Wen | Zhao Zhefeng
Edit | Yang Bocheng
If you want to define the car market in 2021, the most appropriate one should be the "year of inflection point".
According to the forecast of the Association of Passenger Vehicles, the retail sales of passenger cars in 2021 will be 20.09 million units, an increase of 4.1% year-on-year, still slightly lower than the 20.68 million units in 2019 before the epidemic, and far from the peak of 23.75 million units in 2017.
From the numerical point of view alone, we still have not come out of the cold winter of the car market that began to spread from 2018. But behind the seemingly weak data, there are actually quite a few noteworthy changes that are happening.
In this year, the inflection point of the car market has quietly arrived, chip difficult production, production delays, vehicle allocation reductions, delivery delays, and consumer complaints have increased, these keywords have occurred in the car market in 2021, and the year has dropped, but the situation remains unchanged.
Inflection point one: the market is about to regain vitality
The culprit that led to the sluggish sales volume of the car market in 2021 is undoubtedly the "lack of core" that pervades the world.
According to the latest data from AutoForecast Solutions, a global automotive consulting organization, as of December 19, the global automotive market has reduced production by 10.272 million vehicles this year due to lack of cores. Among them, China's auto market has reduced production by 1.982 million units.
If there is no "lack of core tide", China's automobile sales this year are expected to be about 2 million more than the current one, that is, about 22 million vehicles, not only exceeding the level of 2019, but also basically the same as 2018, indicating that the vitality of China's automobile market is gradually recovering.
So when will the lack of cores end?
Data from many sources show that as the epidemic situation in Southeast Asia, which is responsible for chip packaging and testing, stabilizes, the global supply of automotive chips has recovered from the fourth quarter of this year.
China Automobile Center expects that by the third quarter of next year, the supply of chips will be greatly alleviated. In addition, JPMorgan Chase also said that the chip supply situation may be fundamentally improved in the second half of 2022. Although small missing cores may become the norm in the automotive industry in the future, the tide of large-scale core shortages is likely to end in the second half of 2022. At that time, the potential vitality of China's automobile market will be basically released.
At the recent "2022 China Auto Market Development Forecast Summit and Investment Cooperation Conference" hosted by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, many authoritative institutions and industry insiders also made predictions on the direction of the auto market in 2022.
The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said that China's passenger car sales are expected to increase by about 8% year-on-year in 2022.
Wang Qing, deputy director of the Market Economy Research Institute of the Development Research Center of the State Council, predicted that automobile sales in 2022 are expected to increase by 3%-5% year-on-year.
Bai Ling, an industry research expert at Chongqing Changan Product Planning Department, predicted that the growth rate of retail sales of narrow passenger cars in 2022 will be 6.0%.
It can be seen that the industry's sales growth expectations for the passenger car market next year are roughly between 3% and 8%. According to this calculation, then China's narrow passenger car sales next year should be between 2069-21.69 million, higher than in 2019 but lower than the level in 2018.
The reason why it has not reached the level of 2018, or because the market will continue to be affected by the lack of cores in the first half of next year, has led to conservative forecasts from all sides. The author believes that by 2023 or 2024, China's passenger car sales will return to or even break through the historical high point in 2017.
Inflection point two: Chinese brands are back on the growth track
After 3 years, the market share of Chinese brands has returned to more than 40% again. It's just different from a few years ago when we grabbed the share of the joint venture with SUVs, this time we rely on new energy and brand upwards.
Throughout the past 10 years, the market share of Chinese brands has basically belonged to the state of "continuous decline and intermittent recovery".
From 2011 to 2014, the market share of Chinese brands fell for four consecutive years. In 2015, the SUV boom was seized, and the market share began to continue to rise, reaching 42.7% in 2017, the highest point in nearly 10 years.
However, when the joint venture brand began to increase its efforts to lay out the SUV market, the market share of Chinese brands fell again for three consecutive years, falling to the lowest point of 35.7% in the past 10 years in 2020.
However, with the popularity of new energy vehicles, Chinese brands have once again regained the market. The "Wei Xiaoli" in the new force group, BYD, SAIC-GM-Wuling, GAC Eian, Great Wall Euler and so on in the traditional car companies have worked together to pull the market share back to more than 40%.
Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the Association, recently told the media that "independent brands account for 80% of sales in the new energy market, Tesla accounts for 14%, and joint venture brands account for only 6%."
Under the sweep of the wave of electrification and intelligence, foreign brands are gradually declining in the Chinese market. In addition to Tesla, which sells 30,000-50,000 vehicles a month, and the Volkswagen ID. family, which has just exceeded 10,000 units per month, foreign brands really can no longer find players who can play in the field of new energy.
Although foreign brands have also collectively begun the road of transformation, it is difficult to say whether they can fight back successfully. After all, "smart electric vehicles" are a completely different track, and foreign brands face a much greater challenge this time than they did a few years ago.
In addition, the brand upward strategy that has achieved initial results is also a major factor in the chinese brand regaining market share.
According to the data monitored by Wilson, from January to July this year, the average price of BYD bicycles was 151,800 yuan, higher than Volkswagen's 147,800 yuan; the sales of Geely's "China Star" series represented by Xingrui and Xingyue L repeatedly reached a new high, with sales exceeding 25,000 units in November; data from the China Automobile Association showed that in the first three quarters of this year, the average price of Great Wall bicycles increased by 12.5%; in terms of high-end brands, the annual sales of Hongqi and Lynk & Co exceeded 200,000 units, an increase of more than 30%, and the tank brand delivered more than 10,000 vehicles for the first time in November. These are the results of the continuous upward movement of Chinese brands.
So whose share of Chinese brands has eaten up?
From 2018 to 2021, the market share growth rate of The German, Japanese and American systems was 0.6%, 3.0% and -0.1% respectively, which were basically in a state of stability or growth.
In contrast, the market share of Korean and legal systems has declined year after year. From 2018 to 2021, the market share of Korean cars was 4.9%, 4.8%, 3.8%, and 2.7%, respectively, and the French car was 1.4%, 0.7%, 0.3%, and 0.4%, respectively.
Due to the mistakes in the product pricing strategy of the French car, coupled with the fact that its design is becoming more and more "self-indulgent", it is difficult to adapt to the domestic market environment, so it is gradually marginalized.
The market share of Korean cars is mostly eaten by Chinese brands, which is most intuitively reflected in the data. And from the perspective of the positioning of the Korean car itself, after the Chinese brand collectively rises, it should also become the first object to be impacted.
In the past, Korean cars still had good market competitiveness with their high cost performance in the joint venture camp. However, in order to seize sales, the strategy of fighting a price war with Chinese brands has made their brand image and premium ability lower and lower.
In the case of few brand halos left and a huge gap in product cost performance, Korean brands have gradually been replaced by Chinese brands.
Inflection point three: new energy finally get rid of policy-driven
With the outbreak of new energy vehicles in all regions and categories in 2021, the situation that the new energy market is driven by policies such as "priority listing" and "cash subsidies" will become history.
With the addition of the domestic Tesla catfish, as well as the growth of new power brands, some independent brands with strong sense of crisis have accelerated the research and development of new energy products and technologies, and under the joint efforts of the three parties, with the rapid expansion of China's energy network, the new energy vehicle market has finally completely exploded.
The China Automobile Association said that in the first 11 months of this year, the cumulative sales of domestic new energy vehicles were close to 3 million, and the annual sales volume is expected to reach 3.4 million, an increase of 1.5 times year-on-year.
If you want to draw a curve for the development of China's new energy vehicles in recent years, then this year will undoubtedly become the steepest section.
Moreover, there is a change that deserves special attention, that is, "the sales of new energy vehicles have shifted from policy-driven to market-driven".
From the overall perspective of the market, the proportion of sales of new energy vehicles in non-restricted cities has increased year by year, breaking through 70% for the first time this year, an increase of 13% compared with 2017.
Looking at the regional situation, in the first 11 months of this year, among the top 10 cities in terms of new energy vehicle sales, the top 3 cities in terms of growth were Suzhou (245%), Zhengzhou (188%), and Hangzhou (183%), except for Hangzhou, which are non-restricted cities. Moreover, Chengdu, which is not a purchase restriction, also exceeds the tianjin that is limited in terms of total purchase. Overall, non-restricted cities have shown a stronger demand for new energy vehicles.
So which market segment does the increase in new energy vehicles come from this year?
According to the data of the Association of Automobile Associations, micro pure electric vehicles (A00-class BEVs) currently occupy the largest share of the new energy market, reaching about 30%. At the same time, its growth rate of 244% is also at the forefront of all market segments.
Through known data, it can be calculated that the increase in the new energy passenger car market this year is about 1.1 million, and the A00-class pure electric vehicles contribute about 550,000 of them, nearly half of them, which is indeed the "number one hero".
But at the same time, we can't ignore the contributions of other market segments. For example, the models with the highest growth rate in the new energy market this year are B/C class pure electric SUVs and A-class plug-in hybrid cars, with a growth rate of more than 300%, which is also the main force driving the development of the new energy market.
According to Rogers' innovative diffusion model, when a new thing occupies more than 16% of its market, it will enter the "mass period", which means that it will become mainstream. This year, China's new energy passenger car market share has reached 13.9%, very close to 16%, next year into the "volkswagen period" is almost a foregone conclusion.
At present, including the China Automobile Association and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ouyang Ming, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, generally believe that the total sales of new energy vehicles in China will increase by 47% year-on-year to 5 million in 2022. At the same time, there are some "radicals" who believe that this number will double next year, that is, 6-7 million vehicles.
Inflection point four: "Make charging as fast as refueling" is becoming possible
In addition to the macro market level, some of the new technologies that have emerged this year also deserve our attention. For example, an 800V high voltage platform and a 480kW super fast charging pile.
In the past year or so, the "appearance rate" of 800V high-voltage platforms has been particularly high. Including BYD e-platform 3.0, GAC E-An pure electric platform, Xiaopeng new pure electric platform, Geely SEA Haohan architecture, general Aoteneng platform, etc., all claim to support 800V high-voltage charging, which can achieve "charging for 5 minutes and 200km endurance".
In fact, as early as 2019, when Porsche launched the pure electric vehicle Taycan, 800V high-voltage charging has already appeared in mass production vehicles. However, the technology did not become widespread until this year.
The so-called 800V high-voltage charging platform essentially means that the motor inverter can withstand higher voltages. At present, the mainstream IGBT silicon-based chip cannot withstand the 800V charging voltage, so the core component is the SiC silicon carbide chip.
However, with the strong rise of silicon carbide chips, 800V high-voltage charging has a real popular soil.
This year is known as the first year of the silicon carbide outbreak, in addition to infineon, FA-ST and other traditional semiconductor giants, including Bosch, Toyota and other enterprises have also crossed the board, domestic car companies, BYD, Weilai, Geely and so on have begun to develop their own silicon carbide chips.
At present, the annual production capacity of global silicon carbide chips can meet the needs of 1 million new energy vehicles. While this is not enough, it is a trend for the industry to expand rapidly in the coming years.
In addition to silicon carbide chips, the emergence of 480kW supercharged piles is also a landmark event.
In fact, the 800V high-voltage charging platform needs the support of a complete system, in addition to the motor inverter, but also with the super-speed battery, ultra-high power charging pile with the cooperation, in order to truly achieve "charging 5 minutes, endurance 200km". At present, most batteries can meet this technical standard,
So the key point is the charging pile.
At present, the maximum voltage supported by China's mainstream fast charging pile is between 500V-750V, although it is close to the theoretical upper limit of 800V, but it will generally lock the rated current below 250A, then the maximum charging power can only theoretically reach about 120kW-180kW.
At present, the 100-kilometer power consumption of mainstream pure electric vehicles is about 15 degrees, so the endurance of 200km requires 30 degrees of electricity. To achieve "charging for 5 minutes and 200km", at least 360kW of charging power is required.
Therefore, in order to make the best use of the 800V high-voltage platform, some car companies will build their own supercharging stations and use their own research and development of 480kW supercharging piles, such as Xiaopeng and GAC Aean.
At present, the construction of this supercharging station is still in its infancy. Xiaopeng expects to start laying out 480kW charging piles next year, while GAC Aean's supercharger station currently has only one in Guangzhou, and it plans to build 2,000 in 2025.
In addition, car companies also face many difficulties in building superfill piles, which cannot be solved by blindly investing funds. For example, the power design load of Guangzhou Baiyun Hotel is 3120kW, and if 7 480kW supercharge piles are added near it, it is enough to paralyze its power system and damage the interests of the hotel. In order to popularize ultra-fast charging, we must first upgrade the power infrastructure.
In general, "let the charging be as fast as refueling" is still relatively far away, and the problems involved are also impossible to solve by car companies alone, and they need the common support of all sectors of society. But the concentrated outbreak of related technologies in 2021 makes us see the possibility of realizing this vision.
Inflection Point Five: "Cracks" in the Regulatory Wall of Autonomous Driving
As the assisted driving technology of car companies collectively reaches L2.99 level, regulations and policy restrictions have become the last 0.01 to block the landing of L3 level automatic driving.
In the past year, domestic car companies including Weilai, Xiaopeng, Great Wall WEY, GAC Eian, ideal and other domestic car companies have successively launched their own high-speed pilot auxiliary driving functions.
Moreover, at present, some car companies have the ability to realize urban pilot assistance driving, including Tesla, Weilai, Xiaopeng, GAC Aegean, and Great Wall WEY all plan to push a function in 2022.
What is Pilot Assisted Driving?
As the name suggests, compared with the common driver assistance system, the difference between pilot assistance is the word "pilot". This is a quasi-autonomous driving function that allows the vehicle to reach point B on its own from point A.
With a lifting look, it is on top of the "basic version of L2 level assisted driving", extending the functions of "automatic lane selection", "automatic overtaking", "automatic entry and exit ramp" and other functions, and the more advanced urban pilot assisted driving can also automatically complete complex operations such as "steering/turning", "identifying traffic lights/zebra crossings/speed limit signs", "entering and exiting roundabouts" and so on.
According to the SAE automatic driving classification standards formulated by the International Society of Automotive Engineers, L0 is no automation; L1 is driving support; L2 is partial automation; L3 is conditional automation; L4 is highly automated; and L5 is fully automated.
According to this standard, if a car has one of the functions of adaptive cruise or lane keeping, then it belongs only to L1 level assisted driving, both of which are included, and enters the L2 level category.
Pilot assisted driving is basically equivalent to L3 level, that is, in some scenarios, all operations of the vehicle are completed by the system, and the driver only takes over the vehicle at the necessary time.
But why do we now call it "L2.99 Assisted Driving"? What is this last 0.01? is a regulatory and policy restriction.
First of all, in China's regulations, when using L3 level and above automatic driving system, the main body of road responsibility changes from driver to vehicle, so when car companies publicize to the outside world, even if the technology is mature, it is likely that their cars have L3 level automatic driving capabilities.
In addition, the restrictions of the relevant traffic regulations are also a major obstacle to the landing of L3 automatic driving.
For example, on the Tesla official website page, although its products support the optional FSD full autopilot suit, it also specifically prompts "administrative approval" for the relevant functions of urban assisted driving.
The author previously asked Tesla sales staff, the other side said that "urban assisted driving has just completed the test in the United States, this year can not be in the country is not easy to say, because domestic regulations do not allow vehicles to identify traffic lights, even if it is online can not be used."
Weilai sales staff also gave a similar statement "the city NOP is not sure when to go online, because now the state has regulatory restrictions, do not allow vehicles to identify traffic lights, so we are also waiting for the policy to open."
Overall, regulations and policy restrictions may be the last wall that prevents L3 autonomous driving from landing. And now, this seemingly indestructible wall has finally cracked.
In early December, Germany's Federal Motor Transport Authority has approved the launch of the Mercedes-Benz L3 level autonomous vehicle on the road, and plans to officially land in 2022.
It is reported that vehicles equipped with Mercedes-Benz L3 level automatic driving system can achieve pilot driving on specific highways supported by high-precision maps. From a technical point of view, the technology has no highlights compared to Tesla and Wei Xiaoli's pilot assisted driving, but because it is supported by local regulations, it can change the propaganda technique from "assisted driving" to "automatic driving", which is essentially a policy-level promotion.
But the biggest significance of this matter is precisely this, as long as there is the "first person to eat crab", the latecomers will go forward.
Conclusion
At the end of 2020, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (2021-2035)", proposing that the sales volume of new energy vehicles (passenger cars + commercial vehicles) will account for about 20% in 2025. According to the data of that year, that is, 5 million vehicles. Now, it is likely that this goal will be achieved 3 years ahead of schedule.
No one can predict what will happen in the future, and when the inflection point will appear.
In five years, there may be more new things that will continue to subvert our perceptions. But when people look back at "history", they will definitely think of this inflection point-filled 2021.
There's so much more to see