FAW Audi Sales Co., Ltd., Audi FAW New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd. The establishment of these two companies is no less significant to Audi in the Chinese market than the inclusion of Audi cars in FAW-Volkswagen production 27 years ago.
The former was established in December 2020, registered in Hangzhou, and wholly owned by FAW-Volkswagen. The latter was established in March 2021, with Germany's Audi 55 percent, Volkswagen China's 5 percent, and FAW's remaining 40 percent in the hands of FAW – that is, Audi is the dominant player in the new new energy vehicle company. The new energy models produced by the latter will be sold by the former.
In the era of transition from fuel vehicles to electric vehicles, in the case of faw-Volkswagen Audi's established framework is difficult to modify, Audi has chosen to start a new stove in China, with a new energy vehicle company led by itself and an independent sales subsidiary, smoothing the pace towards the next era.
Just last week, Audi FAW New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd. officially launched its plant in Changchun, started construction in April this year, and will be completed at the end of 2024, producing three models under the PPE platform jointly developed by Audi and Porsche.
However, whether it is the progress of the factory, the key time node, the competitiveness and subsequent development of the product, audi's electrification process in China is still so step-by-step compared with those fierce opponents.
In 2025, 3 models, 150,000 production capacity?
Audi FAW BJEV's new plant in Changchun, with a total area of 2.46 million square meters and a planned annual production capacity of 150,000 units, will take a total of 32 months according to the construction time from April 2022 to December 2024.
In contrast, the first phase of Tesla's Shanghai factory covers an area of 860,000 square meters, and the current annual production capacity can be pulled to 700,000-750,000 vehicles, which has taken a total of 15 months based on the cumulative construction of the two phases of the project.
In other words, Tesla's Shanghai factory uses 1/3 of the area of Audi Changchun New Energy Factory to achieve 5 times its production capacity, and the factory construction time is only half of it. In this way, the expansion of the production capacity of Audi's new energy plant should still have great potential.
There may be two reasons for this. On the one hand, the close connection with local governments makes it possible for Audi to roll out the production line of new energy with the idea of taking land first and then gradually building. On the other hand, Tesla's high requirements for production capacity also determine that its factory construction style must maximize the efficiency of every inch of land.
However, compared with the production problems, the three new energy vehicles that Audi will put into production will attract more attention.
All three new cars come from the PPE platform jointly developed by Audi and Porsche, namely the Q6L e-tron, Q6L e-tron Sportback and E6L. If you have to correspond to Audi's existing fuel vehicle system, it can be understood as the electric version of the Q5L, Q5L Sportback and A6L – which corresponds completely to the current FAW-Volkswagen Audi product matrix.
This is also the current BBA's consistent idea on electric vehicles, that is, through the continuation of product planning and naming, consumers under the original fuel vehicle system can find completely corresponding products under the electric vehicle system, whether it is the size and form level of the model or the price.
At present, of the three models, only the E6L concept car is officially unveiled, that is, the A6 e-tron concept that debuted at last year's Shanghai Auto Show. This is more like an electric concept car that combines A6 and A7, and the overall style still maintains a high degree of inheritance with Audi in the era of fuel vehicles, and it is basically above the mainstream level in the basic three-electric performance.
However, this model, which is expected to be put into production in 2024 and is really in 2025, the basic parameters are even placed in today's 2022, whether it is mileage or acceleration performance, in fact, it is not too surprising. Considering that in 2022-2023, the large-size models of the new car-making forces have been listed one after another, Tesla's new Model S is expected to be delivered in China, and the late Audi E6L has little advantage in core product strength. Especially after 2-3 years of overall industrial development, the form of electric vehicles in 2025 will certainly change greatly compared with today. For Audi and for the BBA, the competition it faces will be cross-dimensional.
As for the other two electric SUVs, there is not much news at this time. However, under the same platform and consistent concept, the design, technology and performance of SUVs and cars are believed to remain highly consistent.
In this way, Audi New Energy's annual production capacity plan of 150,000 vehicles is still conservative. In 2021, Audi sold a total of 691,000 vehicles in China, of which the A6L and Q5L sold 155,500 and 137,800 units, respectively. If it is completely equalized by electrification, the planned production capacity of 150,000 units is only half of the current sales of A6L and Q5L.
How long will the life cycle of a PPE platform be?
The planning of the entire Volkswagen Group on the electric vehicle platform, from the perspective of the development of these years, is in the process of continuous optimization and integration.
At the beginning, the Volkswagen Group chose to carry out electrification on the MQB and MLB fuel vehicle platforms, and after the transition period, the MEB electric vehicle platform developed by Volkswagen led by Volkswagen accumulated three/five models in the north and south of Volkswagen.
However, from the perspective of body size, the three models currently in production do not seem to be as easy to retract as Volkswagen in the era of fuel vehicles in terms of body ductility. The wheelbase of the ID.3 and ID.4 is exactly the same, with differences in width; on the ID.4 and ID.6, the width is almost the same (nuances are expected only to be surrounded by wheel arches), and the wheelbase changes. In other words, at least the current Volkswagen has not yet made a model based on the MEB platform, which scales in the direction of the X-axis and the Y-axis at the same time.
The three new energy vehicles put into production by Audi this time are PPE platforms led by Audi and jointly developed by Audi and Porsche. In addition, the Volkswagen Group has a J1 platform developed under the leadership of Porsche.
In fact, the platform hardware gap in the electric age is much smaller than in the fuel era. Compared with the MEB platform, the PPE platform differs mainly in the use of multi-link front suspension, support for air suspension, support for torque distribution and rear wheel steering, support for 800V high voltage, and the rear wheel no longer uses drum brakes.
It is not difficult to see that these differences are either differences in electrical and electronic architecture, and the differences in mechanical structure are almost "different for the sake of difference". Considering that the leading developers of each platform are different, this is more like a "project competition" between different brands within the Volkswagen Group.
In the "money-burning" stage of the transition from fuel vehicles to electric vehicles, this multi-platform strategy may bring duplicate investment and waste of resources. While the highly vertically integrated development model has gradually begun to spread in the automotive industry, Volkswagen is also thinking about how to improve efficiency as much as possible, increase the scale and profitability of the platform, and enhance the profitability of the group.
The result will inevitably be a merger of the MEB platform and the PPE platform, which is the SSP platform that will be put into production in 2026. The Volkswagen Group expects that during the life cycle of the SSP platform, there will be more than 40 million vehicles covering almost all brands such as Volkswagen, Skoda, Seat, Audi, Lamborghini, Bentley, Porsche, etc., from the platform.
In other words, the new Audi PPE car produced in 2024 will face a platform switch after two years.
However, considering the increasingly fierce competition in the era of electric vehicles, this high-level platform integration logic is usually high-level to low-level redundancy, and the integration occurs at the level of electrical and electronic architecture and software, and the change of mechanical structure can fully imitate the current subdivision practices of MQB-A and MQB-B, and plan multiple sub-platforms such as SSP1, SSP 2, SSP 3 and so on.
Therefore, for Audi's PPE new car, we don't need to worry too much about the mechanical level, which is the strength of traditional car companies and the strength of the Audi brand. What we would like to see is that the new software platform planned by the Volkswagen Group can be substantially equipped with ppE new cars after being domestically produced, and in the process of switching from PPE platform to SSP platform, it can also achieve seamless upgrades in experience.
Perhaps, for most consumers, the switching of the platform is just a concept, especially when in the future platform, the mechanical structure is only the foundation, more focused on the changes in electronics, electrical and software. At this time, the degree of attention and resource investment of Volkswagen Group to software is the key to whether Audi electric vehicles can truly stand in the market and continue the brand value of the fuel vehicle era after three years.
Write at the end
Whether it is BMW's i series, Mercedes-Benz's EQ series, or Audi's upcoming series of new electric cars, their common feature is to make every effort to maintain the product system and value system of the fuel vehicle era. Because the proportion of electric vehicles in BBA sales is very low, BMW, which accounts for the highest proportion of new energy sales in 2021, is only 5.97%, and Mercedes-Benz and Audi are only 2.25% and 1.83%. When the sales of fuel vehicles are safe, the BBA will inevitably face the pain of switching in the launch of electric vehicles.
The competition facing Audi electric new cars is 2025, when the intelligent electric vehicle track has already been fully opened. Electric vehicles above 400,000 yuan will have subversive differences in the competitive landscape compared with now. Perhaps in Europe, the decision-makers of these old luxury brands can still be relieved, but in China, the competition for smart electric vehicles in 3 years will certainly not develop as linearly as today's fuel vehicles.