In the car circle, you can always hear the sighs of people around you patting their thighs and losing their arms with wealth, and the object that has been lost the most is Tesla, and the other is Weilai in 2019.
At that time, NIO had just delivered 10,000 vehicles, suffered a large-scale recall and a capacity crisis, and the stock price fell to $1 at one point. Weilai, which survived the darkest moment, seems to have ushered in its own glory in the past two years, from stock price to sales, all the way to leading new forces, until... In recent months, this "brilliance" has pressed the deceleration button.
Not long ago, the car deliveries of various car companies in February were released, with a total of 6131 vehicles delivered by Weilai Automobile, while Xiaopeng and Ideal, which are also new forces, delivered 6225 and 8414 vehicles respectively. Following the second half of last year, after giving up the throne of "Wei Xiaoli" to lead the big brother, Weilai was overtaken by Nezha this time, falling out of the top three sales of new forces.
At the same time as the decline in sales, Weilai's recent series of incomprehensible playing styles:
Contrary to the routine operation of the nio day release of new cars at the end of the year in previous years, WEILAI exposed the new model ES7 only two months after the release of ET5; ES7, together with the ES6 and ES8 currently on sale, may also make the WEILAI SUV product line become particularly crowded;
NIO's U.S. stock price fell from $41 to $20, once falling to $17, a two-thirds reduction in market value compared to last year's high;
Just when mobile phone manufacturers have built cars, Weilai reverses the operation, and it is rumored that it has prepared to build mobile phone business;
On March 10, NIO was officially listed on the Hong Kong stock market, and in order to quickly list, NIO chose the "introductory listing" model without financing;
......
This seemingly unrelated thing has the meaning of not playing cards according to the rules. It is also difficult for us not to ask: What happened to Weilai recently?
Falling out of the top three of the new forces, Weilai fell behind?
On March 10, NIO was listed on the Hong Kong stock market and abandoned the opportunity to raise funds through "introducing listing".
This is not a good point in time: Hong Kong stocks have been diving for a year since last year, the recent geopolitical conflict has made it a new low, and the Chinese stocks in the US stock market have also frequently reported news of "forced delisting" recently; to make matters worse, the recent performance of Weilai's orders has not been so ideal.
In February, the delivery volume of various brands was released, and Weilai delivered 15,783 vehicles in the first two months of 2022, an increase of 23.3% year-on-year; at the same time, Ideal Automobile and Xiaopeng Automobile delivered 20,682 and 19,147 vehicles respectively, and Nezha Automobile delivered 18,126 vehicles, squeezing Weilai out of the top three positions of new forces.
We can't simply evaluate a car company with a few months of delivery, but we have to admit that whether it is for users or capital, the delivery volume is the most intuitive, and it also directly reflects the user's choice. For Weilai's "fall behind", half of it can be said to be "reasonable", while the other half is the "unexpected" caused by its own products.
Why is it "reasonable" to say that half of it is?
Li Bin once responded to the question of sales in this way, which probably means that you can't let the BBA fight with Volkswagen and Toyota for sales.
Indeed, the sales of brands with different positioning are a bit unfair, and the average price of products with an average price of more than 40w in Weilai has defined a market for itself. In the field of fuel vehicles, the sales volume of the 40~48w price range is almost half of the 32~40w, not to mention the 20w+ range of the huge user group. If you look at it this way, when the new energy vehicle market gradually matures, the gap between Weilai and the sales of Ideal, Xiaopeng and Nezha can be said to be an inevitable result, but it is only a matter of time.
However, it doesn't seem to be time yet. Weilai's delivery volume in recent months has not only not played against opponents, nor has it played itself, which has delivered more than 10,000 yuan for several consecutive months, and the delivery volume in February increased by only 23.3% year-on-year. That's the other half of the reason.
Looking back at the top few of the new energy sales list in the past year, almost every one of them has one or two explosive models to support the field. For example, model 3/Y for Tesla, ideal ONE for ideal, Xiaopeng P7 for Xiaopeng, they have contributed more than half or even all of the orders by themselves. For Weilai, the three models of ES8, ES6 and EC6 are relatively average, and the monthly order volume of the EC6 is not higher than that of the ES6, and the ES6 has been on the market for three years.
3 years is not a long life cycle for a model, but for smart electric vehicles, it is different.
The rapid development of intelligent and electrification technology and the iteration of the product configuration of the inner-roll type make the intelligent electric vehicle run forward. Last year, everyone was still cheering for the 8155 chip to get on the car first; after a year, the 8295 chip was ready to be in place; in 2020, everyone was still discussing the possibility and cost of lidar on the car, and by the end of 2021, the car companies have begun to compete in the number of lidar.
Although the word "inner roll" has been used badly, we have to say that today's smart electric vehicles are really too rolled, there are too many products to choose from, and it is too difficult to keep a model competitive for three years.
Because of this, almost every independent brand is trying to launch 1 to 2 new models a year to catch up with the pace of technology. In the past year or so, although NIO launched ET7 and ET5, it has never delivered new models. Those potential owners, either started the "886", or were attracted by new products from other brands, and the remaining loyal users did not care to wait for ET7 for two more months.
Perhaps it has tasted the bitterness of the "empty window period" of new cars, Weilai began to optimize production lines and expand production capacity from the end of last year to cope with the pressure of new model delivery; at the same time, spoilers ES7 models, and strive to return to the peak through a more complete product matrix and new models.
However, it is foreseeable that even if the delivery volume rises, Weilai's next step is still not good; it can even be said that the larger the scale, the more difficult the road, why?
When service becomes a "sweet burden",
What's next for Weilai?
Looking back at every car company that has a firm foothold, almost all have a label to reflect its core competitiveness and brand value. For example, in the era of fuel vehicles, the technical threshold created by the V8 engine and the ultimate driving control experience. In the era of smart electric vehicles, this label is more diversified, such as the ideal daddy car, Xiaopeng's intelligence, Tesla's various polarized labels...
For Weilai, this label is not on a certain model, but the service of the entire brand, which is the core competitiveness of Weilai.
Weilai's investment in services at any cost helped it gain a firm foothold in the early stages and survive the trough of 2019, and once sent it to sit in the position of a new big brother.
How many users choose Weilai for "easy power exchange like refueling", because of the "ripple effect" strongly recommended by friends, because of the official second-hand car system, self-operated driving service, NIO service and choose Weilai. These user operations and energy replenishment systems have enhanced NIO's "soft power" and brand attractiveness, helping NIO to build a foothold.
With the expansion of the scale of NIO's products, the scale of these "soft powers" is also expanding. In the third quarter of 2021, NIO built a total of 4 NIO centers and 39 NIO spaces. In terms of charging and replacing facilities, a total of 217 substations, 175 overcharge stations and 159 destination charging stations were built in the third quarter.
For the automotive industry, the parts and production costs of automobiles will decrease with the scale effect, but the investment in services will not be "reduced and increased" because of the increase in quantity and scale, and even when the scale of users expands rapidly, the manpower and material resources required to ensure the same service level are not simply equal proportions, but more is needed.
At the beginning of 2020, NIO launched The Service Worry-free 2.0 and the Insurance Worry-free Project, replacing the original Service Worry-free 1.0. The new version eliminates the excessive use of individual resources, reduces the service, and also reduces the cost of user subscription services. At that time, Weilai had just survived the darkest moment, and the number of user deliveries began to rise. Subsequently, in 2021 and early 2022, both services are also optimizing their benefits and prices on an annual basis.
With the delivery of ET7 and ET5, NIO's service system will face new and larger pressures. Perhaps, IT is not just NIO Service that needs to be adjusted.
To return to the team, it is still necessary to rely on "hard power"
For a high-end car company, service is the added value of a brand, a plus, but not the full essence of the brand. It's as if we will choose Haidilao for more thoughtful and intimate service, provided that its hot pot tastes good.
We can't compare hot pot to cars, because for consumer choices, the product power of the car itself, which has to drive out every day and may be used for several years, is more important.
Because of this, in the recent NIO DAY we see that WEILAI no longer seems to blindly emphasize "users", but instead emphasizes R & D capabilities, systematic capabilities, in 2021 WEILAI investment in research and development costs also doubled year-on-year: Aspen 3.0.0 car machine system, the launch of 75kWh ternary lithium battery pack, research and development of 150kWh solid-state batteries, self-developed automatic driving NAD, and the upcoming NT2.0 platform and so on. The investment in these research and development and the landing of technology have promoted the continuous expansion of NIO's product matrix.
Perhaps it is after more than a year of "new car empty window period", not long ago, Weilai spoiled the new model ES7, this new model not only shares the NT2.0 platform with ET7 and ET5, the model is between ES6 and ES8, and it is possible to deliver three new models in this year.
While Weilai expands the product matrix, how to avoid the internal volume of its own products "multi-generational same house", how to avoid a series of supply chain problems such as chip shortage, battery cell shortage, raw material price increase, etc., has also become a test that Weilai needs to face while enhancing its "hard power".
At last
Compared with the "darkest hour" in 2019, the decline in sales and stock price fluctuations today are only small waves, and it seems that there is no huge crisis. However, compared with that year, the storm in today's smart electric vehicle market is much larger. Brand competition, product rolling, the emergence of new brands, and the efforts of traditional car companies on smart electric vehicles have made today's bones more difficult to gnaw.
We can't run a marathon like a 100-meter sprint, and a car company can't play a full smart car race with the initial starting posture.
Today's Weilai may be the time to adjust the playing style, looking for the balance of products and services, looking for a new story that belongs to Weilai, in order to cope with the long and fierce competition of Weilai with a light attitude.