 10,000, but it still lagged behind xiaopeng and ideal two major competitors. At the same time, although the delivery cycle of several of NIO's main sales models is not as long as it took 8 weeks in October, the delivery cycle of about 4 weeks is also double that of the previous one.
There is also extreme krypton, which has been delivered since the end of October this year, and the delivery situation has also made consumers dissatisfied. Due to the shortage of air suspension and variable canopy accessories, the delivery schedule of the top and high-end models is seriously lagging behind the low-end model. The low-end model has delivered orders for nearly two months from April 15 to the beginning of June, while the orders for the top-end model in the first half of April have not been delivered, and the brand's commitment to deliver in the chronological order of the order cannot be fulfilled.
Near the end of the year, the supply situation of the entire automotive industry has improved, and the output of many large manufacturers has recovered, but why do new energy vehicle manufacturers frequently break out that production capacity is limited due to supply chain problems? The main reason is that the overall output of new energy vehicles is small.
The output is small, and when the supply chain chaos in the early days is the most serious, the new energy vehicle brand has a stronger ability to absorb high-priced parts because of the more flexible procurement mechanism, and the ability to obtain parts from various circulation channels is obviously beyond that of traditional automakers. And because the output is small, as long as a part is obtained from the market, the production situation can be significantly improved.
However, with the improvement of the supply chain situation, the supply chain Party A is becoming more and more strict in controlling the parts flowing to the circulation field, and the supply situation of traditional OEMs is gradually improving, but because of the small output of new energy vehicle brands, neither bargaining power nor goods acquisition ability can match that of traditional OEMs. At the same time, the entire market is growing rapidly, the order volume is rising rapidly, the supply is tightening, and the demand is growing, so near the end of the year, the new energy vehicle brand is frequently in a hurry.
New energy brands do not want to expand production capacity, but expansion is a problem that is more difficult to solve than the shortage of supply chains, and it is also an important problem that will plague the rapid development of new energy vehicle manufacturers in the next few years.
The hardware of manufacturing equipment and plant buildings is relatively easy to solve. For example, Ideal spent 6 billion yuan to eat the original Beijing Hyundai Shunyi First Factory. On this basis, the company will rebuild a pure electric vehicle manufacturing base with an annual production capacity of 100,000 units, and is expected to be completed in September 2023.
Xiaopeng Automobile's Zhaoqing manufacturing base was completed and put into operation in September 2019, with an annual production capacity of 100,000 units, which is the main reason why Xiaopeng's sales continued to grow in the second half of this year, and the momentum of the three new forces was the strongest. In November this year, Xiaopeng P7 was able to achieve sales of nearly 8,000 units, and the total number of units from January to November exceeded 50,000 units, which were the contributions of the Zhaoqing plant.
The construction plan of Weilai's factory is also huge, and the construction goal of Hefei Xinqiao Intelligent Electric Vehicle Industrial Park is to produce 1 million vehicles per year, 100GWh batteries, and an output value of more than 500 billion yuan. But in October this year, a production line upgrade, it directly pulled down sales to less than 4,000, these grand capacity figures are still on paper, the current Weilai production capacity is still relatively fragile.
Plant, equipment to solve are simple, as long as the investment, can be completed quickly, the real limit of the rapid increase in the production capacity of new energy vehicles bottleneck is people, is the lack of grass-roots positions of the operator.
Although these manufacturers place special emphasis on automation in the design of production lines, the concept of "black light factory" and "unmanned factory" abounds, but in the four links of vehicle production, the four links that can achieve a high degree of automation are currently limited to stamping, welding and painting, and the final assembly link still requires a lot of manual operation. For example, the cable routing that once caused Tesla Model3 to fall into the hell of production capacity is still completely dependent on manual completion.
Taking Tesla as an example, backed by Shanghai's mature automobile production ecology, Tesla is relatively loose in terms of personnel reserves, but tesla's long-term recruitment of positions, the production and manufacturing links are still the most.
Tesla's long-term recruitment of manufacturing positions Image source: Tesla recruitment WeChat public account
This is still the case in a city with a high density of automobile manufacturing talents like Shanghai, not to mention new energy vehicle manufacturers in other cities. New energy manufacturers want to supplement skilled workers, mainly from traditional automakers to recruit people, but compared with the high salaries of engineers, IT development and other positions, the treatment of new energy manufacturers in grass-roots posts is not high. Taking Tesla as an example, front-line operators have 176 standard working hours per month, overtime work must not exceed 36 working hours, including overtime pay, it is difficult for the monthly income to exceed 5,000 yuan after tax, and the attraction is not strong.
Although production and sales of traditional automakers are declining, workers will not flow out quickly because the production lines are still operating normally. It is difficult for workers in general assembly positions to increase in the short term, and in the stock competition, the road of digging people is not easy. At present, in addition to the way that Gaohe Automobile fully accepts the factory and workers of the former Dongfeng Yueda Kia, the front-line workers have not shown a trend of flowing to new energy vehicle manufacturers.
With the expansion of the production capacity of new energy manufacturers, not only there is a huge gap in front-line workers, but also supply chain procurement, logistics and distribution, sales positions, and after-sales service positions need to be expanded proportionally, and these positions also have personnel gaps of different degrees. For example, supply chain procurement personnel are one of the hottest positions this year, and a new power brand has issued conditions for recruiting supply chain leaders without salary caps this fall.
Capacity expansion, hardware problems rely on investment can be quickly solved, but the huge personnel gap for new energy vehicle manufacturers, especially the lack of traditional vehicle factory background of the new forces, will be the biggest obstacle to improving production capacity, and unlike senior research and development positions can throw money to rob people, front-line operators and other grass-roots positions can not be paid high salaries, otherwise both destroy the industry ecology, cost pressure can not be consumed.
Product bottlenecks
In addition to production capacity, the second problem exposed by new energy vehicles this year is that the product structure needs to be upgraded at an accelerated pace. This year's surge in sales is mainly due to the growth of the A00-class market and the increase in plug-in hybrid models. These two products represent the two directions of the structural adjustment of new energy models, one is shrinking and the other is expanding.
A00-class models, commonly known as mini cars, represent models such as Wuling Hongguang MINI EV, which is the biggest highlight of China's new energy vehicle market in recent years. Relying on a product to reactivate a forgotten segment, the micro car market that fuel vehicles almost gave up is now completely occupied by pure electric cars.
However, the growth potential of such products is already insufficient, such as the monthly sales in November, wuling Hongguang MINI EV, although still occupying the top of the list, but the year-on-year growth rate has dropped to 22.1%, ranking last in the growth rate of the listed models. In terms of market share, the proportion of A00 sales in the overall new energy sales volume also fell from 40% in November last year to 31% in November this year. In the future, although this market segment still has some sinking potential to be tapped, such as replacing electric tricycles, the growth rate is bound to slow down, and the contribution to the overall new energy vehicle market will decline significantly.
The rise of plug-in hybrid models is a highlight of this year, BYD has ranked fifth in the national manufacturer sales ranking in November, even if only the sales of new energy vehicles are calculated, it can also rank sixth in the overall list. It surpassed major competitors such as Toyota and Honda, and fulfilled the slogan of fuel car disruptors shouted when the DM-i plug-in hybrid model was launched at the beginning of the year.
Plug-in hybrid models in the overall market of new energy vehicles has increased from 16% in November last year to 20% in November this year, the contribution to the entire market increase is very significant, compared with the European market plug-in hybrid accounted for nearly half, China's plug-in hybrid models in both the number of models and sales there is still a lot of room for growth.
The shrinking market for mini-vehicles and the expansion of the market for plug-in hybrid models are all positive manifestations of the structural adjustment of new energy vehicle products. However, the lack of universal significance of national cars and scooters is the biggest concern about the existing product structure of new energy. In the automotive market, it is a regular phenomenon that nearly half of the sales of mid-range A-class cars are common, such as the top 15 car sales in November, and A-class cars occupy 9 seats. However, in the new energy vehicle market, A-class vehicles accounted for only 25% of overall sales, unchanged from the same period last year.
The A-Class is the most difficult to develop of any model. The variety of consumer requirements, the configuration can not be too low, the cost control is strict, and the gross profit margin is low, which are the practical problems faced by A-class cars, but the consumer group of A-class cars is the largest, and the total market volume is the most impressive.
Moreover, for China's new energy vehicle companies, A-class vehicles are not only a market-driven choice of interests, but also a strategic choice. Li Jinyong, president of the New Energy Branch of the Automobile Dealers Chamber of Commerce of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, said in the latest issue of "Car Understanding Talks": "Only by creating a real national car and scooter can Chinese enterprises become the leaders of the global automotive industry. ”
Referring to Tesla, before the advent of the Model 3, Tesla could only be regarded as a maverick technology pioneer brand at most, until the birth of the Model 3, a global national car, which made Tesla truly grow into a global leading brand. For China's new energy vehicle manufacturers, the development of A-class vehicles is an inevitable requirement for the future.
But the trend seen at present is that almost all new energy vehicle brands are in the direction of high-end luxury. It is indeed not difficult to understand that the luxury car market is the only segment that continues to grow after the decline of China's auto market in 2018, and it is logical to choose an incremental direction, but so many manufacturers are squeezed into the same market segment at the same time, even if the total amount of this segment grows, but the future is uncertain in the hands of each player.
In this regard, BYD's operation is very noteworthy, although the shouted slogan is to attack the high-end through BYD Han, but this year's real driving by BYD sales take off is the new Qin, Song two A-class cars and compact SUV. In november's overall ranking of car sales, BYD Qin has ranked fourth, with monthly sales of more than 30,000, surpassing the Toyota Corolla and only 2,000 units less than the new Langyi.
At the 2021 media communication meeting of the China Electric Vehicle 100 Association held in early December, Ouyang Minggao, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and vice chairman of the China Electric Vehicle 100 Association, said that technological progress, product enrichment and policy incentives have contributed to the "unexpected, but logical" rapid growth of the new energy vehicle market this year. When talking about the future growth expectations of new energy vehicles, Ouyang Minggao said that the market has broken through the inflection point and will enter a period of steep growth, in 2022, the sales volume of new energy passenger cars will exceed 5 million, the sales proportion will exceed 20%, and in 2030, the collection of passenger cars and commercial vehicles, the sales of new energy vehicles are expected to reach 17-19 million, breaking half of the total sales of automobiles that year.
To support such a huge market, it is not enough to rely on cheap mini cars, not to rely on luxury cars of more than 300,000, and only mid-range A-class cars in the range of 100,000-200,000 can support this number. But in addition to BYD, China's new energy vehicle manufacturers are the least prepared in this regard.
The author is a reporter for Caijing
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