"With ordinary names, do unusual things."
In a short period of time, this sentence appeared twice in a row in Xiaopeng Automobile Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Xiaopeng Automobile", XPEV. n) on the event. Last time, He Xiaopeng, chairman and CEO of Xiaopeng Motors, said on the company's brand renewal, when the Xiaopeng brand was positioned as an "explorer of future travel". On December 30, 2021, this sentence was interpreted by a basketball-themed New Year's Eve party with "Love, Courage to Explore".
"In the name of basketball, people who are obsessed with pioneering on the road of love will come together to share the stories of exploration from impossible to possible to realization," Xiaopeng Motors described the event. According to the introduction, this is also the first offline theme event held by Xiaopeng Motors since it was officially announced to be the market partner of NBA China in Chinese mainland, and 200 Xiaopeng owners who love basketball and Xiaopeng executives, NBA executives and many well-known basketball KOLs participated in the activities.
Specifically, among the guests, Chen Dengxing, known as the "Dunk Emperor", used to be a bank clerk, and then quit his job because of basketball and spent several years practicing dunks; Zhang Yuzhong, known as the "Hooker Boss", is now over seventy years old, but still runs on the court year after year; Owen Ya, who is only 11 years old from Liangshan, Guizhou, is obsessed with basketball, and he and his friends imitate the shooting posture of NBA stars thousands of miles away in the depths of the mountains, exploring the must-kill skills on the court in their own way...
These guests, through love and exploration, to some extent, gradually turned the ordinary into the extraordinary, switching to the context of the automotive industry, Xiaopeng Motors is also "using ordinary names, doing extraordinary things".
He Xiaopeng believes that from intelligent cars to three-dimensional travel, There will be a large number of underlying innovations and structural innovations in China in the future, and a number of new means of transportation will be born, and Xiaopeng will participate in them. It is also based on this that Xiaopeng brand positioning has been renewed as "explorer of future travel". In an interview with the relevant media in December 2021, He Xiaopeng said, "Now my expectation is that the name (Xiaopeng) can go global."
"Courage to explore"
For "using ordinary names, doing extraordinary things", He Xiaopeng has had a period of thinking process.
Retrospectively, the original name of Xiaopeng Automobile was "Orange Automobile", but because several trademarks and names have been occupied and registered, it was found that "Xiaopeng Automobile" had not yet been registered, and at that time, the co-founder of the company consulted He Xiaopeng for advice on "whether it can be called Xiaopeng Automobile". For the many discussions caused by the naming of the Xiaopeng brand in the industry, He Xiaopeng mentioned his change of ideas when the brand was renewed.
"To be honest, the first time I heard the name Xiaopeng I felt very earthy, I think how can someone use the name to make a corporate brand? Later, I slowly figured it out, from another point of view, the person itself is used as a corporate name, he is a kind of recognition, responsibility, credit, but also a manifestation of confidence, is a kind of cultural self-confidence. The level of a corporate brand comes from his innovation, from his operations, from his services and all kinds of things. He said.
In the end, He Xiaopeng made his idea clear in early 2020: not to change the brand name. At the time of brand renewal, He Xiaopeng reviewed the exploration process of Xiaopeng Automobile in the intelligent car track, and further revealed the prediction of the future development of the travel industry and the "ambition" of the Xiaopeng brand. In an interview with relevant media in December 2021, He Xiaopeng said, "Now my expectation is that this name can go global."
The path of Xiaopeng brand strength is quite distinctive, which is clearly reflected in the brand renewal.
In the face of changes in the automobile industry, a large number of car companies choose to renew their brands in 2021, but at present, the renewal of car companies in the industry emphasizes electrification, as well as the expression of openness and inclusiveness, and the flatter logo design is in line with the trend of intelligence. The Xiaopeng brand is undoubtedly more special, its positioning is "the explorer of future travel", in the exposed products, the Xiaopeng brand extends from intelligent car capabilities to three-dimensional travel products, planning flying cars, machine horses.
"How to achieve the continuous upward movement of the Xiaopeng brand?" Why do we define Xiaopeng as a technology brand for exploration? At the November 2021 brand renewal event, He Xiaopeng asked himself on the stage, in his view, a good brand should have more beyond the region, not only pursue the needs of individual segments of the audience, satisfied with the changes in the current field, "We should pursue greater change, the pursuit of quality change, only in this way can the enterprise be done in depth, can go global." ”
He Xiaopeng believes that the industry is currently in the early stage of the fourth industrial revolution, and the future travel will not only be electrified, networked and shared. He cited the subversive changes brought by mobile Internet to society far beyond the initial imagination, saying that the changes in the field of travel will also be far beyond people's current imagination, in this round of change, there will be a large number of underlying innovations and structural innovations in China, and Xiaopeng will be one of the enterprises participating in these innovations.
"It's the best answer"
"It's the best answer." In December 2021, He Xiaopeng said in an interview with relevant media about the various views he faced from the outside world. After the brand renewal, the Xiaopeng brand that explores three-dimensional travel, its disclosed products include flying cars, robotic horses, and intelligent electric vehicles, the first two are still in the process of layout and iteration, and intelligent electric vehicles have gradually entered a period of rapid development from the product introduction period.
One by one, in the field of intelligent electric vehicles, the route of the Xiaopeng brand is gradually getting market confirmation from sales.
In terms of the promotion of core intelligent capabilities, Xiaopeng Automobile pushed XPILOT 3.0 in January 2021 to achieve high-speed NGP intelligent driving capabilities; in November 2021, its P5 model, which is positioned in the home car market and wants to be a popularizer of smart cars, officially opened for delivery, and the model is embedded in two lidar and other hardware. In order to support XPILOT3.5; in the first half of 2022, the NGP intelligent driving capabilities in the upper-tier cities will be evaluated by Wu Xinzhou, vice president of autonomous driving of Xiaopeng Automobile, when intelligent driving will enter the second half.
In addition, Xiaopeng Automobile based on the market's charging pain points to implement the supercharging program, in 2021 continue to advance rapidly, according to the plan, by the end of 2021 its supercharge layout to reach 500 supercharging stations, the end of 2020 is 159, in terms of research and development capabilities, as of the end of the third quarter of 2021, the number of its R & D team exceeded 4,000 people, an increase of more than 100% over the end of 2020.
For the full-stack self-research path chosen by Xiaopeng Motors, the market is gradually confirming from sales. From January to November 2021, Xiaopeng Automobile sold 82,200 vehicles, becoming one of the car companies with the highest delivery volume among the new domestic car-making forces, with a single monthly sales volume of 15,600 vehicles in November, which is also one of the car companies with the highest delivery volume among the new domestic car-making forces.
In terms of flying cars and robotic horses, the Xiaopeng brand is also rapidly laying out.
In terms of flying cars, according to the information released to the outside world, the target mass production time of flying cars is 2024, and it wants to control the price within 1 million yuan, and its business is placed in Guangzhou Huitian Aerospace Technology Co., Ltd., an ecological enterprise of Xiaopeng Motors, which debuted the design version of the sixth generation of flying cars in 2021, and announced the completion of more than 500 million US dollars in Series A financing in October 2021, hoping to take the lead in becoming a "global manufacturer of low-altitude manned flight equipment".
In terms of machine horses, at present, its business is placed in Shenzhen Penghang Intelligent Research Co., Ltd. He Xiaopeng believes that from 2025, the market is about to enter the era of active mobile Internet, intelligent robots will be the iconic products that open the era, unlike smart cars, machine horses do not exist in the "assisted driving" stage, need to be directly "unmanned". According to reports, in 2022, Pengxing Intelligent's machine horse will carry out 2 major product iterations.
For the layout of its ecological enterprises, He Xiaopeng previously said that the company is still far from reaching the level of forming a three-dimensional ecological layout, "We expect to have their own ecology in the future, but it takes 5-15 years", the ecological enterprise layout logic is in line with the strategy of Xiaopeng Automobile for product positioning, Xiaopeng Automobile will help its ecological enterprises to do manufacturing and part of the sales, themselves and the company will also invest to help these enterprises have sufficient funds.