Yu Chengdong's key battle, AITO Q&I M5 began to deliver to customers

Economic Observation Network reporter Wang Shuaiguo after Cyrus Huawei's smart selection of SF5 "did not succeed", the first model of the AITO brand asked the world M5 to become the key car that determines whether Huawei can turn the situation around. On March 5, AITO M5 officially opened delivery in more than 100 user centers in 36 cities across the country, and will be tested by the market and consumers.

Looking back at the development of the AITO brand, it has only been established for more than 3 months, but it is a new high-end intelligent car brand that is highly valued by both Xilix and Huawei. In December 2021, Jinkang Cyrus released aiTO, a high-end smart car brand cooperated with Huawei, for the first time, and unveiled the brand's first model, the Q&A M5.

On December 23, 2021, Huawei officially released the Q&I M5, which is positioned as a mid-size SUV equipped with harmonyOS smart cockpit, which huawei called "the first Hongmeng car". This car undertakes the dual mission of whether Huawei can become popular in the automobile market and whether Xilis's parent company Xiaokang shares can take off with the help of force.

Because before that, the first model of the cooperation between the two sides, Huawei Smart SF5, has almost failed. In 2021, Jinkang Cyrus, a new energy vehicle brand under Xiaokang Group, and Huawei jointly launched the Cyrus Huawei Smart SF5, which showed strong market vitality in the early stage after pre-sale and listing. In the more than a month after Huawei announced on April 19, 2021 that it began to "sell cars" (Cialis Huawei Smart Selection SF5), orders for SF5 rapidly exceeded 10,000 units.

Equipped with Huawei DriveONE three-in-one electric drive system and Huawei audio system, and will also be equipped with Huawei's HiCar engine system in the future, these product highlights have also earned enough eyeballs for Cyrus Huawei Smart SF5. However, the enthusiastic feedback from the market in the early stage of the car did not last. According to the data, from the listing on April 19 to the end of 2021, The sales of Thex Huawei Smart SF5 were only 8169 units, which failed to meet expectations.

With the launch of a new high-end intelligent electric brand - AITO, the industry generally believes that Xilis Huawei Smart SF5 has been "hidden", and in the future, Xilis and Huawei will focus on the AITO brand. At the same time, it is worth noting that Huawei has invested a lot of energy in the first model of the AITO brand, the M5.

At the press conference of the Q&I M5 in December last year, Yu Chengdong, managing director of Huawei, CEO of consumer business, and CEO of smart car solution BU (business unit), said: "We and Xiaokang Xilis released the SF5 car this spring, using some components of Huawei Drive ONE, using some of our technologies, but the whole vehicle is not designed by us, we think we can do better, this time we used the industrial design team, software team, The user experience team came together to build (Q&A M5) this product. ”

Yu Chengdong said that Huawei participated in many of the development and design work of the AITO Q&I M5. Previously, Huawei had been constantly arguing about whether to build a car, and the emergence of the M5 further triggered a hot discussion in the industry about Huawei's "substantial car manufacturing". If the Xilix Huawei Smart SF5 is Huawei's "test product" in the automotive market, then the Q&A M5, which has more Huawei's "genes", will be Huawei's first car "finished product".

On March 5, AITO Q&I M5 officially opened for delivery in more than 100 user centers in 36 cities. Compared with the Xelis Huawei Smart SF5, the Q&I M5 has more technical highlights, such as the first Harmony OS smart cockpit, the advanced pure electric drive range extender platform, the ultra-long endurance of 1100+ km WLTC, and the acceleration of 4.4 seconds per 100 km/h. It seems that the M5 is inevitable.

As one of the few products in the domestic market that is currently driven by a range extender, the main competitors of the M5 include the ideal ONE with annual sales of nearly 100,000 and the FREE range extended version of Lantu, which was just launched in August last year. From the positioning point of view, the M5 is a medium-sized SUV, with a length, width and height of 4770 x 1930 x 1625mm, and a wheelbase of 2880mm. The Ideal ONE and Landu FREE are both medium and large SUVs. Therefore, the M5 is slightly smaller than the ideal ONE and Landu FREE in terms of vehicle size and wheelbase.

In terms of power, the M5 is equipped with a 1.5T four-cylinder range extender 3.0, and the four-wheel drive flagship version (the price is closest to the ideal ONE and the Lantu FREE extended range version) has a total power of 365kW and a total torque of 675 Nm, and the two key parameters are higher than the ideal ONE and lower than the Lantu FREE extended range version. In terms of endurance, the Q&I M5 has an advantage, with its NEDC lasting 1195 km, higher than the 2021 Ideal ONE (1080 km) and the Landu FREE Extended Range Edition (860 km).

In terms of acceleration performance, the ultimate version of the M5 all-wheel drive has an acceleration of only 4.4 seconds per 100 kilometers, which is faster than the Landu FREE Extended Range Edition (4.5 seconds) and the Ideal ONE (6.5 seconds). It should be noted that since the ideal ONE is positioned as a family "daddy" car, it is not particularly aggressive in terms of acceleration performance. Combining the above product angles, the M5 is superior to the other two competing models in terms of endurance and acceleration performance.

Previously, there were media reports, Yu Chengdong said, "We plan to use a thousand stores to sell cars by the end of this year, assuming that each store can sell 30 units per month, monthly sales can reach 30,000 units, and this year Huawei will challenge the sales target of 300,000 units." ”

According to Cyrus, in terms of sales, AITO integrates the channel advantages of both Cyrus and Huawei. Up to now, more than 500 experience centers and 150 user centers in aito sales channels have been laid. This year, a total of 1,000 experience centers and about 300 user centers will be settled.

In terms of production capacity, Xilis is also ready. AITO Chongqing Liangjiang Smart Factory already has an annual production capacity of 100,000 vehicles, and has completed the initial preparatory work for the M5. In addition, a new second plant built in accordance with the standards of the intelligent digital flexible vehicle plant has also been basically completed.