Rim frontier
Acura's exit from China is a foregone conclusion
Recently on the Internet about Acura is about to withdraw from the Chinese market news flying, although the official still did not give a clear answer, but the dealer will not lie, the only independent Acura 4S store in Beijing is decorating in the name of "store upgrade", but the sales in the 4S store said that Acura is about to withdraw from China, the future Acura dealers will be merged into Honda's sales system, used to sell Honda's electric vehicles, and will no longer use the Acura logo.
Since the discontinuation of the 2019 mid-size sedan TLX-L, Acura has only two SUV models on sale in China, CDX and RDX. However, due to its own pricing is not cheap, the lack of luxury in vehicle design, and the small marketing efforts of the brand, the sales of CDX and RDX are very sluggish, Acura only sold 6554 new cars in China last year, while its former competitor Lexus, the annual sales have already exceeded the 100,000 mark.
Acura Legend
Acura's failure in China is actually a foreseeable result. Friends who know the history of Acura should know that Acura is the earliest luxury brand in Japan, born in 1984, even a few years before Lexus and Infiniti. In 1986, Acura replaced the Logo of the Acura brand on the basis of the Legend, a honda large sedan, and sold it to the United States as a luxury large sedan. Acura Legend sold well in the United States at first, but because the parent company Honda is a relatively small manufacturer after all, there is no capital to invest heavily in the development of new cars for the Acura brand, so Acura's models are basically based on the existing Honda car.
The original Lexus LS400
In 1989, Toyota's new flagship sedan, the Lexus LS400, was launched, a large rear-drive sedan with a V8 engine that quickly replaced Acura Legend's Japanese flagship as soon as it came out. It can be seen that Acura Legend, a re-labeled luxury car, does not have much competitiveness in the face of LS's independently developed "real luxury car".
And even the CDX and RDX models currently produced in China are actually "hulled" through Honda's existing models. CdX is an extended version of Binzhi, while RDX has an inexplicable association with CR-V. Of course, the same platform production is actually not a problem, after all, Audi also has a lot of cars are shell Volkswagen, Lexus also has a lot of cars and Toyota platform.
However, as a luxury brand with the same group, whether it can open up the gap in interior, design and other aspects is the key to making consumers pay. For example, the current RDX, its interior is indeed sporty, but it is not very much related to the word "luxury".
And for luxury brands, while the products are good, the brand also needs to be able to tell stories and set up people. For example, Lexus relies on pure imports, Japanese craftsman spirit, and high-quality after-sales service to fight the world, BBA has many years of historical accumulation and innate brand aura, and even Infiniti can be promoted as a VQ engine superstar. On the other hand, acura, can friends tell me what the selling points are? After all, the current family flagship sedan, the TLX, is only a premium version of the 10th generation Accord...
There is no doubt that Acura in the era of fuel vehicles is a failure in China, but if you like Acura models, in fact, now is a good opportunity to bottom out. You know, RDX currently has a discount of about 70,000 yuan in the store, and the starting price of the lowest model is only about 260,000, which is actually very cost-effective for RDX equipped with 2.0T+10AT. More importantly, as a car fan, at this time, you can not only get a cheap and high-quality SUV, but also this car can become a capital for telling stories to young people in the future, telling them how brilliant the Acura was. Finally, I hope that this Japanese luxury brand named "Precision" (Acura's brand spelling Acura is derived from the Latin Accuracy, translated as "Precision") can one day return to the top and see us again!
Oil prices will continue to rise next Thursday
Due to the recent turbulence in the international situation, oil prices have been greatly affected. At 24:00 on March 17 next Thursday, the country is about to usher in a new round of oil price adjustment window, according to the current international crude oil situation, oil prices per ton are about to rise by 1040 yuan, converted into liters, about 0.78-0.94 yuan / liter of growth. Compared with the increase of about 0.2 yuan / liter on March 3, the price increase can be said to be a sharp rise. Based on the current price of 8.05 and 8.56 yuan per liter of No. 92 and No. 95 gasoline, after the price increase, No. 92 gasoline will break through 8.8 yuan / liter, and No. 95 gasoline will break through 9.3 yuan / liter! According to the calculation of the 50L fuel tank of the family car, it will cost about 40 yuan to fill a tank of fuel.
Netizen: After riding a bicycle to work!
Blockbuster new car
A new generation of Volkswagen Passat hypothetical diagrams
Recently, foreign media drew a new generation of Volkswagen Passat (called Maiteng in China) hypothetical picture, from the imaginary picture, the front face design of the next generation of Passat has changed a lot, the headlights and the middle of the through-line light bar shape is quite similar to the current ID series of electric vehicles, and the large mouth surround below is almost consistent with the coupe Lingdu L just released by SAIC Volkswagen.
Some people may think that this hypothetical picture is a bit outrageous, but in fact, according to the new generation of Passat test vehicles exposed overseas, although the headlights and front surround of the vehicle are camouflaged with decorative stickers to disguise the appearance of the current Maiten, the internal contour still exposes the design of the vehicle, and the new generation of Passat front face really adopts the design of the evil charm big mouth net.
There is no suspense in the rear and sides of the car, volkswagen's new through-type taillights are naturally not absent, and the exhaust is completely hidden, not even decorative parts. It is worth mentioning that the new generation of Passat will only be available in the European market for the travel version, while the sedan version will only be available in the Chinese market.
Lingdu L
Friends who pay attention to Volkswagen should know that although the Lingdu L is a special car, its status within the Volkswagen Group is still very high. For example, when the first generation of Lingdu was launched in 2014, it was the first sedan of the Volkswagen brand to use the MQB platform in China, only one year later than the Golf 7. You know, the authentic global Sagittarius in the same period, the use of the older generation of PQ35 platform. And according to the Italian design director of the new Lingdu L - Tenazzo, Lingdu L will open a new generation of design language for volkswagen, which further confirms that the next generation of European passat is likely to use the same design of Lingdu L.
Official drawings of the interior of the ideal L9 were released
After the success of the first mass-produced car, the Ideal ONE, recently officially announced its second model, the new car named L9, positioned as a large SUV, the size of the Mercedes-Benz GLS, and will be officially unveiled at the Beijing Auto Show in April. The ideal L9 will adopt a range extender structure that can be charged externally, but the range extender will be upgraded from the ideal ONE's 1.2T three-cylinder to the 1.5T four-cylinder, which is expected to have a significant increase in power generation power, which is more helpful for the power performance of the vehicle in the state of power loss.
After announcing the official naming of the new car, Ideal Auto released a set of official interior drawings of the L9. From the picture, the ideal L9 will abandon the traditional dashboard and replace it with a large-area HUD head-up display. At the same time, the center control screen and the right co-pilot screen are larger in size and have also been changed to a floating structure.
The rear of the ideal L9 is also in place, with a separate screen hanging from the roof, a small folding table on the co-pilot's backrest, and separate air conditioning and a rear refrigerator that can be cooled and heated below. In addition, the second row of seats has leg rests, and the sunroof has a front and rear double sunroof structure. According to the current officially announced parameters, the ideal L9 will use two Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 car machine chips, with 24G running memory and 256G storage space, supporting dual 5G operators online to achieve rich car networking content in the front and rear rows. In addition, the three screens of the vehicle's center control, co-pilot and rear are all 15.7-inch OLED screens, and the resolution reaches the 3K level. I have to say that the rear configuration of the ideal L9 is not only the level of the dad car, but even the administrative needs are completely fine.
In terms of price, Ideal Car said that the L9 is priced between 450,000 and 500,000 yuan, which is more than 100,000 yuan more expensive than the ideal ONE's 338,000. However, considering that the ideal L9 car is 5.2 meters long and has a wheelbase of 3.1 meters, it is 17cm longer than the ideal ONE, and the new car has significantly improved in terms of power, configuration, and hardware specifications, and the difference of 100,000 yuan is more reasonable. On March 16, Ideal Auto will also announce more content about the L9, and we will continue to report on this domestic flagship SUV.
* Why do you think Acura can't sell?