In recent years, the high-end, intelligent and electrified automotive industry has been seriously involved in the internal roll, which has left the automotive industry under unprecedented pressure, and how to break the situation has become a problem to be solved in front of various car companies. In the author's view, in the automotive industry, product technology innovation belongs to the "art", brand concept innovation belongs to the "Tao", when the "art" and "Tao" are combined, it can achieve a breakthrough and lead the brand to a higher mountain.
Unfortunately, many car companies have not been balanced in product technology innovation and brand concept innovation, largely because the big wave of electrification and intelligence hit the car companies by surprise, and grabbed one randomly as a life-saving straw. Of course, there are also some car companies that are keenly aware of the coming atmosphere of the new era, forward-looking to promote the upgrading of brand strategy, and fully armed when the wave of the new era hits, turning the crisis into an opportunity, such as GAC Toyota.
The layout of "full engine power" kicked off the era of electrification
Participating media, guests, experts group photo
At the beginning of 2022, the exchange activity of "Huanqiu Thought Convergence into GAC Toyota" organized by Huanqiu Automobile was officially held at the fourth factory of Guangzhou Nansha GAC Toyota Motor Co., Ltd., when experts from major well-known universities in China and auto media gathered here to gain an in-depth understanding of the achievements made by gac Toyota brand in brand upgrading, promoting brand high-end, electrification and intelligence in 2021 through visits to factories, test rides and test drives of flagship models and communication and exchanges, and handed over a gratifying report card.
In 2021, under the severe domestic and international situation, GAC Toyota's annual sales reached 840,000 vehicles, an increase of 11% year-on-year, achieving double-digit growth for four consecutive years. From the perspective of specific models, GAC Toyota's new Camry sales reached 217724 units in 2021, and in December 2021, it won the B-class car sales championship and won the 2021 sales champion; since the fourth-generation new Highlander was launched in June 2021, the cumulative orders in 2021 reached 57,988 units, which is in a leading position in the joint venture mid-size SUVs.
Huang Heng, Director of the Marketing Department of GAC Toyota
China's auto market competition is becoming increasingly fierce, and technological advantages play an increasingly important role in determining the market. So what kind of brand upgrade code is hidden behind GAC Toyota's brand report card?
In fact, as early as 2010, Toyota proposed the concept of "Toyota's New Global Architecture (TNGA)", which will be reformed from the aspects of product technology, organizational structure, production, research and development. After several years of development, GAC Toyota has made significant progress in product technology, making this automotive head company rejuvenated at the technical level. At present, GAC Toyota has taken the lead in realizing the mass production of naturally aspirated, turbocharged, hybrid, plug-in hybrid and pure electric power technologies, forming an industry-leading "full-engine power" layout. The data shows that in 2021, GAC Toyota hybrid model sales accounted for 21%.
In the future, GAC Toyota will continue to take the dual-engine hybrid as the core and comprehensively accelerate the all-round electrification strategy. In December last year, President Akio Toyoda also proposed a series of goals and initiatives, which shows that Toyota is fully prepared to deepen its electrification strategy.
GAC Toyota's approach does not have a specific model, because their approach is to be fully popularized. At present, GAC Toyota is already the automobile company with the largest number of hybrids, the widest coverage of the market and the best-selling mainstream market among domestic car companies. It is planned that by 2025, the sales volume of its dual-engine hybrid models will exceed 50%, and the cumulative sales volume is expected to exceed 2.3 million units.
Shuai Shijin, professor at the Institute of Aero Engines of Tsinghua University
For GAC Toyota's electrification strategy with dual-engine power as the core, Shuai Shijin, professor of the Aero Engine Research Institute of Tsinghua University, gave an affirmation and expressed his own views, he said: "Regarding the technical route of electrification, passenger cars have several kinds of power such as fuel vehicles, pure electric, and hybrid. From the perspective of power, economy, convenience and cost, there is currently no power that is perfect, nor is there a power to meet all application scenarios, so the power diversification is matched with the diversification of the scene." However, among the many power forms, Shuai Shijin is more optimistic about hybrid power, because hybrid power has played the advantages of pure electric vehicles and fuel vehicles to the extreme, and it may be an alternative for a long time in passenger cars.
Take our three test drives as an example (Xena, new Camry, new fourth-generation Highlander), the Camry is equipped with the TNGA 2.5L Dynamic Force Engine engine, which has a thermal efficiency of 41%, making it take into account the ultimate fuel economy while ensuring strong power, and the comprehensive fuel consumption of 100 kilometers is only 4.1L/100km. The Xena, which was launched in October last year, has also completed a comprehensive innovation under the TNGA architecture, equipped with a new enhanced version of the 2.5 HEV hybrid system, with a comprehensive maximum output of 183 kilowatts. With the blessing of the hybrid system, the fuel economy and handling of the MPV model, which were not optimistic about consumers, have been greatly improved, and the comprehensive fuel consumption of the WLTC is only 5.9L/100km.
The new fourth-generation Highlander is based on Toyota's TNGA-K high-end platform, pouring into the TNGA 2.5L hybrid system for the first time, and with the new E-FOUR electronic four-wheel drive system, it kicks off the era of electrification of GAC Toyota.
These three models are not only representatives of GAC Toyota's all-round electrification strategy to speed up, but also represent the "pyramid tip" of GAC Toyota's product matrix, which is currently the three flagships of TNGA in the models currently on sale. TNGA makes these three cars have unprecedented product advantages in appearance, driving fun, safety, and intelligent connection at the beginning of their birth, which can be seen from the continuous increase in the proportion of sales of TNGA architecture products.
In order to promote the "high-end product" strategy, GAC Toyota will make TNGA's technology and equipment standard, which can make mass production vehicles close to concept cars a reality, thanks to the TNGA architecture, so there will be more competitive products introduced into the Chinese market in the future. As for the current three flagship products, GAC Toyota said that from 2022, the sales of the new Camry, the new fourth-generation Highlander and Xena will account for more than 40%.
High-quality factory to create high-quality products
The three models we test drove are also produced at the fourth plant of GAC Toyota that we visited, which has a total investment of nearly 5 billion yuan and an annual output of 200,000 cars, mainly responsible for the production of LARGE vehicles under GAC Toyota, in addition to Highlander, Xena, and other models will also be produced at this plant. As the highest level of modern vehicle factory in the automotive market, the fourth plant has steadily controlled the quality of final assembly under the "two pillars" of punctualization and self-service. Punctualization "avoids waste and improves efficiency, while the reason why self-service is next to the word "people" requires people and machines to automatically judge the quality of the process, and when problems are found, they can stop and improve in time, so as not to let quality problems flow into the next process.
If the accumulation of quantity cannot be reflected in the improvement of quality, it is a waste of resources. On the production line, GAC Toyota also visualized the quality problem and installed the Anton system. To avoid the tightening caused by accidental errors and omissions, GAC Toyota introduced a "error-proofing system", when the equipment automatically stops when the error occurs, the tri-color lamppost of the Anton system will automatically alarm the indication.
According to reports, after the plant was put into operation in July last year, the industry is also improving, from the original 600,000 vehicles production capacity gradually increased to 800,000 vehicles, but in the face of the domestic market is still in short supply, so the fifth factory located next to the fourth plant is also in the process of accelerating construction. The fifth plant will be officially put into operation in July this year, with an annual output of up to 200,000 vehicles, which can increase the production capacity of GAC Toyota to more than one million after production, and GAC Toyota's new energy vehicle products will also be mainly concentrated in the production of the plant, so that the current problem of insufficient production capacity has been fundamentally alleviated.
2021 and 2022 is an important node for GAC Toyota to actively promote the "EV" layout, and the future production of the fifth plant will further accelerate the electrification layout of GAC Toyota in the domestic market, combined with the planning space on products and the expandable ability of sales channels, it is destined that GAC Toyota will have a long increase in the future.
Through brand upgrading, "mass production happiness" for users
In 2019, GAC Toyota proposed a brand upgrade plan, through continuous efforts, in a short period of time has achieved full power, full product coverage, and through products and services to improve the reputation of enterprises and brands, and for customers to upgrade the whole life cycle of the car experience, continue to create value for customers, provide services beyond expectations.
GAC Toyota has always adhered to the concept of "customer first", and after years of customer service accumulation, it has precipitated a set of customer-centric customer service management system for the whole life cycle, covering the whole process of pre-sale, sale and after-sales of products, casting the GAC Toyota service that is affirmed by the industry and consumers, and providing customers with "mass production happiness".
Zhang Geng, head of the public relations section of the marketing department of GAC Toyota
The new era of intelligence has provided a new channel for GAC Toyota to bring quality services to users, during the epidemic in 2020, GAC Toyota and the national sales store launched online + offline all-scenario worry-free car purchase and car service, so that consumers can watch, book and make appointments for maintenance and other services through the official website of GAC Toyota, Fengyun Xing App and online sales stores through the flagship of the epidemic, at the same time, the mobile after-sales system Apad can also respond to the needs of users online appointment maintenance and other needs for the first time. And intelligently identify vehicle functional wear and security hazards, comprehensively display different parts, functional principles, advantages and disadvantages of different product performance, and so on.
Under the foresight of GAC Toyota, the advent of the intelligent era has become a booster for GAC Toyota to improve the quality of user services and "mass production happiness" for users, starting from high-value products, high-quality services and high-grade experience, continuously promoting brand evolution and brand upgrading, upgrading the "customer relationship" with consumers to "partnership", so that users feel the care of partners.
Relying on Toyota's existing development system in China and bringing together the best partners and suppliers in China, GAC Toyota will take 2022 as the starting point to fully promote its digital strategy and achieve comprehensive innovation and upgrading of services. In the future, all GAC Toyota models will support OTA upgrade functions, so that all GAC Toyota users can experience the charm and convenience of vehicle evolution. 100% equipped with Toyota's latest Internet of Vehicles also better caters to the better demand of domestic consumers for intelligence and digitalization.
Through this communication, it is not difficult to find that GAC Toyota's user thinking has no secrets, only landing, 2022 as the 18th anniversary of the establishment of GAC Toyota, has been fully built a high-quality million vehicle system, looking forward to the future, GAC Toyota will also comprehensively promote the "high-end products", "all-round electrification", "service management technology" three strategic actions before 2025.
Wu Yingqiu, chairman of Huanqiu Automobile
The three strategic actions of "high-end product", "all-round electrification" and "service management technology" are also regarded by Wu Yingqiu, chairman of Huanqiu Automobile, as the three major grasps of GAC Toyota's next development, grasping correctly, grasping in a timely manner, grasping accurately, both forward-looking and more operable, and can help the healthy development and growth of GAC Toyota in the next few years. Combining it with the million-vehicle target, it forms a very valuable path design.
Therefore, we also have reason to believe that with the gradual advancement of the three major strategic actions, GAC Toyota will build a higher-level and more powerful system strength in the future, and transform the powerful potential energy generated in the minds of users into the power of brand upgrading, leading GAC Toyota to take the lead in the new era and challenge greater goals.
Write at the end
The short morning of the event was too short under the communication and exchange with the internal executives of GAC Toyota, and everyone was still unfinished. From the communication and visit, we learned that under the continuous efforts of GAC Toyota in 2021, not only the product line is more abundant, its market competitiveness has also been strengthened, 2021 is a year of full firepower of GAC Toyota, but also revealed the "ambition" of expanding the territory in 2022, I believe that in the future GAC Toyota will also bring greater pressure to competitors, and will also bring more quality services and models to consumers.