How "fierce" is the competition in the SUV segment of the 150,000-200,000 level? Perhaps with such a set of data can prove that there are 155 models on sale, although the market share of the joint venture brand is only about 35%, the "right to speak" and sales volume of this level of the market are still mainly concentrated in the hands of the head joint venture brand.
According to the annual sales data of the Association of Automobile Associations in 2021, the Honda CR-V in this level of market is still the "top seller", and the sales volume of Toyota RAV4 Rongfang has even achieved a year-on-year increase of 17.3%. For comparison, the overall growth rate of the SUV segment in 2021 is only 3%.
Therefore, when the competition becomes more and more fierce, and the footsteps of these joint venture old guns in the Chinese market are getting deeper and deeper, the market will always question and torture the inertia of the new "entrants".
For example, ford lingrui, which recently opened a pre-sale, has attracted the attention of the market. The main reason is that the product competition strategy presented by Ford Lingrui and the pre-sale price of 158,800 yuan have staged a new game of "dimensionality reduction and attack" compact SUV for medium-sized SUVs. In this way, from the perspective of ford lingrui's product positioning, although it is positioned in a medium-sized SUV, Ford lingrui is aiming at the compact SUV segment represented by Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4.
As the saying goes, "a soldier who doesn't want to be a general is not a good soldier." So, the same is aimed at the market demand of "family cars", one is the market sales crown with a solid foundation of word of mouth, the other is the market after the wave of strength, how should Honda CR-V and Ford Lingrui choose in the end? In other words, as a "newcomer" in the market, is there any possibility of Impacting the "Pin Crown"?
Family travel, pay attention to all aspects
In Maslow's pyramid of human needs, from the bottom up, there are physiological needs to ensure survival - security needs - social needs - respect needs - self-actualization needs. As a family car, there are also different levels of demand.
Combining most of the consumer groups in the 100,000-200,000 market segment, the user portrait focuses more on practicality, durability, reliability, stability and brand premium, we believe that on the basis of basic mechanical quality, from the bottom up should be safety demand - quality demand - intelligent demand - driving demand.
To meet the needs of family travel, safety and quality comfort, although most home SUVs have common points, are also the key to pulling apart differences.
Take Ford Lingrui and Honda CR-V, in the lowest safety dimension, in order to meet the needs of Chinese consumer groups, and honda CR-V as the representative of the joint venture SUV obsessed with the past "price determines value" idea is different, in the value war in full swing at the moment, Ford Lingrui first refused to be graded by price in safety, and the active and passive safety was leading at the same level.
Among them, in the passive safety configuration, the Ford Lingrui system is equipped with 6 airbags as standard. In contrast, the Honda CR-V, which lacks a rear exhaust bladder, looks slightly thinner. Not only that, Ford Lingrui is also equipped with the class's unique exclusive children's intelligent car seat interaction system, which can be highly matched with the car machine, and the user can know the specific situation of the child in the front row.
Frankly speaking, perhaps this function can not open a big gap with the Honda CR-V and other joint venture old guns, but from the perspective of the Chinese family, children as the softest feelings in the hearts of parents, the installation of this function, but also let Ford Lingrui have a more "personality" and "flexibility" in the homogeneous home SUV market.
Under this meticulous research and development thinking of car seats, Lingrui is also very suitable for the preferences of Chinese consumers in terms of quality. For example, unlike Honda's flexibility advantage as a space magician in space combination, Lingrui emphasizes a direct comfort experience, so although strictly speaking, Lingrui's body size is decent in the mid-size SUV market, but it has an overwhelming advantage in the compact SUV market.
For another example, in order to maintain the health of the interior environment, Ford Lingrui is also equipped with a 5A-class CN95 intelligent health cockpit. The air purification in the car of the same level of CR-V can only be seen on high-end and top-mate models.
Turn the short board of the joint venture into a "long board"
If the difference in safety and quality makes lingrui's entire product matrix and CR-V produce a "difference", then the reinforcement of intelligent technology that was once regarded as the "short board" of the joint venture is undoubtedly the key to "amplifying" this difference.
As another blockbuster model of "Ford China 2.0 Strategy", in order to cater to the trend of the era of intelligence, as well as to meet the needs of smart car life, different from Honda CR-V's product strategy of "price determines value", as a standard to measure whether a car has a "modern" color, Ford Lingrui has adopted a "entry is high" competitive strategy in intelligent technology, safety configuration and quality sense, and Lingrui has also pulled the entry-level intelligent technology configuration "very full".
Let me give you an example. In the installation of intelligent driving assistance configuration, ford Co-Pilot360 intelligent driving assistance system equipped with Ford Co-Pilot360 intelligent driving assistance system has more than 20 intelligent driving assistance configurations, and basically covers multiple driving scenarios such as parking, reversing, lane change, and traffic jams.
In contrast, Honda CR-V, the above-mentioned driver assistance technology configuration is basically only seen in the middle and high-end models, the entry-level version of intelligent driving assistance is relatively simple, and most of the commonly used intelligent driving assistance configurations are still not equipped.
It is worth mentioning that on the basis of this rich advantage, the above intelligent driving assistance configuration is not only for some novice drivers, or some more complex travel conditions, such as Chongqing, such as a mountain city, with more curves, most bridges and tunnels and complex congestion, which improves not only safety, but also the convenience and pleasure of driving.
In our view, Ford Lingrui's rich intelligent technology is the key to the demands of young user groups that have grown up from the Internet: not to show off, but to make car life safer, smarter, interesting and diverse.
On this basis, Ford Lingrui also continues to be equipped with a double 12.3-inch suspension integrated screen as standard, equipped with the latest Tencent TAI 4.0 intelligent car machine system, with OTA, AR real-life navigation, WeChat one-click start and other rich intelligent configurations.
You know, most of the popular joint venture compact SUVs have a maximum screen size of only 10.1 inches, of which the Honda CR-V's central control screen size is only 7 inches, and the whole series of models do not support OTA upgrades. From this dimension, in terms of intelligent car experience, compared with CR-V, Lingrui is also better.
The texture of daily driving, both cars have their own advantages
Returning to the essential core needs of driving control, in the daily driving process, the driving control texture is the key core selling point of a car. This is also why in the 150,000-200,000 SUV segment, even if the domestic brand has pulled the configuration full, the joint venture brand always has the key right to speak.
It is undeniable that no matter how the demand of the times and the main body of consumption change, power technology is still the existence of users in the process of car purchase. This is like mentioning Honda, the first time you think of Honda's "earth dream" engine of "buying an engine to deliver a car", the importance of power technology is not obvious.
At present, the Honda CR-V entry-level version uses a 1.5T Earth Dream engine. This engine is more to impress the market with the durable advantages of efficient fuel efficiency and low failure rate, although the power output of the Honda 1.5T Earth Dream engine is also relatively strong, but with other brands constantly breaking down technical barriers, the power advantage of Honda's 1.5T Earth Dream engine has gradually been diluted.
Under the demand of most home SUVs to pursue practical economy, Honda CR-V does meet the needs of the market well, but for the user groups that pursue driving pleasure in terms of economical and practical home needs, the driving control texture of cr-V that is more inclined to comfortable tuning has been in the past for a long time, and it is inevitable that it will be a little boring. The American car, which emphasizes the calm tuning style, is very different from the Japanese car that focuses on comfort.
Under the power of the EcoBoost170 engine and the dual-clutch transmission of the latest model of the EcoBoost series, although the same displacement is 1.5T, in terms of power performance, the power specifications of Ford Lingrui are more eye-catching, and this engine can output up to 260N·m of torque. For comparison, the CR-V's 1.5T Earth Dream engine has a maximum torque of 243N·m.
In terms of gearbox, the CVT gearbox equipped with cr-V has a smooth and comfortable shift logic, but the disadvantage is that the speed is slow. The dual-clutch gearbox equipped with Lingrui has the advantage of fast gear change speed and high torque. In addition, the newly designed chassis and suspension have also been tuned to Trust-Mark Ford's global standards, which not only meet the driving pleasure, but also inherit Ford's durable quality.
Overall, from the perspective of family cars, CR-V and Lingrui are two completely different driving control styles, CR-V is more focused on the comfortable driving control texture, while Lingrui is more inclined to more powerful power output. Although each has its own advantages, for young people, it can satisfy both the family and the individual's leadership, and it seems to be more appetizing to young people.
Red dot observation:
Looking back, it is not difficult to find that the launch of Ford Lingrui is not only an important part of Ford's implementation of the "Ford China 2.0 Strategy", but also a key step for Ford to regain Ford's confidence in the most competitive 150,000-200,000-level joint venture SUV market.
From the perspective of product competitiveness in all aspects, the "standard strength" of Ford Lingrui product configuration is not small, and this also brings a larger growth range to the entry-level model.
This month, Lingrui is about to usher in the listing, it can be believed that under this wave of "entry-level high-matching" operation, Lingrui is shortlisted in the mainstream echelon, perhaps it is only a matter of time!