As a leading technology company, Huawei can bring a lot of attention to new cars with its own popularity and appeal, so why is it difficult to convert into purchasing power? Why have you been in the awkward stage of thunder and small rain?
Author | Yang Ming
Edit | Liu Shanshan
This is both the first and final owners.
"From the overwhelming publicity and advertising outside to the sales staff, they have always told me how this car has in-depth cooperation with Huawei, how to support Huawei's three-electric system, and what kind of advanced technology is in line with Huawei's consistent style." In the past few days, many car owners have helplessly complained in a car community: If they do not believe in Huawei, then who will choose the Xilis SF5?
During the Shanghai Auto Show in April 2021, the Xilix Huawei Smart SF5 model was officially launched, and at the same time, it was sold with other Huawei electronic products in Huawei's offline experience stores across the country. According to the relevant data of the Association, the cumulative sales of the Cyris SF5 from January to November 2021 were 7,080 units.
Compared with other new car-making forces, this sales figure is indeed not enough to see, and it is more difficult to achieve the annual target of 300,000 vehicles set by Yu Chengdong in 2022. Therefore, at the Huawei Winter Flagship New Product Launch conference on December 23, Huawei officially launched the second model cooperated with Xilix - AITO Q&I M5.
This is regarded by the outside world as a car that is "both Made by Huawei and not made by Huawei": the early planning of the M5 comes from Huawei, and the design, brand positioning, and post-marketing will be responsible for Huawei, and Xiaokang shares have essentially become Huawei's "foundry". It can be said that in addition to the name without Huawei, the others are all made by Huawei.
This means that Huawei, which has always claimed that it will not "build" cars itself, has penetrated into the car industry, and even in 2022, the intention of using cars as the main battlefield is becoming more and more obvious. Therefore, the M5, like the previous Xilix SF5, has a high degree of attention from the outside world, and it is said that the order for 96 hours on the market exceeds 6500.
However, for the owners of the SF5, the M5 released the world at the same time learned a surprising news: the brand logo of the Cyris store was all changed to the AITO brand, Huawei Smart SF5 online suspension of booking, offline discount processing of exhibition cars and test driving, "equivalent to disguised suspension of production" - many car owners are worried about the low quality of the vehicle, future after-sales maintenance problems, but also angry that they have become the guinea pigs of Huawei's automobile business. Huawei inevitably becomes the target of complaints and complaints from car owners, and many Cyrus SF5 car owners have posted a complaint in a car community that They have been "cut leeks" by Huawei, and even Shenzhen Cyris SF5 owners have threatened to find 370 car owners to defend their rights together.
Objectively speaking, in the cruelly competitive smart car market, many brands will choose to quickly iterate to occupy the market. However, for Huawei, which has no successful cases in the automobile business, when the wave of complaints is higher than the wave, it may cause a consumer trust crisis in the future: When a car has only 8 months of life, does Huawei think too simple of building a car? In 2022, can Huawei's automotive business find a real breakthrough?
01
Can't afford the Cyrus SF5
Only recognize Huawei, not recognize the brand. This is the most important reason why consumers choose the above cars from the Xilis SF5 to the Alpha S and the M5.
"I met the Cyrus SF5 through Huawei, and it was also because of the Cyrus SF5 that Huawei bought." A Huawei car owner said so, as a loyal fan of Huawei, after Yu Chengdong for the Cyris SF5 many times grand platform, believe Huawei, support the mood of domestic production, last May for the first time to place an order, early July to pick up the car, until now just over the first insurance, learned that Cyrus SF5 "disguised suspension" news, the mood is quite complicated, feel that they are "cut leeks, and even deceived."
There are also owners who said that they paid a deposit of 10,000 yuan for Xilis SF5 on December 12, and after selling their old cars, they were told that they could not pick up the car, and now the deposit cannot be refunded, the car cannot be mentioned, and they have to return their old cars, and they have to be doubled by the second-hand car dealership.
Judging from the latest news, the relevant person in charge of Xiaokang Xilis said that Huawei Smart Selection SF5 has not been discontinued, but due to the consideration of timely delivery, Huawei Smart SF5 has indeed temporarily stopped receiving, and the demand for restarting subscription will return to normal when the core parts procurement and other conditions are met. However, many offline store sales staff confirmed that the Cyrus SF5 has indeed been discontinued.
As of now, although many car owners hope that Huawei can give a solution, Huawei has not said anything about it.
In 2021, when the mobile phone business is almost cut off, Huawei began to formally enter the automotive field and cooperated with many car companies from two aspects, such as launching the Polar Fox Alpha Huawei HI version with BAIC BJEV to provide corresponding smart car solutions for Changan Automobile and GAC Group. And, at the Shanghai Auto Show in April, it launched the Cyrus Huawei Smart SF5 with Xiaokang Shares.
At the sales level, Cyrus SF5 is the first automotive product to enter Huawei's sales channels, Yu Chengdong has high hopes for Cyrus SF5, frequently sending Weibo to bring goods for it, hoping to sell 5 million Cyrus vehicles through Huawei channels to make up for the decline in profits caused by the impact on sales of consumer businesses such as mobile phones: "Cyrus Huawei smartly selected SF5 to enter Huawei's flagship store, creating a precedent in the consumer electronics industry and the new energy automobile industry. The market also responded positively, with orders exceeding 3,000 units two days after the sale, surpassing 6,000 units in just one week and quickly breaking through 10,000 units. ”
At that time, Huawei plans to sell cars in 200 experience stores by the end of July 2021, and expand to more than 1,000 by the end of the year. In Yu Chengdong's vision, Huawei will have 5,000 smart stores selling cars at the same time in the future, which is an order of magnitude that car companies such as Tesla, BMW and Mercedes-Benz cannot match.
Later, it turned out that despite the Huawei brand and the blessing of offline high-end authorized experience stores, the actual sales volume was still very different from Yu Chengdong's statement. According to the data of the Association, from April to August 2021, the sales volume of the Xilis SF5 was 129, 204, 1097, 507 and 715 respectively. By the end of November, the cumulative sales of the SF5 were only 7,080 units, and it was no longer expected to achieve the sales target of 300,000 units in 2022.
There are many reasons for the poor sales of the Cyrus SF5. First, Cyrus's own brand power, insufficient production capacity, insufficient after-sales service outlets, the actual fuel consumption of the vehicle is higher than the publicity, the endurance is false, the key induction often fails, the car machine is stuck, the direction is deviated, etc.; the second is that although it has settled in huawei offline retail stores, the in-store sales staff are also from the Huawei team, but its professionalism and experience are far less than the sales of traditional car 4S stores; third, the competition for the price of 200,000 to 300,000 yuan on the new energy vehicle track is very cruel, and the price of Cyrence SF5 is not competitive, which has dissuaded many on-the-sideline consumers.
Whatever the reason, Yu Chengdong, who is also the CEO of consumer BG and automotive BU, must clearly realize that Xilis is already a "unable to support Adou", not to mention that Huawei cannot dominate Cyrus SF5. Therefore, when equipped with Hongmeng OS, from product design, to car and machine mounting and intelligent systems, to the later sales are controlled by Huawei", "AITO Q&A M5" was released, and it became inevitable that the Xilis SF5 would be abandoned.
However, from the perspective of the owner, a new car brand only exists for a few months, there will be brand upgrades, the current model is discontinued, the second-hand car retention rate is certainly impossible to talk about, the concern about after-sales and services is reasonable, and it is inevitable that many car owners will complain about being "Huawei cutting leeks".
02
Personally, the market is not very confident
"Huawei does not build cars, but Huawei helps car companies build good cars." It is an old saying that Huawei has emphasized many times.
Although Huawei says that it will not build cars, a closer look at the M5 cooperation model and production model of the world is actually no different from personally building cars. Behind it, there is undoubtedly Huawei's anxiety and uneasiness, as well as Huawei's ambition and screwing in the automotive business.
"This is the four-wheel intelligent terminal launched by Huawei, the AITO Q&I M5 smart car." In the view of Yu Chengdong, who has always loved to play with his mouth cannon, the M5 has surpassed many Million Luxury Cars in terms of appearance, price and design experience. In order to support this pre-set product tone, Yu Chengdong also took out the SUV products of luxury brands such as Audi, Porsche, and Mercedes-Benz to make a horizontal comparison of multiple core parameters.
So, after integrating more Huawei genes, can the Q&I M5 really help Huawei achieve its ambitions in the automotive business?
In the eyes of many people in the automotive industry, from the price point of view, the price of the M5 is 250,000 yuan, 280,000 yuan and 320,000 yuan, respectively, and the price is not close to the people. At the same time, the market competition is equally cruel, in this price range, direct competitors Ideal ONE, Tesla Model Y, BYD Tang EV user reputation has taken shape, Cyrus SF5 previous car lessons brought by the adverse word of mouth, the world M5 may make more consumers have doubts, for the world M5 sales cast a shadow - in fact, the circle M5 "96 hours 6500 orders" publicity caliber, in the eyes of many people credibility is doubtful.
More importantly, according to the "Million Luxury Car Standard" M5, the product force is actually too decent, and even difficult to say.
In the most important "intelligence" aspect of new energy vehicles, in addition to the HarmonyOS vehicle operating system, the M5 does not reflect too many highlights at the intelligent level. For example, lidar acts as the "eye" of autonomous vehicles, providing cars with a 120°-360° field of view, which is quite popular now - but the M5 has no lidar, only equipped with 4 APA cameras, L2 level assisted driving capabilities of the system. In contrast, ideal ONE already has its own full set of assisted driving systems and combined with lidar, has achieved urban roads in the lighting, auxiliary lane change and intelligent following and other functions.
In addition, Yu Chengdong said that the Million Luxury car is equipped with "double wishbone independent suspension", and many new energy vehicles are basically double wishbone front suspension. For example, the Model 3 from 250,000 and the zero-run C11 priced at 150,000-200,000 are all front double wishbone independent suspensions.
It is worth mentioning that the HUAWEI DriveONE pure electric drive range extender platform equipped with the M5 also needs to be verified. There is also no information that the M5 can achieve FOTA upgrades and expand functions such as automatic driving in the later stage, and its core competitiveness is slightly insufficient compared with other new car-making forces.
The outside world has insufficient confidence in the sales volume of the Q&I M5, and it can also be seen from the capital market - on the day of the release of aiTO Q&I M5, the shares of Xilis parent company Xiaokang fell by more than 7%, and fell for two consecutive days, and the market value shrank by more than 17 billion yuan in two trading days.
In fact, for Huawei, as of now, there is a lack of successful case endorsement on the HUAWEI Inside full-stack solution: not only has the Cyris SF5 "failed", the prospect of the M5 is uncertain, the Polar Fox Alpha S has not gained too much heat in the market because of Huawei's HI full-stack intelligent driving solution, and the sales volume is even more pitiful, and the sales volume in April-November last year was 6, 231, 221, 137, 178, 421, 477, 444 vehicles, as of the end of November, In total, there are more than 2,100 vehicles. Among domestic cars, the annual sales volume ranks 233rd.
03
Huawei urgently needs the endorsement of successful cases
As a leading technology company, Huawei can bring a lot of attention to new cars with its own popularity and appeal, so why is it difficult to convert into purchasing power? Why has Huawei's automotive business been in the embarrassing stage of loud thunder and small rainfall?
At present, there are two main models for cooperation between Huawei and car companies. First, as a parts supplier, based on Tier 1 and Tier 2, it sells parts and Hi technology solutions to vehicle companies; the second is huawei's inside model, which applies Huawei's full-stack intelligent car solutions to products and works with partners to build brands, depending on the specific depth of the manufacturer.
"And a few thousand yuan of mobile phones are completely different, a car is priced at hundreds of thousands of yuan, consumers tend to be more rational, whether to buy or not to depend on the cost performance and product strength, at the same time the brand is also quite important, which is an important reason for the success of BBA." Some auto industry insiders have clearly stated that Huawei's partners have not been selected well, whether it is Xiaokang Xilisi or BAIC Jihu, there is no brand influence in the industry, and there is a lack of technical accumulation.
In fact, Huawei does not want to choose a first-line brand, but has a lot of helplessness. On the one hand, Huawei HI can be understood as the Android operating system in the automotive industry, which needs enough and large enough first-line manufacturers in the industry to support, but SAIC, Great Wall, Geely, BYD, etc. are unwilling to cooperate with Huawei in depth, at the SAIC shareholders' meeting at the end of June last year, SAIC Chairman Chen Hong faced the torture of investors, and said very clearly, "Can not accept cooperation with huawei and other third-party autonomous driving solution providers, Huawei and other become the soul, SAIC becomes the body, such a result can not be accepted, SAIC wants to take its soul into its own hands. ”
On the other hand, Huawei itself wants to have more voice and dominance in the automotive business. Although Huawei claims to be positioned in Tier 1, it is actually not willing to do so at the beginning, but is a solution provider that can provide a full set of services.
For example, in the construction of the M5, not only from the design, positioning, marketing, sales all packaged, and Yu Chengdong did not even mention the names of Xilis and Xiaokang at the press conference, it can be said that he fully grasped the right to speak, BYD, Great Wall, and Geely obviously cannot accept this cooperation plan for Huawei.
For various reasons, the Huawei Inside model can only choose some second- and third-tier car companies that need Huawei's traffic and technology. In the end, this proves that building a car is not as simple as Huawei imagined.
But Huawei's auto business is not without more good news. In 2022, Huawei's cooperation with Changan and Ningde times will also be launched; in the car machine system, Yu Chengdong has revealed that Huawei has cooperated with more than 20 car manufacturers, and the loading volume will reach 5 million units this year. At the same time, according to Caijing, after nearly half a year of negotiations, the cooperation between Huawei and Volkswagen on the autonomous driving business is about to be finalized.
In addition, Huawei does not hesitate to invest in research and development funds. Official data shows that Huawei will invest about $500 million in automotive-related research and development in 2020, and this figure will double this year to more than $1 billion.
Some insiders predict that most of the order opportunity points of Huawei's automotive business will generate a stable profit flow after 2025 - however, for Huawei, whose revenue plunged by 28% in 2021, even if it can afford to wait, it is urgent to need a successful case as an endorsement, in order to attract more first-line car companies and report group heating.