Source | Salt Finance
Huawei and DJI, these two companies in many people's relatively "narrow" cognition, are the representative enterprises of Chinese manufacturing.
The two Chinese companies, founded in Shenzhen, have become global communications equipment giants and one has grown into a global commercial drone market leader.
They have a lot in common, and one of the most frequently asked questions is "Why not go public?" According to previous media reports, as a technology-based entrepreneur, Wang Tao himself does not want to be held back by capital. This point is quite similar to Ren Zhengfei's huawei.
Today, they have made a common cross-border choice - they have become a first-tier supplier of intelligent software and hardware for automobiles. In the general trend, new energy and intelligence have long become the consensus of the automotive industry.
Both DJI and Huawei have outstanding strengths in research and development and funding. During the 2021 Shanghai Auto Show, DJI launched its intelligent driving business brand "DJI Automotive". Huawei, on the other hand, listed the Cyrus Huawei Smart SF5 in early 2021, and released the AITO | Q&A M5 at the end of the year.
The smart car solutions are quite similar, but they choose different directions in the way forward.
DJI chooses "bottom-up", affordable brand, price butcher, focusing on assisted driving technology, and strives to achieve market share in the shortest possible time; Huawei takes the high-end route, designs comparable to Million Luxury Cars, and is committed to breaking through advanced automatic driving technology and creating products that lead this era.
We can't draw conclusions about which direction is better. However, in the window period brought about by technological change, the entry of technology giants to try to achieve a technological breakthrough is to some extent a way for Chinese enterprises to "huddle" forward, and it is also the best path for "Chinese-style" intelligent breakthrough.
In 2021, the two companies will only start to emerge in the automotive field, in fact, they have been dormant for many years.
Secretly build cars
In the field of car building, there are too many "giants of language".
In the winter of 2015, Wang Jin, then a senior vice president of Baidu, shouted with great fanfare, "Unmanned taxis should be commercialized for three years and mass-produced in five years." Jia Yueting's FF 91 is still stuck in the PPT for investors and the rhetoric of "mass production next year", and finally it is like a naked swimmer whose tide has receded.
Most of these people who had "told the world" and could only tell stories before doing things disappeared before long. The homogenization of these enterprise products and the research and development capabilities of technology have also made consumers lose trust.
It is worth mentioning Xiaomi. Before the advent of the first generation of Xiaomi mobile phones, the vast majority of people had not heard of Xiaomi. Lei Jun said in an interview, "I told myself - secretly do a millet, we will do it; if it can't be done, we won't admit it." ”
DJI also took this path, after all, cross-border work, especially in the early days, is somewhat suspected of not doing the right thing.
In 2016, DJI "secretly" started the car business - before the matter was done, it was silent, and some people directly denied it when they inquired. According to media reports, DJI also considered making self-driving taxis, but finally gave up for various reasons.
Up to now, DJI's in-vehicle related business has been explored for nearly six years.
Quietly work hard and wait until the wind comes. In 2019, the DJI vehicle brand was officially launched, and DJI incubated Livox Technology, which makes lidar. In December of the same year, DJI's first vehicle-grade intelligent manufacturing center was completed, and cooperation with Volkswagen Group and SAIC-GM-Wuling began to be established.
In December 2020, DJI's intelligent driving solution D80 Urban Expressway Intelligent Driving System passed the ASPICE CL2 (Automotive Industry Software Process Improvement and Capability Assessment Model Level II) audit.
DJI became the first Tier1 in China to use the L2+ intelligent driving solution to pass the audit. To put it simply, this audit certification is an important qualification assessment requirement for automakers for software suppliers, and has an internationally recognized authoritative position.
Coincidentally, as early as 2014, Huawei set up a car networking laboratory in its famous "2012 Lab". On this basis, in May 2019, Huawei established a first-level division "Intelligent Vehicle Solution BU". Huawei, which has been dormant for many years, has a complete automotive business unit.
But when everyone waited for Huawei's official announcement of car construction, there was no common rhetoric in this industry, but it was poured with cold water, "Huawei does not build cars."
In 2019, when the DJI vehicle brand was officially launched, Huawei also clarified its strategic choice, "Huawei does not build cars, focuses on ICT technology, and helps car companies build good cars" .
Huawei has repeatedly stated its position that "Huawei does not build cars, but will help car companies build good cars"
In October 2019, at a media communication meeting, when asked what step Huawei had taken, Vice Chairman Xu Zhijun gave the answer, "Tesla can do it now, we can do it." ”
Behind the "dead car", each has its own dilemma. DJI has repeatedly suffered setbacks in the consumer drone market, and Huawei's consumer business is even more difficult to develop, which can be said to have experienced a helpless grind.
Surviving with quality is an unavoidable fate for a business that wants to go great.
Civilians are still high-end
DJI first took the road that others did not take much - it set its sights on the new energy market of less than 100,000.
In May 2021, SAIC-GM-Wuling and DJI jointly released the "Adventure DJI" concept car. This car is similar to the popular Wuling Hongguang MINI in the market, with a small body, high cost performance, and a graffiti version. After cooperating with DJI, this car has advantages that models at the same price point do not have.
Shenyang, general manager of SAIC-GM-Wuling, high-profile proposed to create "people's intelligent driving". This is in line with DJI's development route - to create a smart car that is easy to use and affordable, and to accelerate the intelligent process of the whole industry.
How to achieve this market share in the shortest possible time has become its route choice. This logic is easy to understand, high market share represents the scale advantage, can maintain a strong cost competition, as well as revenue scale effect.
This is deeply appreciated by DJI, which occupies half of the global drone market.
Prior to this, DJI's internally incubated lidar company, Lanwo, has been called a "price butcher" and has launched low-cost lidar solutions by integrating DJI's supply chain system and manufacturing resources.
The "price war" in the in-vehicle lidar industry is about to erupt, and DJI has obtained the first front-loading mass production order of LiDAR Xiaopeng Automobile and the opportunity to mass-produce a certain model of FAW Group.
As long as there are buyers, and gradually more buyers, it can continue to iterate and let the entire industry form a positive cycle.
Huawei is taking the high-end route.
There are many products, such as the Polar Fox Alpha S Huawei HI Version created by Huawei and BAIC, the Avita 11 created in cooperation with Changan and Ningde Times, and the Xilis Huawei Smart Selection SF5, AITO | Q&A M5 in cooperation with Xiaokang.
From the price point of view, the price of the ordinary version of the BEIQI Polar Fox Alpha S is 251,900-344,900 yuan, the price of the Xelis Huawei Smart Selection SF5 is 216,800 yuan, and the pre-price of the newly released AITO | Q&I M5 is 250,000-320,000 yuan.
Another big difference between Huawei and DJI is that the degree of deep involvement when working with car companies is different.
Huawei is a very strong full-stack supplier with the ability to chip, operating system, perception hardware, and decision fusion algorithm. When working with the whole vehicle, in addition to the body, chassis (non-electronic part), seats, tires, etc., the rest are huawei-owned technologies.
At the end of 2021, At Huawei's winter flagship new product launch, Yu Chengdong unveiled the AITO | Q&A M5 produced by Xiaokang Xilis factory. According to the introduction, compared with other cooperative products, this car has been infinitely close to Huawei's "pro-son", in addition to not hanging up Huawei's logo.
Moreover, this time, the new car release did not see the figure of Xiaokang Xilis at all, only the strong endorsement of the Huawei brand.
The problem faced by Huawei is that the recognition and sales of several products released before are very general in the market. However, Xilis is still confident and announces that it will become the world's top 3 brand of new energy vehicles within 5 years.
Why doesn't Huawei work with larger, better-known automakers?
"Working with third-party companies like Huawei on autonomous driving is unacceptable to SAIC. It's like another company providing us with a holistic solution, so that it becomes the soul and SAIC becomes the body. For such a result, SAIC is unacceptable and must take the soul into its own hands. ”
At the SAIC shareholders' meeting at the end of June 2021, Chen Hong, chairman of SAIC, said so. After all, at present, car profits have transitioned from hardware to software. Under Huawei's turnkey plan, car companies are like being reduced to a "foundry" role.
Therefore, Huawei has set its sights on second- and third-tier car companies, so can these car companies support Huawei's ambitions for technology? At present, the BAIC Polar Fox or the Well-off Xilis have not yet been able to carry Huawei's lofty ambitions.
It is worth mentioning that Huawei car manufacturing also has a big famous saying: who will suggest building a car in the future, interfere with the company, can be transferred away from the post, and find another post. But Huawei's car is not without feasibility.
In 2002, Ren Zhengfei also said the same thing when he insisted on not making mobile phones, "Huawei does not make mobile phones, this matter has long been determined, who is talking nonsense, who is talking nonsense who is laid off." ”
In 2002, Ren Zhengfei said that "Huawei does not do this thing of mobile phones, it has long been decided, who is talking nonsense, who is talking nonsense who is laid off." ”
After accumulating technology, will Huawei copy the mobile phone path of the year and cut into the vehicle market?
L2 or L4
Tesla's current level in the field of intelligent driving is L2 to L3, and Huawei said that the driverless technology of the Polar Fox Alpha S (Huawei HI version) has reached the L4 level.
Note: SaE International standards are widely adopted by the industry to judge the level of autonomous driving of vehicles by means of grading. On April 30, 2021, SAE made an important update to the SAE Driving Automation Classification, naming the L0-L2 level system "Driver Assistance System" and the L3-L5 level "Autonomous Driving System".
ADS, officially Chinese named "Huawei Advanced Autonomous Driving System". According to the data, ADS can realize the continuous automatic driving experience of the owner on the whole route from the "residential garage" to the "company garage". The technical architecture of ADS also comes from the L4 level autonomous driving system.
However, according to SAE or MIIT standards, Huawei ADS belongs to the L2 level automatic driving system - the system provides assistance, and the driving responsibility is borne by the driver.
In other words, passenger cars with L4 level automatic driving capabilities, but the division of responsibilities is set according to L2 level automatic driving.
At present, there are two main technical routes to achieve automatic driving, one is the route of technology giants, with Google, Baidu and other Internet companies as the main representatives, through the development of software algorithms, build an automatic driving platform, provide a complete technical chain to cooperative automakers, and fully develop L4 and above high-level automatic driving technology.
The other is the car company route, Tesla, Weilai, Xiaopeng, ideal such car companies as the main representatives. They bring mature products to the market, starting from L1 and L2 low-level autonomous driving, and gradually climb upwards, and they have revealed their own technical routes to autonomous driving in various strategies.
DJI Automotive has made it clear that it is focusing on L2's autonomous driving solutions at this stage. It is understood that the core hardware achievements of DJI vehicles will most likely be supplied to the market in a permutation and combination in the next 3-5 years.
Compared with the L4, the advantage of the L2 is that it is easier to land and more in line with DJI's "civilian route" - with cheaper sensors and lower computing power to achieve richer driver assistance functions.
As the standard trend of automobiles, autonomous driving services have become one of the main profitable spaces for car companies to develop in the future.
From the perspective of the domestic price of the automatic driving system, the average price of WEILAI Automobile is 430,000 yuan, and the price of the automatic driving system is 15,000-39,000 yuan, accounting for 3-9%. Xiaopeng P7 is priced at 240,000-400,000 yuan, and the automatic driving system is priced at 20,000 yuan, accounting for 5-8%. Tesla Model3/Y is priced at 250,000-380,000 yuan, and the automatic driving system is priced at 64,000 yuan, accounting for 17-26%.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the current market penetration rate of China's L2-class passenger car new car market has reached 20%. According to research institute data, by 2025, it is expected that the market penetration rate of intelligent driving cars above the L2 level in China will reach 59%, and the market space will increase significantly.
At present, the only companies involved in the integration of soft and hardware in the market are Huawei and DJI.
A few days after Huawei's winter conference, at the DJI vehicle experience exchange activity, the person in charge Of Khotan said that the DJI vehicle team is expanding rapidly, and the team has reached nearly 1,000 people.
Huawei is also recruiting a large number of people, according to media sources, the formation of a team of 5-6,000 people will be the final scale, for the automotive business to pour all efforts.
Technology will eventually win the market.
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