Written | Cold Zelin
Edit the | Wang Pan
At the beginning of the new year, the waist forces Nezha and Zero Run have successively spread rumors of listing in Hong Kong, and after Weima folded the science and technology innovation board last year, the new forces naturally aimed their financing channels at Hong Kong stocks.
Recently, Nezha Automobile completed the third round of financing of more than 2 billion yuan in the D round, and has now opened a Pre-IPO round of financing with a target valuation of about 45 billion yuan, and plans to launch an IPO in Hong Kong within this year. Similarly, Zero Run also submitted listing materials to the International Department of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, and will sprint to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in the near future.
Why the second echelon has rushed to raise "grain and grass" on a large scale, the lack of hematopoietic ability before the war is an important factor.
He Xiaopeng said to Photon Planet last year that if it is said that it is about 20 billion yuan to build a car from 0 to 1, the problem facing today is from 1 to 100, each company needs funds that may not be the same, Xiaopeng needs more than 30 billion yuan of money, and today every company is in reserve grain and grass, and industry competition has moved from the Spring and Autumn to the Warring States Era.
According to last year's Weixiao Financial Report, even if the current new forces head in a short period of time is difficult to say profitable, although the gross profit margin continues to rise (last year's three quarterly report data: Weilai, ideal more than 20%, Xiaopeng about 14%), but due to the adoption of expansion strategy, investment has always been more than expenditure.
At present, traditional car companies, whether they are independent brands or joint venture brands, have shown greater determination to transform, such as Volkswagen, Audi, Honda, Ford, Volvo have clearly announced the time of sale of fuel vehicles, and traditional car companies led by BYD in their own brands are also actively transforming new energy.
However, can the speed of new energy penetration keep up with the speed at which car companies are entering the game? It's suspicious.
For waist forces such as Zero Run and Nezha, the main models are below 200,000, the gross profit margin is lower, and naturally they cannot sit still. Of course, even if they are successfully listed in Hong Kong, they are not a panacea, they can solve a momentary worry, and it seems that only ensuring that "the volume and price rise together" is their only means of life.
Bite the tail of the head force
There is such a strategy in long-distance running, closely following the competitors in front, which can not only better control the pace and rhythm, but also reduce some wind resistance and save physical strength, but if the difference is too far, it loses meaning and the possibility of overtaking.
Before joining the car company melee, the waist forces are also ensuring a premise, that is, they cannot be left behind in the new forces. In the two elements of volume and price, Nezha and Zero Run have invariably chosen to first ensure that the amount does not fall behind, and then consider the problem of price.
We compare the delivery of the head and waist of the new forces of car manufacturing, although there is still a big gap between the delivery volume between Nezha, zero running and the head force, but compared with 2020, there has been a significant increase, in recent months Nezha even completed the anti-overtaking, zero running single-month delivery volume is gradually approaching the head.
Of course, due to the large difference in models, prices, and benchmarking groups, it is only a digital growth, and it is far from being truly overtaking.
However, we can see that Nezha and Zero Run have learned their lessons after the poor performance of the first cars N01 and S01. Nezha V and Zero Run T03 were created respectively, and the delivery volume of the two companies after the two models were listed was qualitatively improved.
How much do the waist forces not want to be left behind in terms of quantity?
In order to increase the volume, the two main models are priced below 100,000 yuan, Nezha even decisively stopped the production of N01 with similar pricing, and four months after V was listed, launched its second mass production car Nezha U upgraded version of the U Pro, although called Pro, but the starting price was pulled from 150,000 to 99,800 yuan.
Since then, Nezha has drawn a very beautiful curve, which has also been favored by the 360 and Ningde eras. Although zero run has experienced a slump in production capacity for more than half a year, it has also begun to increase its volume recently.
Interestingly, in addition to efforts to increase sales, the two waist forces also particularly like to make a fuss about sales data, zero run and other car companies only publish delivery is different, but also announced the number of orders, and from June last year to January this year, the number of orders in the public account push has been placed in the most conspicuous position; and Nezha Automobile also frequently announced the proportion of individual users last year.
The implication is that one means that my products can be sold, and the other means that my sales have a mass base and are full of desire to survive. Of course, it is much better than another brand that seems to be a new force that has fallen behind and announced sales in a "look at the mood".
In fact, compared with the models launched by other new car-making forces, Nezha V is more moderate in terms of shape, performance and intelligence, but it is precisely because it has seized the market gap that it has been able to stand out, for models below 100,000, as the first car in the family, practicality is often the primary factor.
Although mini cars are sought after by young people and short-distance travel, it is actually difficult to cover the needs of family cars. We inquired about models of the same level, and there are only 15 models of pure electric SUVs below 100,000, most of which are still for the B-end market.
Thanks to the team of BAIC BJEV, Nezha is still more sensitive in the market than the "layman" of zero running, which is one of the reasons why Nezha is faster than zero running in terms of growth.
However, in the iteration of the third generation of models, Zero Run has also shown its ability to actively learn from experience and continuously optimize.
The best defense is offense
After having a little amount of foundation, Nezha and Zero Run began to align with the price increase.
In October last year, zero-run's third production model, the C11, officially began to be delivered, drawing on the shortcomings of the niche market of the first car and the shortcomings of the low gross profit of the second car. Zero Run has honestly built a Volkswagen "favorite" SUV, and has also raised its own price to 150,000-200,000 yuan.
In this range, zero-run is no longer a fight with A00-class cars such as Hongguang MINI and Black Cat, but competes with Xiaopeng G3i, BYD Song Plus EV, Volkswagen ID.3/4, Ean V and other models.
Similarly, Nezha's fourth mass-produced model Nezha S will also be listed this year, from the publicity of some of the information learned, the car has higher performance and intelligent configuration, may be Nezha's first stand on the 200,000 yuan price model. However, this range will also face strong competitors such as P7/P5, Model 3, BYDHan EV and so on.
Why are Nezha and Zero Run unwilling to continue to cultivate the low-end market? On the one hand, it is a low gross profit factor, on the other hand, it may be unwilling to passively defend and wait for the rest of the brands to ride the face output.
Overall, the capacity of the low-end market is large enough, and the current competition is also small. If the dividends of the mid-to-high-end market in 2020-2021 are gradually released, then perhaps 2022 is the time for companies such as Nezha and Zero Run to stand on the card table and share the cake. This has been evident in sales since the end of last year to the beginning of the year.
However, in the long run, this is not a long-term solution, and there is not much time left for Nezha and Zero Run to enjoy the exclusive market. Not only to face the dimensionality reduction blow of high-end brands, but also to face some car companies that retreat to the second place.
At present, most of the new energy vehicle companies are aimed at the high-end market to give the waist power development space, such as Wei Xiaoli price is in the range of 200,000-500,000, and the brands transformed from traditional car companies, such as Jihu, Salon, Extreme Krypton, Lantu, etc. are also undertaking the goal of getting rid of the low-end image for traditional car companies for many years.
However, the high-end can not accommodate so many "luxury brands" after all, there must be some companies in the high-end fold and then will turn to the low-end market, in addition to new forces such as Weilai, Tesla, but also in order to expand market share to the mass market, such as Tesla Model 3 and the model Q that has been passed on for a long time, Weilai began to plan a new brand last year.
After all, in the context of software-defined hardware, or many of them have more than one share of the competition.
From top to bottom has always been more relaxed, such as Hongguang MINI EV after the explosion, many companies have begun to step up the production of A00-class micro pure trams, such as Euler, Zero Run, Chery, etc., even if it is impossible to copy the explosion of Wuling, but also a good share.
In the low-end market, performance and intelligence can be disregarded, and controlling costs is often the first productivity.
Although Zero Run constantly emphasizes the cost advantages and system advantages of global self-development, all of this needs to be built on the degree of reaching a certain scale, and the performance of T03 in the A00-level market is not outstanding.
However, in the high-end market, consumers will not be so "tolerant", service, after-sales, brand power, interior, performance will all be included in the scope of assessment. If the low-end model is a single subject examination, then the high-end model is more like a general examination, and there can be a certain subject that is more prominent, but it is never allowed to have a partial subject.
This will be a big test for the waist forces that are trying to move upwards.
Go a different way
Zero run put away their own unique product concept, Nezha gave up the B-end, it seems that the two are very similar, are first the amount of price, first low and then high, in fact, the two are somewhat like Huawei and Millet, taking two completely different paths.
Because of the back of the world's second largest security Dahua shares, zero running from the beginning in the emphasis on self-research, such as the Lingxin 01 that took several years to develop, although it is not as good as the journey 3 in the same period in terms of data, but perhaps like Huawei's K3V2, it has taken the first step in the long march and also helped to form a high-end image.
On the contrary, in order to ensure survival, Nezha opened up the B-end market, entered the sinking market early, and even did not establish sales channels in first-tier cities in the early stage. This also causes its brand power to be weak.
We observe that generally after a car company releases two or three cars, volkswagen's perception of the brand will gradually be fixed. Like Xiaopeng and Zero Run are gradually rising, and based on the experience and lessons of the last time, they have come up with good products in the second or third models, and have initially been recognized by the market, such as Xiaopeng P7 and Zero Run C11, which are in a rising trend of brand and product power.
Therefore, in the current situation, each model is particularly important, to paraphrase Li Xiang's words, "the rhythm of entrepreneurship". At present, Nezha's brand power is lacking, and choosing to directly join the competition of Tesla, Xiaopeng, BYD and other car companies is not necessarily a good choice. On the contrary, in the high-end of the car company melee, the model that chooses to continue to cultivate below 200,000 may have a better chance of killing the bloody road.
So why choose to launch Nezha S? Perhaps this was an attempt by Nezha rather than a desperate gamble.
On the one hand, car companies will never put them under the same brand when they are high-end or launch low-end products, so as not to affect each other. On the other hand, after Nezha turned to the C-end market, the external propaganda caliber has always been based on the masses, which is actually similar to what Lei Jun said when he founded Xiaomi - to let everyone enjoy the fun of science and technology.
If you continue to enter the middle and high-end under this slogan, it seems a bit contradictory.
In fact, Nezha began to lay out directly operated stores in first- and second-tier cities in April 2020, and there have been more than 70 so far. Different from the previous sinking market, at this time, it is obviously unattractive to put Nezha V, U and other models in direct stores, and Nezha S is more like the entry ticket for Nezha to enter the first- and second-tier markets. At the same time, the launch of Nezha S is also a experience that can be used as a reference for high-end in the future.
On the one hand, it is laying out sales channels in first- and second-tier cities, and on the other hand, Nezha is also one of the new forces that went to sea earlier. Unlike Weilai and Xiaopeng who chose the European market, Xiaomi generally aimed at Southeast Asia, and the right-hand drive version of Nezha V in the first half of this year will officially enter the Thai market.
On the contrary, the zero run itself brand has not yet been fixed, on the one hand, it is related to its small sales, on the other hand, it is also a lack of publicity. And zero running wants to go up, at present, it also needs the continuous improvement of the self-research system, self-development and self-production must experience a wave of pain, but after the pain of the brand has ushered in the dawn, BYD, Huawei are so.
At present, the new forces of car-making have great uncertainty, especially for waist forces such as Nezha and Zero Run, we do not label which model is good or bad, but to see that it is not easy for the waist to survive.
Nezha deeply cultivates low-end models and waits for opportunities to look for opportunities to move upwards, while zero runs on the self-research road full of thorns. Under the wave of new energy, they are also trying to contribute their own strength.