On January 18, Xiaopeng Automobile officially announced that it has become the industry's first super charging vehicle company to penetrate 337 cities across the country, covering 333 prefecture-level cities and 4 municipalities directly under the central government in the mainland, and has launched 813 brand supercharging stations and 166 destination charging stations.
In addition, Xiaopeng Automobile provides 180kW DC supercharging services that are extremely scarce in the local areas for 12 cities such as Bortala, Kyzyl su kirgiz, Nujiang, Qamdo, Nagqu and Nyingchi, and will open supercharge stations to the outside world in the northeast and northwest in the future.
Xiao Lei believes that whether it is crazy to expand the supercharging station, destination charging station and other energy networks, or open the supercharge station to the outside world, it is a wise move for Xiaopeng Automobile to face a difficult situation.
The awkward situation of Xiaopeng Motors
In the year-end sales ranking of the new car-making forces in 2021, Xiaopeng Automobile has become the sales champion of the new car-making forces in 2021 with a sales performance of 98155 vehicles, with a year-on-year growth rate of 263%, which can be described as the biggest winner among the new car-making forces last year.
However, in the face of such excellent achievements, even He Xiaopeng, chairman and CEO of Xiaopeng Motors, has claimed that ideal car Li wants to live most comfortably in 2021, and it is more difficult for himself and Weilai Libin to live. In Xiao Lei's view, the "difficulty" of Xiaopeng Automobile is mainly that the positioning and core competitiveness are relatively easy to be beaten, and the supplementary energy network is one of the few strategic layouts that can win with geographical advantages.
NIO has established a foothold in the high-end market and is deeply involved in the field of power exchange. In Xiao Lei's view, there are only a few competitors who can compete with Weilai at the same level and in the same field in the future. For Weilai, the few variables are the strong entry of the Ningde era in the field of power exchange, as well as the transformation of high-end traditional car companies such as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi.
At the moment when the power battery has not yet broken through the technical bottleneck and the price of battery raw materials has soared, the ideal car without endurance anxiety is indeed the most comfortable new car-making force in 2021. In addition, its ability to support tens of thousands of monthly sales with only one model is also a testament to its strong product strength.
Compared with the first two opponents who are very distinctive in their respective fields, Xiaopeng Motors is always in anxiety. From the perspective of positioning, the product price range of 100,000-300,000 yuan of Xiaopeng Automobile is almost the power point of all independent brands to transform new energy vehicles, so the competitiveness of this price range is the most cruel.
From the perspective of core competitiveness, Xiaopeng Automobile has taken the successful case of Tesla as a development template from the beginning of its establishment, so it is similar to Tesla in terms of automatic driving, vehicle networking and energy supplement network. However, Xiaopeng Automobile's blue out of blue may not be better than blue. Nowadays, Xiaopeng Motors still has a certain gap with Tesla in these aspects, and Tesla's price reduction space can bring a fatal blow to Xiaopeng Motors at any time.
In terms of technologies such as autonomous driving and car networking, Xiaopeng Automobile has always been Tesla's most active catch-up, but these technologies may be instantly dispersed by the condescending Tesla through price cuts at any time. In terms of the layout of the supercharge station, Xiaopeng Automobile, which fights locally, has a strong advantage over Tesla, which focuses on the world.
Building a supercharging station, Xiaopeng Automobile is the infrastructure demon
The energy replenishment network is one of the core competitiveness of Xiaopeng Automobile, and the supercharge station is the core technology of Xiaopeng Automobile in the field of energy replenishment. In Xiao Lei's view, the penetration of 337 prefecture-level cities and municipalities directly under the central government is not only the embodiment of Xiaopeng Automobile's infrastructure strength, but also the basis for its sales increase.
By January 17, 2022, Xiaopeng Motors had built 813 supercharging stations across the country, and by October 23, 2021, Tesla's 1,000th supercharging station in China had been completed. Obviously, at present, there is still a gap between the number of super charging stations of Xiaopeng Automobile and Tesla, but if you look at the construction speed of supercharging stations, Xiao Lei can't help but sigh at Xiaopeng Automobile: Infrastructure madness, horror!
Tesla's official website in China shows that its first supercharging station in China was completed on September 23, 2012. Tesla China took 9 years to build its first supercharging station to 1,000 supercharging stations. The construction of Xiaopeng Automobile's first supercharging station was in March 2018. This also means that the supercharging station of Xiaopeng Automobile is much higher than the construction speed of Tesla's supercharging station in China.
For the coverage ability of Xiaopeng Automobile, an infrastructure maniac in the supercharging station, Xiaolei predicts that it will not exceed 2 years at most, and its domestic supercharge network will surpass Tesla in one fell swoop and become the most comprehensive new energy vehicle company in the domestic supercharging network. In the past few years, Xiaopeng Automobile is basically in a state of huge losses, in such a state it can spend huge sums of money to build a supercharge network, once it achieves profitability, then it will accelerate the construction speed of the supercharge network.
In the future, Xiaopeng Automobile will rely on the 813 supercharging stations that have begun to take shape to increase the density in the form of "urban encirclement of the countryside", strengthen the practicality of the energy replenishment network, and truly connect the energy replenishment network of Xiaopeng Automobile nationwide, so that pure electric vehicle refueling can also be as convenient as traditional fuel vehicles.
The construction of the supercharge station is a strategic goal that Xiaopeng Automobile must complete, but from the current point of view, the construction of the supercharging station is a complete loss-making business for Xiaopeng Automobile. According to industry experts, the investment cost of a charging station infrastructure with 10 140kw charging piles is about 2.5 million yuan.
Although Xiaolei did not find the construction cost of Xiaopeng supercharge station, the charging power of Xiaopeng charging pile single gun is generally 120kw, and the double gun is 180kw, which should be too different from the above cost. In addition, unlike Tesla, which also spends a lot of money to build a supercharging station, Xiaopeng Automobile users have a free charging quota of 1000-3000 kWh of electricity every year.
According to the "theoretical value" that the battery pack of the Xiaopeng P7 2020 706G model with 80.9 kWh of electricity can run 706 kilometers, 1 degree of electricity can run about 8 kilometers. This also means that Xiaopeng Automobile users can catch a mileage of 8,000-23,000 kilometers on the supercharge pile of Xiaopeng Automobile every year, while the vast majority of people drive less than 23,000 kilometers a year.
For the "white prostitute monster" of Xiaopeng automobile users, the Xiaopeng automobile super charging pile, which mainly serves Xiaopeng automobile users, cannot be said to be grainless in a short period of time, and can only be regarded as a return. Faced with such a situation, Xiaopeng Motors does not want to profit by canceling the free charging of users like Tesla.
In order to return the blood on the painstakingly operated supercharging station, Xiaopeng Automobile must start to generate income from other aspects other than Xiaopeng automobile users, and opening up the supercharging station to the outside world is a good idea.
Xiaopeng Automobile generates revenue by opening up supercharging stations?
At the moment when the sharing economy is prevalent, Xiaopeng Automobile is not the first car company in the world to open a supercharging station to the outside world. As early as last November, Tesla had already launched the first pilot project of the open charging pile network, and its 10 supercharger stations in the Netherlands would be open to pure electric vehicles of non-Tesla brands.
Tesla's front foot in foreign small-scale open to the public supercharge station, Xiaopeng Automobile followed by the opening of its super charging station in China, so it seems that Xiaopeng Automobile is really a loyal follower of Tesla. It can be seen from the fact that Xiaopeng Automobile did not learn from Tesla to cancel the user's free overcharge quota, and it is very clear about what it should learn and what it should not learn.
In order to make the supercharging station profitable, Tesla canceled the user's free overcharge quota, and Xiaopeng Motors, which has always liked to emulate Tesla at this time, did not follow up. Also in order to make the super charging station profitable, Tesla has opened its super charging station to other brands abroad, and this time Xiaopeng Automobile chose to follow up in time.
So the question is, why is open supercharging considered by Xiaopeng Motors to be a right thing? Xiao Lei believes that open supercharging is a matter of one stone and three eagles for Tesla and Xiaopeng Motors.
The first is, of course, to generate income. At present, the most extensive domestic car company with the most extensive layout of the charging network is Tesla, followed by Xiaopeng Automobile, which has a huge base of supercharging piles in China. Once the supercharged pile is opened to the public on a large scale, it can be rationally charged electricity and service charges to other brand pure electric vehicle users. The large-scale supercharger pile base is accumulated over time, and the electricity and service fees that can be earned are quite considerable.
Second, by opening up the supercharge station, it can also shape the brand influence of Xiaopeng Automobile in the minds of non-Xiaopeng Automobile users. Just imagine, in the future, no matter which new energy vehicle brand you are a user, you may use the supercharging network opened to the outside world by Xiaopeng Motors. Under the long-term influence of Xiaopeng Automobile's supercharging network, you have already accepted Xiaopeng Automobile's products, maybe your next car will be replaced by Xiaopeng Automobile?
Third, the opening of supercharge stations is expected to receive supercharging subsidies. The "Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Construction of Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure" issued by the General Office of the State Council of the Mainland in October 2021 pointed out that in order to meet the charging demand of more than 5 million electric vehicles, the construction subsidy policy on charging infrastructure may be introduced in the future, and the subsidy ratio is expected to reach 40%, and the maximum subsidy for the construction of charging stations is expected to be 3 million.
In Xiao Lei's view, the subsidy policy mentioned in the "Guiding Opinions" is obviously not prepared for brand supercharging stations under the closed-loop ecology. Therefore, in order to obtain subsidy policies, Xiaopeng Automobile must open its super charging piles.
You know, in the era of software-defined cars, the vast majority of new energy vehicle companies have lost money to sell cars, and state subsidies and points have become one of their few sources of income. Therefore, the 40% charging pile subsidy ratio is not a small amount for Xiaopeng Automobile, which is eager to make a profit.
From a macro point of view, the comprehensive opening of brand supercharge stations can improve the utilization rate of public resources, reduce the construction pressure of the state on public charging piles, accelerate the construction speed of the mainland new energy vehicle refueling network, and realize the sharing of the energy replenishment network.
In addition, in addition to Tesla and Xiaopeng Motors, which have successively opened supercharging stations, GAC Aean and WM Motors have also successively laid out private pile sharing. It can be seen that in the mode of sharing economy, the sharing of energy replenishment networks in the future may become the trend of the times.
Note: The material for this article comes from the Internet