From toyota Senna to the cold, tube peeping into the sweet trap of the sea tactics

Text: Zheng Driving @ Tan Qing said AI editor-in-chief

Toyota's hybrids are becoming more and more impeccable, but so what?

As we all know, mark-up sales are Toyota's usual pride, from camry to Highland to Senna. Before the listing at the end of October last year, the news of the increase in the price of GAC Toyota Saina's new car was circulated, and after the official listing, many 4S stores gave a boutique optional package with a price increase of 70,000 or 80,000 yuan as usual.

However, relatively many brands like the opening of new cars, a large number of publicity orders and sales data, Xena did not publish sales data in the first month, and the follow-up sales data is also high and low.

In terms of configuration, compared with Tesla's continuous reduction, after the domestic Senna is equipped with a 2.5L THS hybrid system, its acceleration ability can even match the previous generation model equipped with a 3.5L V6 engine, and the acceleration smoothness and fuel economy brought by the hybrid powertrain are incomparable to the old models. However, such a generous configuration of GAC Senna can not make users feel excited again.

From the financial report, in the october-December period of 2021, Toyota Motor's revenue was 7.79 trillion yen, down 4.46% year-on-year; operating profit was 784.3 billion yen, a year-on-year decline of 20.6%.

The decline in revenue data and the pre-cooling of the popular model Senna show that Toyota is no longer the most profitable car company in the world. In Tan Qing's view of AI, this may indicate that its proud product power has begun to crack. As the king of traditional car companies, how to smoothly pass the transition period from the fuel era to the electric age?

Why is Toyota mired in hybrid mire?

At present, the world is accelerating the embrace of the trend of automobile electrification and intelligence, in this context, Toyota, which has no opponents in the era of fuel vehicles, is facing a shrinking advantage, on the one hand, Toyota wants to continue the huge foundation, on the other hand, Toyota also understands that it is imperative to follow the trend of new energy vehicles, and the problem is only how to take the road of transformation.

Now everyone can see that Toyota has embarked on a different non-plug-in hybrid transition route. One question worth exploring is: How did Toyota step by step embark on this isolated hybrid road?

First, Toyota did not grasp the opportunity of electrifying the layout for the first time.

As one of the most successful traditional car companies today, Toyota actually had a deep understanding of Tesla, which was still a small sapling at that time.

In October 2010, Toyota invested $100 million in Tesla and held a 3% stake in Tesla to jointly develop the Electric Version of the Toyota RAV4. However, due to the reluctance of both sides to share core technologies and other reasons, Toyota eventually gave up the opportunity to jointly develop electric vehicles.

Since then, Toyota has begun to sell its Tesla shares and sold them all in 2017, completely ending its cooperation with Tesla. After parting ways, Toyota decided to take its own new energy route: hydrogen energy and hybrid.

In fact, there have been many failed cooperation cases in the car manufacturing industry, for example, "Harmony Futeng", which was once formed by Tencent, Foxconn, harmony automobile, BYD and Daimler, deforestation, the results of their cooperation are not ideal. Different companies have different genes, and participants think more about what they can get from cooperation, rather than prioritizing what to do together, and this kind of cooperation in the same bed and dream is unlikely to release the commercial value of 1+1>2.

In tanqing said AI view, in the cooperation between Toyota and Tesla, Tesla is financially demanding of Toyota, is a weak party, and Toyota, which occupies a strong voice, is easy to start from its own interests, and more consideration is to get visible returns from cooperation, rather than paying too much sunk costs for an uncertain future.

In short, in Toyota's first encounter with Tesla, Toyota saw the impracticality of Tesla's pure electric vehicle. Looking back on this past now, Toyota may regret its indiscretion.

Second, Toyota tasted the sweetness after laying out the hybrid model.

Over the years, Toyota has created a good story in the history of the automotive industry, and the quality of "driving is not bad", the TNGA architecture known in the industry, and the global sales ranking of the top five all year round are all the confidence that Toyota is proud of.

As a parent-young enterprise, its core technical barriers are quite thick, and there are rich know-how reserves, and in the current menacing electric vehicle, if it is not released, there may not be too good a chance to get on the car in the future, so its hybrid model has absolutely nothing to say in terms of configuration.

On the other hand, Toyota still has a large market, and it is completely worthwhile to open up hybrid models based on the existing user scale, and the explosion of hybrid models such as Camry and Highlander also proves this.

Third, plug-in or non-plug-in, the choice of two technical routes, behind the national strategic level of the game, but let Toyota fall into passivity.

Toyota in the field of hybrid layout very early, a lot of HEV (non-plug-in hybrid) patented technology in the hands of Toyota, if China subsidies HEV is almost equivalent to subsidizing Toyota a company, according to Toyota patent production will inevitably increase the cost of domestic HEV.

On the other hand, charging anxiety is an inevitable pain point for pure electric vehicles in the early stage, and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV) are conducive to guiding related companies to lay out infrastructure such as charging piles, thereby accelerating the market penetration of pure electric vehicle models.

Specifically, compared with HEV cars, plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV) have a larger battery capacity and can support a longer range, if each time is a short drive, there are better charging conditions, plug-in hybrid vehicles can even be used as pure electric vehicles without refueling.

That is to say, in the future, the electrification of automobiles must have a charging network, to the need for external charging HEV subsidies, China's emerging charging network facilities construction climax will soon cool down, so that the popularity of China's new energy vehicles will be delayed for at least ten years.

Therefore, toyota is not wrong to choose non-plug-in hybrid, but the layout of plug-in hybrid is not effective, and there is no Chinese car company that can curb BYD, Great Wall and other plug-in hybrids. What makes Toyota feel even more unhappy is that not only local OEMs, Chinese parts companies are accelerating import substitution, grabbing the market share of international giants, and have the strength to compete with Japanese car companies such as Toyota.

For example, in terms of power batteries, there have been NINGD times, BYD and the upcoming listing and expansion of China New China, Hive Energy. In the field of intelligence, last year, Huawei and Baidu both worked hard to play the role of first-tier suppliers, promoting their software technologies and solutions to vehicle companies, and challenging established giants such as Bosch and Continental.

Toyota has even started working with BYD. On July 19, 2019, Toyota and BYD signed an agreement to jointly develop battery electric vehicles (BEVs), which are scheduled to be available in the Chinese market by 2025. According to the search of Tianyan, on March 25, 2020, both parties invested 50% to establish BYD Toyota Electric Vehicle Technology Co., Ltd.

Reviewing Toyota's electrification transformation measures, it is not difficult to find that Toyota failed to grasp the opportunity to cooperate with Tesla, and then had to do hybrid models while adopting a cooperative model to develop pure electric vehicles. But one question that must be considered is, how long can this comfortable transition period last?

Taking The Corolla Hybrid as an example, although the cost has been reduced to a certain extent after the localization of Toyota Hybrid, the cost is still high, and the profitability is far less than that of the 1.6 gasoline version, because Toyota is walking on a lone technical route, and there is no cost advantage without industry scale.

The obstinate unplugged hybrid technology, like Nokia's popular Symbian system, is destined to be replaced by more supporters of Android and iOS systems. On the other hand, after-sales and supporting services also need to be followed up synchronously, and the comprehensive cost remains high.

Therefore, Toyota's hybrid technology is actually on a short-slope snow track, and the snowball is destined to roll small.

Under the tactics of the sea of vehicles, the sweet trap of technology devolution

Now Toyota, has fully realized that there is no future for continuous improvement of hybrids, changed the cautious style of eight winds and winds, and began the crazy layout of electric vehicles.

On December 14, Toyota released 16 electric vehicles in one go, covering cars, SUVs, MPVs, sports cars, pickups, and K-Car models. It feels like a different style, so why does Toyota want to engage in car-sea tactics?

First, from the perspective of the industry, it is unclear whether batteries and many new technology routes are superior or inferior.

For example, in the field of power batteries, the two technical routes of lithium iron phosphate and lithium ternary are catching up with each other under the action of a variety of factors; at the perception level of intelligent driving, the lidar school and the pure visual school are from mutual disclosure to complementary integration.

The new energy revolution is a protracted marathon race, and the prospects of many technologies are indeed uncertain. Toyota's layout plug-in hybrid must have also been carefully weighed.

On the other hand, tesla's success on the user side makes consumers feel that the definition of the car is being changed.

Consumer demand has changed, the cognitive system of the original automotive products has been shaken, and some independent brand car companies do not know which model will explode, but since there is a pure electric platform, simply bet on multiple parties and do not miss the opportunity to explode. On the other hand, the post-90s and Z generation have become first-time users, and their consumption concept is driven by personalization and self-expression, but what is the answer to the explosion, car companies can not guess at all.

For example, the explosion of the tank 300 off-road model was unexpected by the Great Wall. In China, off-road vehicles belong to a niche market. In 2020, the sales volume of domestic + imported off-road vehicles added up to only 200,000 units, and the market penetration rate was only 0.9%. However, this niche off-road SUV of the Great Wall actually sold more than 80,000 units in more than a year on the market, accounting for nearly half of the domestic off-road vehicle market.

Second, from Toyota's own point of view, the transition period can still reap dividends.

The survival law in nature is that big fish eat small fish, small fish eat shrimp, and the automotive industry is the same.

Before the official launch of the pure electric model cooperated with BYD, Toyota's strategy was to "defend the attack", give full play to the advantages of basic disks such as supply chain, and curb other traditional automakers with low gross profits.

Although Tesla was a small fish when it worked with Toyota, it became a catfish after building a factory in Shanghai in 2019, and now it has become a big fish. In the face of Tesla's sudden rise, Toyota obviously does not have the ability to confront them in the field of electric vehicles and autonomous driving, and the defensive measures it can make is to bully other traditional manufacturers with lower profit margins.

Toyota still has the advantages of a strong supply chain, a high zero-to-whole ratio and a high retention rate, which can be used as a weapon to combat backward traditional car companies. Compared with the new forces, electric vehicles and intelligent driving are not enough, but competing with traditional car companies is what Toyota is good at, and Toyota will fully grasp the opportunity of "eating shrimp and rice".

However, the above advantages are gradually decaying in the new energy era, and the sweetness of the transition period is getting less and less. Like what happened to Toyota Senna today, the configuration increase does not increase the price, reflecting the depreciation of Toyota's technology reserves on non-electric models.

Moreover, the Chehai tactic itself also has drawbacks, which is essentially a waste of resources of the "landlord-style". Although the product line is widely differentiated, although it can capture consumers in market segments, it also means that the target user group is small, and the continuity of the product life cycle may be limited, resulting in waste of resources.

In the era of fuel vehicles, Toyota has targeted the development of new models, and now it has to disperse its efforts, indicating that it has not grasped the key points at all, and it is not known where the most core transformation breakthrough is. Therefore, the Chehai tactic is an attempt to invest huge resources to cope with the uncertainty of the future.

For example, although the Great Wall's tank 300 is selling very hot, Euler also relies on the naming of the cat system and the fashion shape to capture the hearts of many female users, but recently there has been news that black cats and white cats have stopped accepting orders, and the reason is not difficult to speculate, after the subsidy decline, due to the limited production line resources, the models with low profits should give way to models with high profits.

For Toyota, which has launched the tactics of the sea of vehicles, too intensive new product launches will also have a new round of homogenization to bring about internal friction, which means that Toyota's brand reputation may also face erosion.

Write at the end:

Toyota is undoubtedly the last benchmark enterprise in the era of fuel vehicles, giving people the feeling of being a first-class student with all-round development of morality, intellect, body and beauty, but now it is in an embarrassing situation of tail difficulties. For Toyota itself, the basic disk of the enterprise is a product force of excellence and a very mature supply chain ecosystem, and how to use these advantages to smoothly transition to the era of electric vehicle scale is a difficult problem.

On New Year's Day 2021, Akio Toyoda displayed the annual Chinese character he wrote on Weibo - "stable", but the tree wants to be quiet and the wind is not stopping, and it is no longer the traditional car company that can call the wind and rain and lead the general trend of the industry. At present, Toyota has no way back, and since it has made up its mind to lay out electric vehicles, it must also be ready to meet the challenge.