Once upon a time, Weima was able to confront "Wei Xiaoli". In 2019, Weima won the second largest sales volume of new car-making forces, and called "New Car-making Forces F4" with "Wei Xiaoli". At that time, Shen Hui, CEO of WM Motors, also bet with Wang Xing on Weibo, saying that "WM motor will definitely be one of the Top 3 in the future." But now, Weima has retreated into the "second-tier camp", although the delivery volume has increased year-on-year, but it is a horizontal comparison of opponents, which is considered to be a laggard.
(WM Motor's january-November delivery data)
What's so wrong with Weima? The first thing to mention is that spontaneous combustion to WM, like brake failure to Tesla, has become a negative label for the brand. However, WM is far less powerful than Tesla, and the spontaneous combustion incident has greatly damaged the brand image.
Spontaneous combustion was also a common hidden danger of lithium batteries, Tesla, BYD, Weilai and other brands have appeared, but some are too frequent on the Wei carriage. On December 21, a WM car in a state of charge in Zhengzhou, Henan Province, suddenly caught fire, burning the vehicle to the point of being left empty. On December 22 and December 23, the WM EX5 spontaneously combusted on the streets of Haikou City and Sanya City, Hainan Province. There were three spontaneous combustion accidents in four days, characterized by short time, concentration, and lethality to the brand comparable to Tesla brake failure. From September to October last year, Weima also came to a wave of spontaneous combustion "four consecutive shots", and over time, Weima left people with the impression of "very unreliable".
No better than Tesla, in response to the spontaneous combustion incident, WM did not prevaricate, nor did it want everyone to understand the "possible risks of new things", generously acknowledged the quality control problem, but the responsibility is often pushed to the battery supplier. Originally, the main engine factory must have the responsibility of checking the quality of the battery, and there were problems in building the supply chain in the first place. In October last year, WM officially recalled a batch of EX5, and replaced the power battery pack for the recalled vehicle free of charge. In addition, after several spontaneous combustion incidents, Weima finally made up its mind to replace a number of battery suppliers, only considering the four of Ningde Times, Lishen, Suzhou Yuliang and Zhejiang Ceres.
(No OEM and no good quality)
At present, the problem of spontaneous combustion has not been well solved. In recent years, in response to the problem of battery thermal runaway, the technology has developed rapidly, spontaneous combustion can not be 100% avoided, but it can be controlled very effectively, and WM has not paid enough attention to battery safety. 2021 is really a good situation, Weima could have "taken off", but the sales volume was implicated by the spontaneous combustion incident, and it has to be said that it is a pity.
In fact, the comprehensive strength of Weima is not bad. Unlike "Wei Xiaoli", WM is not a cross-border car. In 2014, Shen Hui, who was the vice president of Geely Group, founded WM with a group of "old cannons" in the automotive industry. So far, WM has raised more than 35 billion yuan in financing, including state-owned assets, the Li Ka Shing family in Hong Kong, and the Ho Hung Sun family of Macau gambling king. In fact, being able to be favored by Li Ka-shing, who has a unique vision, shows that WM is extraordinary.
WM's sales in 2021 are less than expected, and it certainly cannot be completely blamed on the spontaneous combustion incident. When the first model EX5 came out, it mainly focused on the concept of "intelligent technology popularizer", the positioning was more awkward, and the pricing of about 150,000 yuan avoided Tesla, Weilai, and ideals, and competed head-on with Xiaopeng and BYD. The opponents are too strong, and the little "black technology" on the EX5 car has not been worth mentioning in recent years. As for the cost performance card, in the face of "cruel people" such as zero running and Nezha, some of them can't get their hands on it.
Fortunately, the new products launched by WM this year are a bit of a look. WM W6 is known as the first model in China with limited scene unmanned driving technology, and the WM M7 is also equipped with 3 advanced intelligent sensors such as 3 autonomous zoom high-precision super-visual solid-state lidar for the first time in the world, claiming to be "the first car in China with scene-specific automatic driving technology", which will be put into production in 2022. The W-series of WM came a little late, which has brought huge imagination space to WM's future delivery performance, and ex5 should be gradually marginalized.
Regarding the recent developments of WM, not long ago, Li Bin, CEO of Weilai Automobile, complained that "I don't understand why there are still people buying oil trucks", and Shen Hui immediately rubbed hot spots on his personal Weibo, saying that "traditional oil trucks can't go back". However, Shen Hui's view is slightly biased, not objective enough, atmospheric, was complained by netizens that "halfway without electricity really can't go back", "Yes, Weima car used to ascend to heaven, can't go back"... Although WM's delivery volume this year has risen with the "bull market" of new energy vehicles, WM's brand recognition is really average.
Uncle Che concluded
In fact, Weima's playing style is a bit similar to Xiaopeng, focusing on intelligent technology, but unfortunately, the strength and rhythm of the force are not as good as Xiaopeng. In addition, Weima's handling of negative events is also far worse than that of "Wei Xiaoli". However, in the team of new forces in car building, Uncle Che believes that Weima still has a certain strength and accumulation, but it still needs a lot of effort to return to the first echelon.