On December 18, Qiantu Automobile said through the Weibo platform that it held a "2022 Zhiqian Strategy Sharing Meeting" at its Suzhou plant. At the meeting, Qiantu Automobile released the technology research and development and application of new materials, new energy and new intelligence. At the same time, Qiantu Automobile also announced that its new model, the Qiantu K20, will be officially launched in 2022 and deployed in overseas markets. At the same time, Qiantu Automobile also held a ceremony for the down-of-production of Qiantu K50 and delivered Qiantu K50 to 6 new users.
This news caused a shock in the car circle: the future car is alive again?
According to public information, Qiantu Automobile was founded in February 2015 with the founder Lu Qun; The parent company of Qiantu Automobile is Great Wall Huaguan, which is an independent automobile design company and vehicle development solution provider, founded by Luqun in 2003; in November 2015, Great Wall Huaguan landed on the New Third Board; in February 2016, Qiantu Automobile laid the foundation stone for suzhou plant, with a planned investment of more than 2 billion yuan and a production capacity of 50,000 vehicles; On October 10, The production qualification of 50,000 pure electric vehicles in Qiantu Automobile's Suzhou plant was approved by the National Development and Reform Commission; in August 2018, Qiantu Automobile's first product, K50, was listed on the market, and the price after subsidy reached 686,800 yuan; in February 2019, due to the weakening of capital circulation, Great Wall Huaguan was delisted from the New Third Board and tried to seek listing on the Science and Technology Innovation Board, but failed.
At the end of March 2020, the media reported that Future Auto employees were asking for wages, and Lu Qun had publicly stated that "there has been new progress in Future Auto recently, and the future is still bright", but this is not the case.
In April of that year, Qiantu Automobile became a defendant in two lawsuits, and Lu Qun was listed by the court as a restricted high-spender. In November 2020, the media reported that The first store of Qiantu Automobile in Sanlitun was withdrawn, and the delivery center in Jingang Automobile Park was also empty. Media reported that the future K50 has been on the market for more than two years, and "the sales volume is more than one hundred."
In contrast, Qiantu Automobile did not raise funds everywhere like other new car-making forces, but through its parent company Great Wall Huaguan equity and debt financing. When The first car of Qiantu Automobile was listed, Lu Qun once revealed that Qiantu Automobile had raised a total of about 3 billion yuan through equity and debt financing, and about 2 billion yuan had been spent as of the K50 listing. After the development is obvious, 3 billion funds are far from driving the future of the car to continue to move forward.
CCTV News has reported that Byton Automobile, also located in Jiangsu Province, "burned out" 8.4 billion yuan and failed to build a whole vehicle; Sailin Automobile exhausted 5.9 billion yuan of financing and finally announced bankruptcy; Bo County Automobile has experienced 6 rounds of financing, the last round of financing claimed to be 2.5 billion, but finally dissolved. In addition to these three companies, around 2019-2020, Singularity Auto, LUCHI Auto, Ranger Auto, Changjiang Auto, etc. have all fallen into a state of bankruptcy or dissolution, and Future Auto is among them.
However, compared with the grand situation of Byton and Sailin's "burning money" of billions or tens of billions of dollars, the funds consumed by future cars are not much, and mainly come from the parent company, which is still operating. In addition, Future Auto not only has factories and production qualifications, but the first car has also been launched and sold (although very little). This provides excellent conditions for the "resurrection" of the future car.
In March 2019, Cornerstone Capital Zhang Wei even publicly shouted: 2019 will be the year of the collapse of new car-making forces, new energy vehicles and smart driving are the undisputed directions in the automotive field, and no new energy car-making company in China is worth investing in. Therefore, it is not unusual for Future Auto to be among these companies facing closure.
However, after the arrival of 2020, Weilai, Ideal, Xiaopeng and other enterprises represented the emergence of new car-making forces, supporting half of the sky of electric vehicles. Subsequently, Xiaomi Group, Xiaoniu Electric, Feifan Automobile, Zhiji Automobile, Extreme Krypton Automobile, Avita and other brands have been released, and the new energy automobile industry has shown a thriving scene. Capital is back in the new energy automobile industry.
According to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, from January to November 2021, the cumulative sales of new energy vehicles in China reached 2.99 million units, an increase of 166.8% year-on-year. China Automobile Synergy predicts that China's new energy vehicle sales will reach 5 million in 2022, while BYD expects to sell about 5.5 million vehicles by then.
As early as 2019, when Zhang Wei of Cornerstone Capital "shelled" the new forces of car-making, He Xiaopeng, chairman of Xiaopeng Motors, publicly responded: "It is easy to be a critic, it is difficult to be a builder, we just need to choose the 1% believe in the origin and seed, step by step to do our own and amplify." Both Geely Great Wall and Tesla deserve respect, and the ridicule they faced back then will only be more, and today's new car manufacturers are just repeating their stories of that year. Today, the difficulties and challenges of Weilai, Xiaopeng, etc., are just a pit on the road to growth, and they always have to move forward."
At such a juncture, the announcement of the "comeback" of the future car is afraid that it will make people think of it one after another.
Public information shows that at present, the future automobile legal person is still not a land group. In December, Qiantu Automobile announced that it will sign a strategic cooperation agreement with Goldenport Holding Company and Blue Ocean Creative Company; another media report said that Qiantu Automobile's parent company Great Wall Huaguan and Suzhou Beifeng Laser Technology Co., Ltd., Monash University Suzhou Campus two major institutions on aluminum alloy components 3D printing, in-car personalized product design and production, battery tray weight reduction and production, new model advanced design and graduate internship platform cooperation, the new research and development results are widely used in new models.
In addition, Qiantu Automobile also announced that it has reached a strategic cooperation agreement with Suzhou Canadian Solar Power Technology Co., Ltd. and Global Trust Asset (Ma) Company, and plans to mass-produce and launch the world's first solar photovoltaic vehicle in 2022.
On June 1 this year, the parent company of Future Automobile, Great Wall Huaguan, "suddenly" updated a message that "the Great Wall Huaguan Shareholders' Meeting and the New Board of Directors were successfully held", and some important institutions, enterprises and capital parties such as the Nanjing Economic Development Zone Management Committee, Su Gaoxin Venture Capital Group, Guoke Jiahe appeared in this news, which was interpreted by the media as Great Wall Huaguan or will be re-listed, and before that, Future Automobile did not publicly raise funds.
The Economic Observer reported that from 2020 to May 31 this year, 16 shareholders of Great Wall Huaguan have withdrawn one after another, which may mean that Great Wall Huaguan is preparing space for new shareholders to enter.