Author 丨 Cheng Xiaoyi
Editor 丨 Kang Xiao
Produced by 丨Shenwang Tencent News Xiaoman Studio
"DeepNet" learned from many insiders that the employees and assets of Baidu Intelligent Driving Business Group (IDG) have been transferred from Baidu Group's relevant main companies to several Baidu wholly-owned subsidiaries this year, such as Apollo Intelligent Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd., Apollo Intelligent Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd., Apollo Zhilian (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. and so on.
Although it was transferred to the new entity, the position, age, and treatment of the employees did not change. Li Zhenyu, senior vice president (SVP) of Baidu Group and general manager of IDG, explained the reasons for the change at the internal meeting: In order to better operate, IDG transferred to the independent operation of the new entity, "independent legal person, independent company".
A Baidu insider said that in terms of architecture, IDG is still a business group under Baidu Group.
"DeepNet" learned that after IDG was transferred to new entities in the first quarter of this year, some commercialization departments needed to formulate and complete annual revenue targets. This means that IDG, which has been "raised" by Baidu for 7 years, needs to start earning money to support its own family.
A Baidu IDG source told the DeepNet that the current cost of IDG is linked to the annual revenue indicator, that is, "the group gives you money, but you also have to make money." Another IDG source said, "Recently (IDG) has begun to reduce costs." ”
IDG has three main businesses: autonomous driving, intelligent transportation, and intelligent vehicles (including the Internet of Vehicles business and the L2+ assisted driving business). The commercialization of the first two is still in its infancy, and the intelligent car business with a more mature business model is the main force of commercialization of IDG at this stage.
IDG's emphasis on the smart car business is self-evident. "DeepNet" exclusively learned that in September this year, Chu Ruisong, formerly responsible for Baidu's B2B SaaS (Business-to-Business, Software-as-a-Service, enterprise-oriented cloud services) business, rotated to IDG as the general manager of IDG's intelligent vehicle division, and was fully responsible for the intelligent vehicle (that is, automotive intelligence) business, reporting to Li Zhenyu.
This is the second internal rotation of senior executives at the vice president level of the group after Baidu CFO (Chief Financial Officer) Yu Zhengjun was rotated to the position of CSO (Chief Strategy Officer).
A Baidu source said: This is a normal job rotation within Baidu, the purpose is to stimulate organizational vitality, promote business innovation, and is the embodiment of Baidu's emphasis on IDG to B business.
After Chu Ruisong joined, the organizational structure of IDG's intelligent vehicle division has undergone a new round of adjustment.
The original Vehicle Networking Division was changed to the Intelligent Vehicle Division, and a new delivery-related business department was established, the team responsible for project delivery in the original department was dismantled into the new delivery business department, and some of the commercialization teams in the original department were dismantled into the GTM department (that is, the commercial department). Su Tan, the former general manager of the Vehicle Networking Division, who originally reported directly to Li Zhenyu, reported to Chu Ruisong instead.
At the same time, the business strategy of the Smart Vehicle Division has also changed.
An IDG source said that Baidu's intelligent car products will be changed from main line research and development to large-scale delivery, that is, from the original customized production according to the needs of car companies, to the production of standardized products with open SDKs, benchmarking Tencent's ecological car networking TAI. Chu Ruisong said internally, "New product development can only be considered successful if it reaches large-scale delivery." ”
Baidu Intelligent Driving Business Group (IDG) Latest Organizational Chart Draft: Deep Web
Here comes a man who understands the business of to B
Chu Ruisong's rotation is extremely low-key, and an IDG person told the Deep Web that there is not even a "(personnel) announcement email." Some employees even know only that a new leader has arrived called "Rob."
Chu Ruisong
According to public information, Chu Ruisong is a veteran of the cloud service To B industry, he worked for the German enterprise software provider SAP (Sip) for 20 years, from a technical consultant all the way to the core business S/4HANA Cloud (intelligent ERP cloud business suite, that is, global SaaS and cloud ERP system) SVP.
In 2019, Chu Ruisong joined Baidu as the vice president of the group, responsible for the B2B SaaS business, and took over the last product released by the former baidu senior vice president Xiang Hailong during his tenure, the customer relationship management software Aifanfan.
Up to now, Baidu has not announced the performance of Aifanfan separately, and Chu Ruisong's performance in Baidu is not yet known. However, from the past resume, Chu Ruisong can bring more To B business experience to IDG.
A number of Baidu IDG employees told The DeepNet that the way and cycle of Internet companies do things is very different from that of traditional car companies, and there will be some friction in the process of cooperation. According to 36Kr, citing sources familiar with the matter, car companies hope that Baidu white box delivery (open algorithm code), but Baidu does not agree and has a strong attitude, so there are many car companies talking about but the support is "not very large".
The operational strategies and business models of C-end (consumer-facing) businesses are different from those of B-end (enterprise-oriented) businesses. C-end products are mainly based on "traffic thinking", which depends more on user scale and requires continuous user growth. The B-end products are more about the head effect and the word of mouth in the circle, so in addition to the product force, they rely more on sales and customer relations to complete the signing (order).
Chu Ruisong, who has many years of experience in corporate cooperation, may be able to better connect IDG with car companies.
After this rotation, Chu Ruisong served as the general manager of IDG's intelligent vehicle division. A Baidu source told Shenzhen Network that Su Tan, the former head of the Car Networking Division, has since only been responsible for the smart cabin business department and the intelligent driving integration innovation department under the intelligent car business unit.
An IDG source said that the intelligent driving and innovation department does automotive-related hardware and software, which not only docks the demand for jidu automobiles, but also "supports" jidu automobiles, "HC (headcount, recruitment quota) has no upper limit."
The single project cycle of automotive intelligence and intelligent cockpit is basically the same as the manufacturing and use cycle of a new energy vehicle, and the long-term span has higher requirements for continuous investment in resources and team stability, which can be described as a "giant's game". A Baidu person said that the next benchmarking direction of Baidu's intelligent car team is Tencent's ecological car networking TAI.
According to IHS Markit, with the gradual homogenization of automotive products, the dimension of users' demand for car cockpit functions is constantly expanding. In addition to safety, the future cockpit needs to take into account both "active intelligence" and "content + service". This is also one of the next directions for Baidu's smart car team to work, and officials say that it expects to carry more than 100 million cars equipped with its intelligent car connection by 2023.
If Robotaxi wants to be profitable on a regular basis, the daily order volume needs to exceed Didi
Baidu IDG was founded in 2017, under the leadership of Lu Qi, then president of Baidu, to integrate the Autonomous Driving Division (L4), the Intelligent Vehicle Division (L3), and the Internet of Vehicles (Car Life etc. Three major businesses.
In 2019, Baidu Autonomous Driving decided to change the technical route from bicycle intelligence to vehicle-road collaboration, and in November of the same year, Baidu upgraded the vehicle-road collaboration business to the intelligent transportation business department, which was at the same level as the Vehicle Networking Division and the Autonomous Driving Division, and the Intelligent Automobile Business Department was merged into the Autonomous Driving Division. From 2020 to 2021, the organizational structure has been adjusted many times to form the structure of the three major business divisions and large commercialization departments.
Although the smart car business is currently the revenue pillar of IDG, Baidu mentions the most and the outside world is most concerned about its automatic driving and intelligent transportation business.
After the release of the financial report in the first quarter of this year, Baidu Chairman and CEO Robin Li clarified for the first time in baidu's all-staff letter three business models of Baidu's intelligent driving (external brand name Apollo) business:
1. Provide Apollo automatic driving technology solutions for host manufacturers;
2. Baidu car manufacturing is Jidu automobile, end-to-end integration of Baidu's automatic driving innovation, the most advanced technology to the market for the first time;
3. Robotaxi (unmanned car travel service) is the radish fast running business.
Jidu Automobile is a smart electric vehicle company established by Baidu in January this year, Baidu initiated the lead, has absolute controlling rights, Geely Holding Group is currently the only investor except Baidu. In terms of specific division of labor, Baidu Apollo exports all intelligent technologies to Jidu, and Geely is responsible for the manufacture of traditional automobile parts.
Robin Li attaches great importance to Jidu Automobile, although he is not on the board of directors of Jidu Automobile, he will also participate in the relevant review meetings of product definition and design. In the third quarter earnings call, Robin Li said that Jidu Automobile will unveil and demonstrate its intelligent cockpit and intelligent driving capabilities at next year's Beijing Auto Show, and is expected to be mass-produced and delivered in 2023.
Different from the progressive autonomous driving solutions chosen by other car companies, it is gradually iterated from L1-level assisted driving technology to high-level automatic driving technology. The first model of Jidu Automobile will be directly equipped with L4 level autonomous driving.
Classification system for autonomous driving of automobiles
Robotaxi has previously predicted that the comprehensive cost of Robotaxi will be lower than manual driving in 2025, when the single-day service order exceeds 50 million, the cost of Robotaxi will be one-fifth of the current price, lower than the average price of ordinary express services, Robotaxi will have the opportunity to achieve normalized profitability. "By 2025, autonomous driving technology will enter the stage of large-scale commercial use."
It is not easy to achieve the goal of 50 million daily orders. Even Didi, which is currently in the monopoly position of the head of online ride-hailing, has a daily order volume of only 41 million. (As of March 31, 2021 data) Baidu's Robotaxi service, Radish Run, has just completed the first domestic paid passenger order for autonomous travel on November 25 this year.
According to Baidu's plan, Baidu Apollo will expand to 30 cities by 2023, while building a large-scale L4 level autonomous travel service fleet of 3,000 vehicles. At that time, the number of Baidu Apollo users is expected to reach 3 million, serving millions of travel needs.
Although the fifth-generation model of Baidu Apollo's autonomous driving has reduced the cost of bicycles to 480,000 yuan, the official said that it has reached the lowest cost of domestic Robotaxi models at this stage. But unlike the traditional ride-hailing model, Robotaxi is an asset-heavy operation that requires the cost of an unmanned fleet.
Assuming that the daily order volume is equal to the number of users, according to the above plan, 1 vehicle corresponds to 1,000 people, and at least 50,000 vehicles are needed to reach 50 million daily service orders, and the vehicle cost is about 24 billion yuan.
The need for open source throttling is urgent, and the year-end award is postponed for two months
Baidu has not yet disclosed the detailed profit and loss of the intelligent driving business, but since the second quarter of this year, Baidu has disclosed the revenue of ACE Intelligent Transportation (Autonomous Driving, Connected Road, Efficient Mobility) and classified it under the AI cloud sector. The latest data as of September 30 shows that Apollo ACE Intelligent Transportation (Autonomous Driving, Connected Road, Efficient Mobility), with a cumulative contract amount of more than 10 million yuan, has tripled from a year ago and is the same as in the second quarter of the same year.
Intelligent transportation is still in the national pilot and demonstration area operation stage, the collection cycle is long, but the daily cost expenditure is not small. Taking labor costs as an example, a person familiar with the matter told DeepNet that the intelligent transportation business has more than 2,000 employees.
Li
Robin Li previously said in his speech that Baidu is a company based on technology, whether it is 1 yuan, 100 million or 10 billion, it will be invested in technology.
While it's true that investing in technology requires patience and tolerance for losses, almost all commercial companies thrive on growth and profitability. At this time, Baidu proposed to set an annual revenue target for the intelligent driving business, which is not only the reason why the business has reached the commercialization point, but also the inevitable transformation process of its business transformation.
According to the third quarter financial report, although Baidu's non-online marketing revenue (including AI and cloud services) increased by 79.31% year-on-year to 5.2 billion yuan, the growth rate was nearly 13 times that of online marketing revenue (such as advertising), but it only accounted for 16.3% of total revenue.
Further accelerating the proportion of non-online marketing revenue will be the top priority of Baidu's business transformation at this stage.
In addition, Due to the non-cash, market-denominated long-term investment loss of up to 18.9 billion yuan in the third quarter, Baidu's net loss in the third quarter expanded 27 times from the previous quarter to 16.559 billion yuan, and the free cash flow excluding iQiyi was only 2.9 billion yuan.
The tight financial situation makes Baidu's need for open source throttling more urgent. A number of Baidu employees told ShenzhenNet that Baidu has notified that the year-end award will be postponed by two months, that is, the year-end bonus will be issued after the 2021 financial report is issued.
Baidu's intelligent cloud revenue has increased by more than 50% year after year, can intelligent driving become the future revenue increase of Baidu Group? Baidu will submit a new answer sheet in 2025.
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