On the evening of March 1, GAC Aeon released its February sales data. According to the data, GAC Aeon sold 8,526 new vehicles in February, an increase of 163% year-on-year.
According to previous data, from July last year to January this year, GAC Aeon has sold more than 10,000 units per month for seven consecutive months, and in January this year, it reached a record high, achieving a good result of 16,031 units per month. However, judging from the sales volume in February, this situation has not been extended.
From the perspective of reasons, the Spring Festival holiday is an important influencing factor. As we all know, February this year is basically in the off-season of post-holiday sales, and at the same time, the number of working days affected by the Spring Festival holiday is reduced, and the short-term support for the slowdown in market demand is insufficient, and the sales of car companies will inevitably be affected. At present, in addition to GAC Aian, Weilai Automobile, Xiaopeng Automobile, Ideal Automobile and other car companies have also announced February sales, although the performance is mostly better than the same period last year, but it is basically in a downward trend from a month-on-month perspective.
Therefore, on the whole, gagae Aeon's monthly sales of 8,526 vehicles in February are still at a good level. Behind this sales performance is the contribution of many models of GAC Aean.
At last year's Guangzhou Auto Show, GAC Aeon brought a brand new model, the AION LX PLUS. In January this year, the AION LX PLUS was officially launched, and a total of four models were launched with new cars, priced at a price range of 286,660-459,600 yuan. It is reported that the new car adopts the latest family design language, and is equipped with a "sponge silicon anode plate battery" in terms of power, and the clTC comprehensive working condition cruising range can reach 1008km.
AION LX PLUS; Image source: GAC Aeon
Prior to this, GAC Aeon already had three models, AION Y, AION S PLUS, and AION V PLUS, and all of them had good sales performance. With the addition of AION LX PLUS, GAC Aeon's product matrix has been further enriched, covering market segments such as small cars, compact cars, and mid-size SUVs.
At the beginning of this year, the 2022 AION S PLUS model was also officially launched. It is reported that the new car has launched a total of 4 models with a price range of 153,800-179,800 yuan. As a redesigned model, the number of models has been streamlined by the new car, the previous 410 km endurance version of the model has been cancelled, and the configuration of each model has been adjusted to a certain extent, and the level of intelligence has been further improved.
The launch of new models is expected to promote the continuous rapid growth of GAC Aean's sales. In addition, GAC Aegean is also rapidly expanding its production capacity to cope with the subsequent sales explosion in the new energy vehicle market.
According to the data, GAC Aean's cumulative terminal sales in 2021 reached 123,660 units, although the annual production capacity of the Aeon plant was only 100,000 units before. GAC Aean has revealed that in the face of growing market demand, the continuous hot sales of AION family products, and the impact of unfavorable factors such as the epidemic and lack of core, Aion has previously used its production capacity to the extreme, and the peak capacity utilization rate once exceeded 160%, which brought great pressure to the existing production capacity of the Aion plant, and capacity upgrading is imperative.
On February 18 this year, GAC Aeon announced the completion of the second phase of its smart ecological plant capacity expansion project. In view of this, GAC Aegean's annual production capacity has been smoothly increased to 200,000 units.
The second phase of the capacity expansion project of GAC Aean Intelligent Ecological Factory was completed; Image source: GAC Aeon
In addition, at the end of December last year, GAC Group also deliberated and passed the "Proposal on the Capacity Construction Project of the Second Plant of GAC Aean", and agreed to the implementation of the capacity construction project of the second plant of its subsidiary GAC Aean New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd., with a planned production capacity of 200,000 units per year, which will be completed and put into operation in December 2022. This means that GAC Aean will have an annual production capacity of 400,000 units.
With the advancement of the expansion plan, the supply of new vehicle production capacity of GAC Aean will be fully guaranteed, which can effectively meet the needs of consumer orders, and is expected to further increase the sales volume of GAC Aean.
In addition, it is worth noting that at the end of November last year, GAC Group deliberated and passed the "Proposal on THE RESTRUCTURING AND CAPITAL INCREASE OF GAC AEAN Assets". According to the plan, GAC Aeon will undertake R&D personnel in the field of pure electric new energy of GAC Research Institute, and implement internal asset restructuring through cash capital increase, asset injection, cash purchase and capital reserve conversion to increase registered capital.
Specifically, the relevant plans include: GAC Group increased the capital of GAC Aean with 7.407 billion yuan in cash, GAC Passenger Vehicle increased its capital to GAC Aean with physical assets such as production equipment of 3.557 billion yuan; GAC Aeon purchased intangible assets and fixed assets related to the pure electric new energy field of GAC Research Institute and GAC Passenger Vehicle by paying 4.975 billion yuan in cash and bearing liabilities; GAC Aeon will increase its registered capital with part of its capital reserve.
According to the plan, after the completion of the A round of financing, GAC AE will use the capital market to seek to list at an appropriate time to build an independent capital market platform and a market-oriented incentive mechanism. Jiang Xueqing of Orient Securities said that the acceleration of mixed reform is expected to continue to enhance the competitiveness of GAC E-An and promote the long-term sustainable development of GAC E-An.