At the Jietu brand night held at the beginning of the year, the hardcore off-road SUV concept car T-X made a horizontal appearance, which attracted enough attention in China. For the inherent impression of the majority of consumers, it is indeed rare to be able to give birth to a model with a styling style that is different from the previous model in the product matrix of "Polytechnic Man" and has been unanimously praised. From the perspective of the fundamental mission, T-X has received relatively good public opinion reviews, which is of great significance to the revitalization of the brand to a certain extent.
There are indications that the T-X will face the now popular Tank 300. It's just that Chery, which has always focused only on the three major parts of the car, has the pearl jade of the tank 300 in front, what are the chances of the T-X, which only emerged at the conference for the time being?
Refreshing T-X
Although the T-X is still in the concept car stage, from the many details of the exposed vehicle, there are actually not too many conceptual elements, and most of them have the possibility of mass production. According to the plan, the first model of the T product series will be launched as soon as 2023, when chery can see the real strength of developing off-road SUV products.
Tank 300
Ford Bronco
Jeep Wrangler
However, in terms of design, the T-X's hardcore off-road SUV temperament is not inferior at all. In my personal opinion, the T-X front face shows even more originality than the tank 300. As we all know, about the tank 300, there has always been a suspicion that it copied the Jeep Wrangler and the Ford Bronco. To be honest, the depiction of hardcore off-road SUVs on the market is nothing more than a set of design languages such as round headlights, box body and rear spare tires, which are constantly changing, and the face of the tank 300 seems to be beyond reproach.
However, the Jetway T-X handed over a very different answer. In the design of the headlight shape, T-X did not follow the round light idea of the hard-core off-road vehicle, but adopted a matrix headlight composed of six LED light sources symmetrically. It is said to be rectangular, but in fact, it seems to be round and non-round, completely dependent on the consumer's personal subjective aesthetic to decide. In addition, the presence of a Jietu English text pattern that glows between the two headlights helps to improve the grade of the vehicle and complements the design of the light group.
At the same time, the two bright green trailer hooks below, with the square rearview mirrors in the form of protruding shapes, slightly thrown wheel eyebrows and heavy front bumpers, create a strong hardcore off-road SUV style. In terms of momentum, it is not inferior to the Wrangler, Tank 300 and other SUVs that have a deep influence in the pure off-road field.
One thing to say is that we appreciate the high originality achieved in the first half of the T-X, but it is also an indisputable fact that the second half of the T-X looks like a Land Rover Defender. Although Chery and Land Rover have a deep partnership, this blatant take-it-all is not what automotive development advocates.
Jetway T-X
Land Rover Defenders
As for the interior and configuration, it is still unknown. However, referring to the historical intentions of independent brand models in this regard, I believe that T-X is unlikely to lose points because of this. On the contrary, since the T-X is positioned as a hardcore off-road SUV, the market has certain requirements for its off-road skills. Chery's previous involvement in the off-road category is relatively scarce, it is neither like the Jeep Wrangler who was born to be crazy for off-road, nor the tank 300 can have the Great Wall in the pickup truck, Haval H9 and other years of precipitation in the off-road field.
There is no doubt that the surface parameters provided by T-X can be in line with its off-road attributes, including the conventional configuration of hardcore off-road SUVs such as non-load-bearing body, front and rear differential locks, etc. The T-X will not be absent, the key is Chery's integration tuning, what height can be reached, will determine whether T-X's hardcore off-road SUV title is worthy of the name.
Why not the T-X of Starway?
I believe that many consumers will express the same doubts when they first see the T-X unveiled by Jietu. As Chery's rare product with a good reputation in design and influence in recent years, T-X naturally shoulders the heavy responsibility of brand upwards, and is also Chery's unremitting goal for many years. However, in terms of the positioning of the sub-brand Jietu, it is half lower than Chery, and Chery itself has a high-end sub-brand Xingtu.
Like tank 300, when it was first born, the Great Wall also put it in its high-end brand WEY, and later in view of the rapid popularity of tank 300, the Great Wall took it out to become an independent brand, in the essential positioning, tank and WEY sit on an equal footing, complement each other.
T-X, which is also a hardcore off-road class, chery has put it on the shortcut of entry positioning, in fact, it has to be blamed on the indisputable atmosphere of the star path. For Chery, its high-end sub-brand Xingtu has indeed reached the point where it is tasteless and abandoned. In contrast, Jietu officially announced its promotion to an independent brand in July last year, and its cumulative sales reached 150,000 units in the whole year, an increase of 17.9% year-on-year. In addition, since the launch of Chery Jietu, the cumulative sales volume has reached 460,000 vehicles, which has become the mainstay of Chery's current sales system.
Compared with the "unsupportable Adou" of Xingtu, it is obvious that the value potential of digging deep into Jietu is greater, and it is more worthy of Chery's support. Chery has formulated a grand plan for Jietu: sales will exceed 200,000 vehicles in 2022 and 1 million vehicles in 2026. It should be known that chery Group's overall sales last year were only 961,900 vehicles, which shows that if Jietu wants to achieve a leap forward, it is imperative to upgrade the brand and expand the product matrix.
Therefore, when everyone was amazed by the shape of the T-X, they speculated that the new car would be priced more closely than the tank 300 under the Jietu banner, imagining that the sales price was 150,000 or 160,000. I think it is not appropriate to define the price of the T-X in terms of the existing brand positioning of Jietu. Like the impression left by the current shortcut to consumers is still more emphasis on cost-effective, the main hot selling model of the medium-sizeD SUV tonnage of the X70 family, the whole series of guidance price range is only about 7-150,000.
The T-X can be said to be a product conceived on the future of Jietu, and its positioning is more advanced than the current Jietu car series. It is more reliable to guess that the price of the T-X should be comparable to the tank 300, at least not too far from the tank 300. The range of 180,000-230,000, I think is more appropriate, and it is more acceptable to consumers. After all, the benchmark strength of the tank 300 is there, the price is too high to sell, and the low price is not conducive to maintaining the brand value and brand upwards.
It is not impossible for Jietu to grow steadily and replace Xingtu as a high-end sub-brand that can play in Chery's lineup in the future.
Jietu T-X knows more about Chinese users?
The performance of the tank 300 phenomenon level has made a number of independent brands coveted. In the era of serious internal rolling in the car market, tank 300 can open up a new blue ocean in the niche market segment, which not only greatly reduces the threshold for ordinary consumers to enter the hardcore off-road vehicle circle, but also sets an example for other friends, proves excellent product strength and suitable price, and can also stimulate the vitality of the niche market.
But hardcore off-road vehicles also have a major pain point, that is, fuel consumption is not very friendly to daily household consumers. Even if the tank 300 takes into account the comfort of daily home use, the current 2.0T engine will still make its fuel consumption higher than that of the same level of urban SUVs. According to the feedback of many Xiti Tank 300 users, in the congestion of cities with more daily occupation car scenes, the fuel consumption of tank 300 is often 15L away.
Perhaps in this regard, the Jietu T-X can be more in line with the minds of domestic consumers than the Tank 300. To be fair, the vast majority of user groups like Tank 300 are not necessarily consumed for its off-road performance, and there are few scenes of pulling the car to off-road every day. In the final analysis, the styling can be pleasing to the user's individual needs for hardcore off-road, of course, off-road performance is better than nothing. In the daily commute, the economic cost of ordinary travel can be taken care of, which undoubtedly makes the T-X play a role in adding bricks and tiles to the sales volume of the tank 300.
It is reported that jietu T-X will be based on Chery's latest Kunlun architecture, and will be equipped with Kunpeng power system, providing fuel, hybrid and pure electric power structure covering 1.0T, 2.0T, 3.0T, as well as two kinds of body structures including bearing and non-bearing, as well as mechanical four-wheel drive and electric four-wheel drive versions. In other words, the Jetway T-X may not refer to just one model, but an entire series. Imagine a hardcore off-road vehicle with a fuel consumption of as low as 1L per 100 kilometers, or a hardcore off-road experience driven by pure electric power, which sounds quite exciting, and may also make up for Chery's gap in off-road performance achievements.
Asteron summary
On the night of the brand night, Jietu also officially announced the layout of the four major product sequences of X, T, P and V, respectively, mainly SUV, hardcore off-road, hardcore pickup truck and MPV models, laying the seeds for Chery's revitalization plan.
I hope that this time, Chery can truly learn the failure lessons of the previous brand upward exploration, adjust the strategy, start again, and restore the glory of Chery's former "independent brother" as soon as possible.
Figure | Sourced from the web
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