Oil prices are rising, and more and more consumers are considering buying new energy vehicles. Taking Tesla as an example, the domestic Model 3 and Model Y are still in short supply after subsidies have declined and the price has been raised, and the new car booking cycle has been extended to 16-20 weeks.
Market guidance is only one aspect. The "14th Five-Year Plan" recently released by Beijing even mentioned that by reducing the total amount of oil used in vehicles, the current stock of private cars should be guided to "oil for electricity".
Therefore, Xiao Yaqing, minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said in a public interview that the overall sales of new energy vehicles this year will greatly exceed expectations.
This confidence comes from the substantial growth of new energy vehicles in the first two months of this year. The full monthly sales statistics in January this year show that the total sales of new energy passenger cars were 419,000 units, an increase of 138% year-on-year; the most prominent data came from plug-in hybrid models, and the sales performance of 85,000 units brought about a double year-on-year increase.
For those consumers who need to buy more trams, pure electric vehicles are not the only option. Whether it is the mainstream family market or the luxury car market, plug-in hybrid vehicles still show great potential this year.
Again, the sales of new energy vehicles in January this year are used as an example. Wuling Hongguang MINIEV ranked first with 26682 units, followed by two BYD plug-in models, namely BYD Qin PLUS DM, 18449 units, and BYD Song DM, 16411 vehicles. In the top 5 sales of new energy vehicles in January, there were 3 plug-in models.
Obviously, at the moment when the endurance of pure electric vehicles is no longer anxious and infrastructure is no longer a constraint, there are still many consumers who are willing to buy plug-in hybrid models, which are mainly driven by three factors:
A new generation of plug-and-mix technology of independent brands represented by BYD and Great Wall WEY brands;
The new force range extender hybrid model represented by the ideal and lantu;
BBA-based luxury brand plug-in hybrid models.
At the beginning of 2021, BYD and Great Wall Motors successively released the Super Hybrid DM-i and The Lemon Hybrid DHT, both of which adopted the strategy of efficient internal combustion engine and electric matching, changing the embarrassing problem of the high fuel consumption of plug-and-mix models in the past under the condition of power loss. In particular, BYD Qin PLUS and Song, two mainstream compact cars, can also be controlled at 4L/100km after being equipped with DM-i technology.
This actually explains that BYD Qin and Song's plug-and-mix models have been in a hot selling state after they were listed. In the compact family car market of 100,000-150,000 yuan, BYD's plug-in and hybrid models have an absolute advantage in economy. Taking the 132,800 yuan Qin PLUS DM-i 120KM Premium Edition as an example, the pure electric state can travel more than 120 kilometers, and the fuel consumption of 100 kilometers under WLTC conditions is only 4.36L. Even if it only uses a 1.5-liter self-priming engine, the book parameters are much better than the old 1.8L used by Toyota Raelic Dual Engine.
Obvious economic advantages, license plates and purchase tax incentives enjoyed by plug-in models have become important considerations for ordinary income people when buying a car for the first time. Moreover, in the past two years, BYD's improvement in design and the reputation driven by BYD Han have actually enabled a considerable number of young consumers to put aside their prejudices, and even DM-i technology has once become the capital bragged by Di fans.
Riding on the sales volume and word of mouth in 2021, in the context of rising oil prices this year, it is expected that the compact BYD DM-i model will have few sales. However, as DM-i models continue to enter the market, BYD's hybrid technology has also been questioned a lot, especially the lack of power of the 1.5L self-priming engine, resulting in many power problems at a speed of more than 100 kilometers per hour, even consumers who mainly commute in the city will hesitate.
In addition, the hot sales of self-owned brand plug-in and hybrid models are currently limited to the main economic family car market. Last year, BYD launched the DM-i super hybrid to change the technical strategy and weaken the performance advantage, mainly because the performance-oriented plug-and-mix model of the independent brand could not compete with the stronger joint venture model in the higher price segment, and entered the price segment of more than 200,000 yuan, and a number of pure electric models with stronger performance also became fierce enemies.
This situation not only exists in the performance-oriented BYD Tang DM, Han DM, Great Wall Motor WEY brand's latest flagship model Mocha PHEV is also difficult to open the market.
Another important growth point for this year's plug-in models comes from new forces, especially the ideal car.
Before the ideal ONE, the extended-range hybrid car could hardly find a place in the hybrid market, and the BMW i3 and Buick Velite 5 that had appeared in the past had become victims of the times. The ideal ONE's strategy of adopting range extender hybrid is not the biggest factor that impresses consumers, it just bypasses the positive competition with the same level of pure electric vehicles, and takes "enjoying new energy preferential policies and no endurance anxiety" as an inexcusable advantage.
Since the ideal ONE launched the annual model update in 2021, its monthly sales have been maintained at 8,000-10,000 vehicles, not only thriving in the 300,000 yuan or more intermingling market, but also always sitting in the top three of the new forces. In fact, there is a lot of controversy around the ideal ONE's extended-range hybrid technology, 1.5T three-cylinder is one of them, and smoothness is also a problem that has been criticized.
However, in the face of the ideal ONE's other long boards - such as shape, space layout, intelligence, especially the existence of a unique copy of the same level, so that consumers do not care too much about which kind of insertion it is.
Even because of the success of the ideal ONE, it attracted Lantu FREE, Qingjie AITO and Niuchuang Self-Youjia NV, entering the 300,000 yuan market as an extended range hybrid + pure electric. In December last year, Landu Free once rushed to the top five of high-end new energy vehicles of more than 300,000 yuan with a score of 3138 vehicles.
For potential users of the ideal ONE, the soaring oil price only stimulates them to make a decision as soon as possible - the extended range hybrid is not without burning oil, and even its strategy of charging the motor with the engine has made the average fuel consumption of 100 kilometers to more than 8L, which is not competitive with the same level of pure electric vehicles.
But it is worth mentioning that the ideal ONE can provide 188 kilometers of NEDC pure electric endurance, is the highest level of the current plug-in hybrid model, it is different from BYD's main economic plug-and-mix model strategy, longer pure electric mileage encourages users to use pure electric driving more, the overall calculation, in the absence of mileage anxiety under the condition, economy and comfort have become factors that impress consumers.
In areas that are not often concerned by ordinary consumers, luxury brands of plug-and-mix models are also ushering in new growth. In addition to the perennial sales of the BMW 5 Series, including the Wrangler 4xe, Mercedes-Benz GLE 350e and even the Land Rover Discovery Sports PHEV have also become a new choice for the rich to highlight their personalization.
Jeep mentioned in its January sales that the Wrangler 4xe sold 249 units, accounting for 8.4% of JEEP brand sales. That's a pretty good number.
In fact, in the price segment where luxury brand plug-in models are located, consumers will no longer take fuel consumption as the main appeal. For example, the two Mercedes-Benz GLE 350e models priced at more than 800,000 yuan have a pure electric endurance of 88/103 kilometers, which belongs to the mainstream level of luxury, but there is user feedback that the power failure after turning on the air conditioner in the winter is very serious; the acceleration of 7.4 seconds per 100 kilometers is not called outstanding performance. However, for a large car like Mercedes-Benz GLE COUPE, the fuel consumption of WTLC's 100 km is 2.0L/100km, and the fuel consumption of 100 km in normal mode is also about 5-6L, which is still significantly different from the fuel version of more than 100 km fuel consumption.
Of course, at this level, consumers buy luxury brand plug-in hybrid models are mainly additional purchases, more emphasis on scarcity, high-grade texture, in the plug-in mix and pure electricity choice, rarely put endurance anxiety and charging facilities in the first consideration, and even compared to the pure electric experience of less than 100 kilometers, they are more willing to retain the feeling of driving fuel vehicles.
As for whether there is a current car and the length of time to pick up the car, it will affect these budget-rich candidates to buy a luxury brand, the performance is not outstanding plug-in model.
Asteron summary
In the face of the strict dual credit policy, more and more car companies have launched hybrid models, especially plug-in hybrid models, which is a necessary stage for car companies to upgrade by using existing models before they make great strides towards pure electric. Judging from the market trend in the past year, consumers are still willing to choose powerful plug-in models, and for them, this is also the best transition plan before making great strides towards pure electric.
However, the plug-and-mix model actually presents a dumbbell-type development pattern similar to that of pure electric vehicles, low-priced compact family cars, high-priced luxury performance cars are more popular, in the 200,000 yuan price segment of the main joint venture, like Volkswagen plug-in mix, Toyota plug-in mix has not been able to open this market.
Figure | Sourced from the web
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