Will intelligence kill used car platforms?
@ Tech New Knowledge Original
Author 丨 Sakuragi Editor 丨 Tsukimi
Recently, another overseas auto giant announced the establishment of its own used car platform.
On January 13, GM announced that it would launch an online used car platform called CarBravo in the spring of 2022, formally challenging Carvana, Chemax and other companies that have profited from the sale of used cars.
Since 2021, the used car market is undergoing a change. The first is the policy leadership, in August 2021, the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Public Security, and the State Administration of Taxation issued an announcement to accelerate the promotion of cross-provincial communication for the registration of used car off-site transactions. On September 16, the Ministry of Commerce once again said: Encourage the branding and chain operation of second-hand car distribution enterprises, and promote the innovation of circulation models. Accelerate the promotion of cross-provincial communication for the registration of used car off-site transactions. Promote the implementation of the policy of canceling the relocation of second-hand cars. Support qualified enterprises to carry out second-hand car export business, and expand the scale of second-hand car exports in an orderly manner.
However, since 2021, in the face of continuous increase in policies, gasoline used cars and new energy used cars have shown a completely different reaction of ice and fire.
According to the Securities Times report, in the traditional peak season at the end of this year, second-hand car transactions have encountered a situation of "peak season is not booming". Shenzhen as one of the national second-hand car market vanes, "science and technology new knowledge" to explore the local second-hand car dealers found that the head and small and micro enterprises operating individual feedback is quite different, but generally agree that there was a significant correction in sales in October.
The market for new energy second-hand cars has gone from abroad to China. According to the list of the fastest-selling used cars in September published by overseas automotive website iSeeCars, the Model 3 became the best-selling used car in the United States for four consecutive months, and its price is sometimes even higher than that of new cars. According to the daily car auction report, the transaction volume of new energy used cars in 2021 increased by 65% year-on-year. The rising enthusiasm has also allowed second-hand car dealers to also set their sights on the new energy vehicle market, and a series of policies to facilitate second-hand car trading and the gradual introduction and improvement of financial services are helping the new energy second-hand car industry to scale and standardize operations.
Under the fiery background, the players of new energy second-hand cars have shown a different state.
New energy vehicle manufacturers began to set up their own used car platforms, and Xiaopeng, Extreme Krypton, Zero Run, and Weilai have successively added second-hand car distribution business to their registered company functions. Different from the era of fuel vehicles, new energy vehicles have made the relationship between car owners and manufacturers closer with their increasing intelligence and digitalization.
At the same time, the Internet used car platform does not seem to have much layout for the rapid development of new energy vehicles and used cars. A head used car trading platform staff told the "science and technology new knowledge" that for new energy used cars, everyone is still in the wait-and-see, melon seed, Uxin and other head platforms are currently considering the most is the policy support of the current bet online or open up offline business model issues.
Between hot and cold, it is the prediction of different players for the wind outlet. Some people in the game choose to be radical, believing that after intelligence, the second-hand car platform does not even have the need to exist. Some people also choose to be conservative, thinking that new energy used cars are just leek games.
Used electric vehicles, complex value depressions
For new energy used cars, public perception is still stuck in the impression of a few years ago. Low retention rate, large power loss, fast price reduction, almost no large transaction value.
However, since 2021, changes in the macro environment and the continuous development of technology have made used cars quickly become a value depression.
One of the most critical factors is the lack of supply, the lack of core and the rising upstream raw materials, which is delaying the delivery speed of new energy vehicle manufacturers. At the same time, these problems are transforming into a medium- and long-term time dimension, which makes the already insufficient supply volume worse. In terms of the crazy market of lithium carbonate this year (330,000 yuan a ton, last October was 170,000 tons), the long-term cost price center has moved up, which has become the consensus in the industry.
At the same time, the continuous mutation of the new crown strain, the repeated epidemics, has almost become a reality that the public has to accept. This has formed a lot of constraints for manufacturers. Taking BYD as an example, when the epidemic broke out in Xi'an, its factory in Xi'an had to stop work and production, which also caused some delay in the delivery of new cars.
According to the "New Knowledge of Science and Technology" learned from the channel side, the waiting time for new cars from Tesla and other head car manufacturers has gradually increased from two months to about 3 to 4 months.
Under the shortage of supply, on the other side is strong demand. Tesla handed over 930,000 super sales data for the whole year in 2021, at the same time, according to professional analysis, Tesla's sales data simply cannot represent the global demand for it, "In other words, Tesla's sales of 930,000 vehicles can only mean that it can produce so much, and the rapid launch of the Berlin Gigafactory in Germany also shows Musk's long-term optimism about strong demand." ”
At the same time, another manifestation of strong demand is the bold decline in policy subsidies and the price increases of new energy vehicle manufacturers. At the beginning of the year, Tesla first issued a price increase announcement, and its products Model 3 and model Y have raised prices. Not long after, Xiaopeng Automobile also announced a price increase, P7 models rose by 4300-5900 yuan; P5 models rose by 4800-5400 yuan; G3i models also rose by 4800-5400 yuan.
Insufficient supply, strong demand, and simple economic principles have created a premium for new energy used cars.
After the beginning of the year, in the second-hand car market, the owners of the price-increasing brands comfortably experienced the thrill of pulling up immediately after a bottom.0 At this point, we can almost judge that new energy second-hand cars do have a lot of opportunities under the contradiction between supply and demand. However, whether it can be judged that the outlet of new energy second-hand cars has arrived, and the real situation shows the complexity of new energy second-hand cars.
A second-hand car dealer told "Science and Technology New Knowledge": "Now there is a great demand for new energy markets, but only veterans are better at making money. The key point of the user's concern lies in the policy of the car manufacturer, for example, in the first-hand car, the main engine factory promises a lifetime warranty on the battery, but after becoming a second-hand car, this policy is gone. ”
At the same time, another factor affecting the price of new energy used cars is the iteration speed of car manufacturers. A second-hand car dealer frankly said, "If the car changes not much, the value preservation space is very large, for example, the most sought-after model is the Xiaopeng P7, the price is rising steadily, but Tesla is not so much value preservation, the update is too fast, the old Tesla is basically going to lose money now." ”
It is this uncertainty that allows offline second-hand car dealers to have a space for operation on new energy vehicles, but it is also because of this uncertainty that the Internet second-hand platform, which has always pursued "standard products", is more regressive for new energy vehicles. In our research on second-hand car platforms such as Guazi, Uxin and Renrenche, we found that the number of new energy vehicles sold is very small, taking Guazi as an example, even in large cities like Beijing, the number of second-hand Teslas sold on the platform is extremely limited. In terms of renren car data, the number of Tesla in second-tier cities is only in the range of dozens of vehicles, and the trading heat is very low.
At the same time, when "Science and Technology New Knowledge" told the relevant person in charge of the relevant used car platform website, they admitted that new energy vehicles have not yet been included in the focus of development strategies. "Our focus now is actually on online e-commerce and stabilizing online traffic." After the off-site car sales model was liberalized by the government this year, it is actually very conducive to our layout of the country's Internet platform, and new energy second-hand cars may have to be put aside. ”
Closed systems do not require used car middlemen
The ecology of new energy vehicles is actually very similar to Apple's smart phones: a relatively closed system, a data and system dominated by the car factory, and whether it is intelligent or entertainment in the car, it has achieved full scene coverage of travel. Under the closed loop, car owners will gradually get used to a certain set of system language. To put it simply, it is difficult to adapt to Android phones even if you are used to Apple mobile phones. This will bring two results, the first owner of the car is very loyal to the car factory, will not be easily replaced; the second car factory for the control of data will reach an unprecedented high.
A 2021 survey from the Tesla China Owners Club shows: "If you buy an additional car at home, are you still willing to buy a Tesla?" The percentage of affirmative answers was as high as 91%, and more than one owner said that "driving a Tesla is addictive." Another data from a third-party voting system shows that 97% of car owners will continue to support Tesla.
This situation is even more pronounced among the new car-making forces. Among them, Weilai, which focuses on building communities and improving services, is particularly prominent. Since 2021, WEIO has built a total of 4582 new supercharge piles and destination charging piles, and will also provide flexible power exchange services and release second-hand car business. At the same time, 15 nio houses, 72 service centers, and 594 new NIO Life products were released. The annual car club, Weilai Day and other activities have almost become a carnival feast for car owners, creating service brand services to improve the closed-loop ecology, and the effect is very obvious.
On the other hand, in the survey, "New Knowledge of Science and Technology" found that the control of data by car manufacturers penetrated almost every corner of the use of drivers and passengers. In the actual case of a car owner, in the process of driving back home, when encountering extremely cold conditions, air conditioning failure and other issues, the solution is to dial the Tesla depot telephone, after the owner of the problem description, the depot by observing the background system abnormal data, while remote control system software repair, the owner of the problem to solve.
Although it is only an episode, it is not difficult to find that the granularity of the management and control of each car by the depot has reached a very meticulous point. At the same time, under the consensus of the car factory to continuously increase the intelligence, the data management will gradually strengthen the behavior collection of the owner. The incident exposed by hackers that Tesla collected information about pedestrians in the car is one of the typical representatives.
Then, based on the above two conclusions, it is not difficult to speculate from the perspective of consumers that when you decide to buy a second-hand car, you will still believe the official car manufacturer at the first time. The reason is very simple, the decision to buy a new energy vehicle is, to some extent, the result of the brand and trust. Under the closed-loop ecology, compared with new energy vehicle manufacturers and second-hand car platforms, new energy vehicle manufacturers undoubtedly have unparalleled advantages in the data side and brand side. In other words, the choice of new energy used cars is to some extent the choice of the system, and it is almost impossible to grow a third-party platform that is compatible with various systems.
For used car platforms, after losing the background data of the depot, they lose the initiative in terms of their understanding of the vehicle and the accuracy of the service. At the same time, even if they want to develop the new energy vehicle business, they will be challenged by the lack of flexibility of the business model to price sensitivity, the mismatch of market information, and the monopoly data of new energy vehicle manufacturers.
In addition, it is reasonable to imagine whether automakers are willing to access data to third-party second-hand platforms. For the car manufacturer, the disadvantages outweigh the benefits, first of all, the value and scarcity of data lead to the car factory will not give up easily, and the third-party platform can only increase the cost if it wants to obtain data. Secondly, from the perspective of data security, the risk is extremely high, and it is difficult to prevent the transaction and leakage of information unless there is a national level of departmental coordination.
Therefore, we can foresee that when the intelligence of new energy vehicles becomes more and more mature, and the volume of information data continues to increase, a high moat is also planted in front of the third-party second-hand car platform.
What about melon used cars?
According to the data of daily auction car, the transaction scale of new energy second-hand cars is expanding rapidly, and the transaction volume of new energy vehicles in 2021 will grow rapidly year-on-year. The replacement cycle of new energy vehicles is shorter than that of fuel vehicles, and 43.3% of new energy vehicles will be sold after less than 3 years, so the replacement cycle also means more active circulation for the second-hand car market.
Under the double carbon target, the continuous acceleration of the penetration rate of new energy vehicles is the main feature of the next few years. In addition to the increasing intelligence of all parties, the new energy second-hand car market, as the outlet determined in the next decade, will also attract all parties to compete.
Looking closely at today's second-hand car platform players, Guazi second-hand cars bet on online in all aspects, directly hit the "new e-commerce" on their homepage, using VR car viewing and other technologies to try to change the user's purchase habits, similar to the shell model, the focus is still on grabbing front-end users and doing traffic business. This set of playing methods in gasoline cars, very reasonable, relatively complex structure, a variety of cats that are not easy to avoid, will invisibly increase the credibility of this business model. However, in the new energy second-hand car, this business model shows the drawbacks, the service and data of new energy vehicles are almost on the side of the car factory, for example, Weilai, which can change the power, and Tesla, which cannot change the electricity, are two systems in the value evaluation, and in the future of continuous iteration of technology, more new technologies are also testing the iteration speed of the second-hand platform.
At the same time, in the brand link with the highest value of the smile curve, second-hand car platforms such as Guazi seem to have not found a way to break the game, and people will "cult" believe musk and Li Bin, but it is difficult to believe in a platform. Brand potential energy is not in an order of magnitude, claiming that there is no middleman to earn the difference between the melons, in the new energy used car dealers still seem to see no value-added space.
The new characteristics of new energy vehicles also mean that there must be a new business model to subvert the existing second-hand car market, and this business model can be determined to be more refined and customized. Survival of the fittest, this war on new energy used cars has just begun, and the excitement of the future is worth looking forward to.