Economic Observer Pu Zhenyu Huawei Automotive Headquarters is about to settle in Shanghai? Tesla's first overseas design center is located in Beijing? Jidu Automobile wants to set up a "double headquarters" in Beijing and Shanghai?
Shortly after the beginning of 2022, a number of new energy automobile industry "big melons" have appeared in an incomparably lively manner, involving the three major automobile industry bases of Yizhuang, Jiading and Lingang in the two super-first-tier cities of Beijing and Shanghai, as well as the three giant enterprises of Tesla, Huawei and Baidu.
In January 2022, the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology mentioned in an official document that "Baidu Car has completed the industrial and commercial registration of 'Jidu Technology Co., Ltd.' in Beijing and set up a headquarters in Beijing." As a result, Beijing became the second city after Shanghai to be recognized as the headquarters of Jidu Automobile.
Interestingly, the news of Baidu's establishment of "Jidu Technology Co., Ltd." in Yizhuang was already out in June 2021, but at that time, the outside world did not realize the importance of the company, but only regarded it as a branch of Jidu Automobile, rather than another headquarters.
At about the same time, another list of key tasks in 2022 released by Beijing Mentioned that it will promote the construction of the Tesla Design Center. This marks a step forward for Beijing in competing with Shanghai for Tesla-related industrial resources.
At present, Tesla's manufacturing center, data center and R&D and innovation center in China are located in Lingang, Shanghai, while the Chinese headquarters, operation center, settlement center and sales company are located in Beijing.
As a Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone, Yizhuang is the core platform for Beijing to expand and strengthen the intelligent technology industry chain. In Yizhuang's obvious strength, Shanghai Lingang, which stands on the cusp of the wind, and Shanghai Jiading, which has a mature automobile industry chain, have also made frequent moves in introducing automobile investment.
Just after the Spring Festival in 2022, some reports quoted the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology as saying, "In 2022, Shanghai will accelerate the development of intelligent and connected vehicles through a number of projects, including "promoting the physicalization of Huawei's intelligent vehicle solution (BU) headquarters." The report is widely interpreted by the industry as Huawei's automotive headquarters will be located in Jiading, Shanghai.
In this regard, Huawei officials said that it is inconvenient to comment. However, relevant insiders replied to the Economic Observer reporter that the car BU is one of Huawei's five major business units, and there is no headquarters. "Promoting the materialization of Huawei's intelligent vehicle solution (BU) headquarters" is the direction of the work of the relevant departments in Shanghai, but there are still many unknowns about this matter. The person said that Shanghai has indeed docked with Huawei and expressed this intention, but Huawei has no plans in this regard so far.
In addition to Huawei, Xiaomi, Baidu, etc. are all enterprises that are actively engaged by senior leaders in Beijing and Shanghai. Since 2021, a new wave of intelligent electric vehicle companies such as Jidu, Zhiji, and Xiaomi Automobile have been established. Unlike the new car-making forces such as Weilai, Xiaopeng and Ideal, which were "short of clothes and food" at the beginning of their establishment, the newly established intelligent electric vehicle companies are backed by Internet companies with extremely strong talents, funds and technologies, so they are considered to have great potential and have become the guests of seed projects and local governments actively fought for in various places.
At the end of 2021, the Great Wall Salon project, which has settled in Shanghai, moved to Yizhuang, Beijing, becoming a strong proof that Yizhuang grabbed the project.
Behind the competition between Yizhuang, Jiading and Lingang over the new energy intelligent vehicle project is the competition for manufacturing resources in Beijing and Shanghai, two of China's megacities. At present, it seems that Beijing locks the headquarters + production capacity, and Shanghai is mainly the positioning difference of design + research and development, and it is not the boundary between Yizhuang and Jiading Lingang investment. The similarities and differences between the criteria for the selection of automobile projects and the ideas around the overall goals of automobile projects also determine that the competition between the two places in the intelligent automobile industry chain has just reached the midfield.
Compete for Jidu, Xiaomi, Tesla
The Beijing-Shanghai "dual headquarters" model, the final choice of Jidu, has become the most powerful footnote to the fierce competition for smart car projects in Beijing and Shanghai.
In March 2021, The auto company Jidu Automobile Co., Ltd., a joint venture between Baidu and Geely, was registered and settled in Jiading, Shanghai.
Jidu Automobile site selection Jiading is considered to be related to its second largest shareholder Geely, as the main shareholder of jidu automobile project to undertake manufacturing-related tasks, Geely's headquarters is located in Zhejiang, and Jiading belongs to the Yangtze River Delta region, where the automotive industry chain is complete, shipping, land transport are very convenient.
As the largest shareholder of Jidu Automobile, Baidu has not ignored the role of beijing, its base camp. In June 2021, Jidu Technology Co., Ltd. was registered and established in Yizhuang.
Baidu is a local Internet company in Beijing, and Yizhuang is a strategic hub for Baidu's intelligent driving business. In 2020, Yizhuang specially set up the "Beijing High-level Autonomous Driving Demonstration Zone", successively issued test licenses in various scenarios, and also took the lead in opening the first commercial pilot of autonomous driving travel services in China.
In terms of business scope, there is almost no difference between Jiading Jidu Automobile Co., Ltd. and Yizhuang Jidu Technology Co., Ltd. At that time, Jidu Automobile said that Shanghai and Beijing are currently two important strategic center cities for Jidu business, and based on the current business needs of enterprises, the establishment of companies in the two places can facilitate the absorption of talents and better business development nationwide.
Combined with the relevant expressions of the Documents of the Beijing Bureau of Economy and Information Technology in January 2022, Jidu Automobile has substantially formed a model of "dual headquarters" in Beijing and Shanghai.
Unlike Yizhuang and Jiading, who are evenly matched in the competition for Baidu's car-making project, Xiaomi Automobile's headquarters in Beijing Yizhuang is an unexpected result.
Shortly after Xiaomi announced its car-making in March 2021, it was reported that in order to win the Xiaomi car-making project, senior leaders in Shanghai had come forward. Moreover, in July 2021, Lei Jun, the head of Xiaomi, also personally visited the SAIC Passenger Car Headquarters in Jiading.
However, Beijing's sincerity in attracting investment is also obvious. In the month when Xiaomi announced the car manufacturing, Yizhuang introduced a new support policy for the new energy automobile industry, including encouraging domestic and foreign new energy intelligent vehicle manufacturers to settle in the development zone, and for driving the formation of a 100-billion-level industrial cluster, leading enterprises can be given innovative financial support.
After all, Xiaomi Group is headquartered in Beijing, and Xiaomi has built a smart factory in Yizhuang. From the perspective of industry, Yizhuang and Jiading have brought together a large number of automotive industry chain enterprises, all of which can meet the supporting needs of vehicle enterprises.
The landing of Xiaomi Automobile's headquarters in Yizhuang is expected to change the status quo of Yizhuang's only Jingdong headquarters, a significant landmark. The Tesla Design Center is becoming another iconic project that Yizhuang strives for.
Compared with Jidu Automobile and Xiaomi Automobile, Tesla is not an emerging electric vehicle company, but it has benefited from the rapid increase in sales, and its expansion demand in China is now extremely strong.
When Tesla's Shanghai factory was completed in 2019, Tesla head Musk germinated the idea of developing models specifically for the Chinese market. In the second half of 2021, Musk's idea landed substantially, and Tesla began to recruit local talents in China, requiring candidates to have more than 20 years of design experience and in-depth understanding of the Chinese market.
It is not surprising that the Tesla Design Center plans to settle in Beijing revealed in the Beijing government documents. In Beijing, Tesla has long had relevant strategic layouts.
In 2017, Tesla established the (Beijing) Science and Technology Innovation Center. According to Tesla's position at that time, Beijing universities gathered, is an important talent base, with many world-class universities and research institutions, Tesla will make full use of Beijing's advantages in talent and innovation.
According to the relevant documents of the Beijing government in early 2022, the main responsible units for tesla design centers and other projects include the Fangshan District Government, the Shunyi District Government, the Huairou District Government and the Yizhuang Management Committee. Some analysts believe that from the perspective of the policy environment, the Tesla Design Center is more likely to settle in Yizhuang.
In addition to the Tesla Design Center, Tesla's second factory will continue to spend Shanghai, which has Jiading and Lingang, or choose other regions, which has also aroused external concern.
Tesla's 2021 financial report shows that tesla's Shanghai factory achieved 484,100 deliveries in 2021, accounting for 51.7% of Tesla's total deliveries. China has overtaken the United States to become Tesla's most important manufacturing and export center. In January 2022, Tesla CEO Musk publicly stated that the company is selecting a site for the new factory, and there may be relevant information announced at the end of this year.
Auto industry analyst Yan Jinghui said that from the shanghai factory landing process, Tesla is very concerned about policy factors, before lingang to Tesla to open the conditions is beyond the industry's expectations, if Shanghai wants to retain Tesla's new factory, enough policy sincerity is still extremely critical.
Beijing-Shanghai Automobile City to build a path
In January 2022, Beijing and Shanghai announced that their RESPECTIVE GDP in 2021 will reach 4 trillion yuan. Facing the future, beijing and Shanghai will regard new energy intelligent vehicles as the key growth points of urban development.
According to the plan, by 2025, beijing's new energy vehicle ownership will reach 2 million, the output value of automobiles will exceed 700 billion yuan, and Shanghai plans to achieve the goal of the first place in the country in the total scale of new energy vehicles.
As an important automobile industry town in the north of the mainland, Beijing laid out the new energy automobile industry very early, and there have also been car companies such as BAIC New Energy that have been the first in domestic new energy vehicle sales for many years. However, due to subsidies and other reasons, BAIC BJEV's sales have continued to decline in recent years, and the development situation is not optimistic.
Yizhuang's auto project investment speed also did not meet expectations. If Shanghai Lingang chose Tesla and abandoned Weilai that year, it was a reasonable choice after its comprehensive strategic considerations. Then missing Weilai has always been considered a huge "mistake" in Yizhuang's introduction of new car manufacturers.
In May 2019, NIO signed a framework agreement with Yizhuang SDIC, under which NIO will receive a 10 billion yuan investment from Yizhuang SDIC and will set up a new entity in Yizhuang, NIO China, and build a new factory, which has made Yizhuang's automotive blueprint full of imagination. However, this financing project eventually came to an end, and the automobile "net red city" Hefei became the benefactor who saved Weiwei from danger and obtained efficient returns.
In 2021, Beijing released the "14th Five-Year Plan" Period High-tech Industrial Development Plan, and new energy intelligent vehicles were listed as strategic emerging industries.
In order to encourage domestic and foreign new energy intelligent vehicle manufacturers to invest in Beijing, the area including the 225 square kilometer planning area of Yizhuang New City has been designated as a policy pilot zone.
In the face of the blowout of new energy vehicle sales and the advent of the era of intelligent electric vehicles, Yizhuang began to increase its efforts. The high-end intelligent car project of the Great Wall Salon, which has been settled in Shanghai, was "snatched" to Beijing, which was interpreted as Yizhuang's compensation for the missing Weilai.
It is reported that among the irresistible preferential conditions used to attract salons, they also include the provision of land resources and various policy support for the establishment of the Great Wall's Beijing headquarters. For the Great Wall, the convenient transportation between Beijing and Baoding and the advantages of being close to the "central" decision-making level are obviously the best choices.
In addition to Yizhuang, Beijing is also strengthening the construction of high-end manufacturing bases including the automobile industry in other areas, such as the High-end Manufacturing Base in Doudian, Fangshan District, which has gathered projects such as Changan Automobile, Jingxi Heavy Industry Shock Absorber, and Guoneng Power 3D Lithium Battery, and Shunyi District, which has gathered Beijing Benz New Energy Automobile Factory and Ideal Automobile Factory.
Compared with Beijing, Shanghai has successfully built and introduced more new energy vehicle projects in the past few years. In addition to successfully attracting Tesla to build a factory in Lingang, Shanghai also has the headquarters of new car-making forces such as the global headquarters of Weilai, the headquarters of WM Motors, the headquarters of Huaren Express (Gaohe parent company), and the headquarters of the emerging electric vehicle company Zhiji.
According to Yizhuang's estimates, its intelligent networked vehicle-related industries will complete an output value of 160 billion yuan in 2021. In addition, as far as the overall layout of Beijing is concerned, Shunyi's previously announced goal is that by 2025, the annual output value of the entire industrial chain of intelligent and connected vehicles in the region will reach 100 billion yuan.
Shanghai is using the different positioning of Jiading and Lingang to create a new layout of the automotive industry chain. As the oldest automobile industry agglomeration area in Shanghai, jiading district achieved a total output of 111.7 billion yuan from January to November 2021. According to the plan, by 2025, the output value of new energy vehicles in Jiading District will reach 100 billion yuan.
It is understood that Lingang has gathered about 100 enterprises such as Tesla, SAIC, Ningde Times, and Horizon, including Tesla and SAIC, two tens of billions-100 billion-level enterprises, as well as a number of industrial chain enterprises with an annual output value of one billion-ten billion.
According to the data, the industrial scale of new energy intelligent networked vehicles in Lingang New Area will exceed 60 billion yuan in 2020. According to the plan, by 2025, the total output value of the intelligent new energy automobile industry in Lingang New Area will be 120 billion yuan. This is closer to the relevant output value target of Jiading District.
However, the two cities currently have different advantages in attracting new energy smart car projects. Some people from automobile consulting institutions pointed out that Shanghai's fashion attributes attract more design centers of automobile companies, and at present, whether it is traditional car companies or new car companies, there are forward-looking modeling design centers settled in Shanghai. However, with the settlement of Tesla factories and WEILAI headquarters, Shanghai has a greater goal in research and development and the construction of the whole industrial chain of intelligent electric vehicles.
Beijing's position as a political, economic and cultural center is its unique advantage. In the stage where smart electric vehicles have entered the stage of intensive landing of regulations, technical standards, and related industry policies, the attraction of being close to the top-level design center of the industry, as well as various unique policy preferences, is enough to attract the headquarters and R&D centers of car companies.
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