How long can | ideal trick be eaten?
| Quotient packets
As we all know, every year around March 15 is a period of concentrated outbreak of consumption problems. The consumption trap of the automotive industry is particularly numerous, especially the ideal car, one of the new car-making forces, under the madness of its capital expansion, its service quality problems and consumer complaints are also increasing day by day.
Although the complaints have not decreased, the sales of the ideal car have continued to grow, and under the price reduction and mark-up, the lifetime warranty it once promised has been gradually canceled. This makes a group of purchased car owners feel deeply "nonsensically cutting leeks".
At the same time, Ideal Auto still maintains a long-term huge loss trend in terms of performance. The more it sells, the more it loses, and it has become the "ideal state" that ideal cars are most accustomed to. However, the company's stock price fell to a new low, and investors around the world also felt that the company bubble was gradually emerging.
False promises whipped up a wave of wool?
In May last year, at the 2021 Ideal ONE conference, Ideal Auto CEO Li Xiang said that in September of the same year, the NOA assisted driving system will be launched, and when the time comes, owners who have purchased the 2021 Ideal ONE can directly obtain this function through the OTA online upgrade.
Many car owners said that the 2021 ideal ONE is more expensive than the old one ten thousand yuan, in contrast, the appearance, interior is almost the same, the biggest difference between the new model and the old model is that the noa auxiliary driving system on the line of this plan, they are precisely because they listened to this introduction at that time, very interested in the NOA auxiliary driving system, and chose to buy the 2021 ideal ONE.
Unexpectedly, this NOA driver assistance system did not go live in September as the CEO of Ideal Cars said. Ideal customer service claims that there is an on-line plan, but no one can say which day the research and development can be launched, and the specific time limit cannot be told.
Therefore, the owners of the 2021 ideal ONE feel deceived, if they know that this NOA assisted driving system can not be launched as scheduled, they do not have to spend more than 10,000 yuan to buy the 2021 ideal ONE.
According to the data of China.com's auto quality complaint platform, Ideal Auto has jumped to the first place in the brand complaint list at a very short speed, and Ideal ONE is also at the top of the train complaint list.
(Image from automotive quality complaint platform)
As we all know, Ideal Auto is suspected of false publicity, false promises, sales fraud and other behaviors on the old ONE models, which has triggered a large number of strong dissatisfaction and complaints from old car owners, and as of now, the rights protection activities of car owners are still continuing.
According to incomplete statistics, more than 300 ideal ONE car owners have launched complaints on the China Net car quality complaint platform, of which about 300 cases of false publicity and sales fraud of ideal cars, and more than 20 cases are complaints about the quality problems of ideal ONE cars.
Some car owners said that the listing of the new ideal ONE directly led to the depreciation of the old model by 100,000 yuan. Compared with the old model, the new Ideal ONE is replaced by an 8-megapixel camera, 5 fifth-generation Dr. Millimeter Wave radars, and two Horizon Journey 3 series special chips for autonomous driving, and finally the new car realizes the standard ideal AD advanced driver assistance system.
However, the price of the new model is only 10,000 yuan more than the old model. Therefore, the outside world has understood the ideal car as a "clear inventory" and "cutting leeks" behavior of manufacturers to induce consumers to buy old models.
In this regard, some lawyers said that the biggest problem of ideal cars is false publicity and false promises, and ideals must bear responsibility. In order to promote the transaction, the salesman promised not to change the model in the near future, which is a job behavior, and the ideal car can dismiss the employee, but the loss caused to the owner must be compensated.
However, it is more difficult to make the ideal car recall directly, and the more reliable approach is to let the manufacturer apologize and compensate. The court will stand in a fairer and fairer position to comprehensively evaluate this incident, but it is not that the company will return the car after false publicity, theoretically it is possible, but the court may think that it is most beneficial to both parties to make some compensation or compensation appropriately.
Lifetime warranty playing into a marketing gimmick?
In addition, the fear of canceling the lifetime warranty of ideal cars has also greatly annoyed many car owners. On December 29, 2021, the sales staff of the suspected ideal car released in their WeChat circle of friends that the first owner of the three electric life free warranty rights will be cancelled in February 2022, but the order placed before January 31 will still enjoy the lifetime warranty.
After inquiring about the ideal car APP, it was found that the owner's rights column was indeed displayed as a vehicle warranty of 5 years or 100,000 kilometers, and a warranty of 8 years or 120,000 kilometers of the three-electric system.
(Source: Baidu Auto)
In response to this incident, ideal auto public relations personnel responded that the lifetime warranty is only a time-limited promotion policy. The vehicle warranty of the ideal car is always 5 years and 100,000 kilometers, and the warranty of the three-electric system is 120,000 kilometers for 8 years, without change. As for the old car owners who have already obtained the lifetime warranty benefit, they are not affected. For the authenticity of the above-mentioned ideal car sales spread in the circle of friends, the other party did not respond.
The news of the ideal car store is similar to the news revealed in the circle of friends before February 2022, and users who book cars in the store before February 2022 can receive a lifetime warranty, but not through the official APP car purchase channel, but by the store sales to sign an agreement with the user. At the end of 2020, some salespeople said that the lifetime warranty of the ideal car will be canceled, and the news that the right can still be granted immediately.
In fact, for new energy vehicles, the lifelong warranty of the three-electric system is still relatively important, after all, the battery will age over time, and the cost of replacing the power battery is too high. Some old car owners believe that as the first batch of subscribers, what they value is the lifetime free warranty.
However, after the end of the first batch of bookings, there are still a considerable number of subsequent booking users who receive lifetime warranty rights, which is a damage to the interests of old car owners.
But this is not the first time that Ideal Has adjusted the relevant warranty terms. In March 2020, Ideal Auto launched the first owner's lifetime warranty purchase program on its APP, which can be purchased by users from the time the vehicle is ordered to the time before the new car is delivered.
However, in June 2021, Ideal Auto cancelled the purchase plan of the first owner's lifetime warranty of the whole vehicle, and changed it to a lifetime warranty of the three-electric system + extended range system, which was also protested by many ideal car owners, but did not affect the sales of the ideal car.
At present, new energy has entered a stage of accelerated development and has become a major trend, and the decline of subsidies has already begun. The United States has stopped issuing subsidies for new range-extender technology vehicles, and Shanghai has also made it clear that from 2023, it will stop issuing free licenses for plug-in hybrid vehicles, and extended-range electric vehicles are included. This means that in 2022, the ideal launch of a range extender SUV will face no subsidies, or some areas can not be played, which will also have a great impact on delivery.
Increased losses fall into the trap of burning money?
In fact, for the new car-making forces such as Ideal Automobile, it lacks long-term brand precipitation, so if you want to gain the favor of consumers, you must put the quality of service in the top priority, otherwise the new forces will catch fire quickly and turn off quickly.
Recently, Ideal Auto announced its 2021 results, and last year again achieved an annual loss of 1.02 billion yuan. The total delivery volume of the ideal ONE in 2021 reached 90,491 units, which shows that the ideal ONE is selling a loss of more than 10,000 yuan, and the unit price of the ideal ONE is 338,000 yuan.
However, in terms of other financial data, the performance of ideal ONE is relatively excellent, the total delivery volume of ideal ONE in 2021 still reached 90491 units, an increase of 177.4% year-on-year, and the total revenue was 27.01 billion yuan, an increase of 185.6% year-on-year; gross profit increased from 1.55 billion yuan in 2020 to 5.76 billion yuan in 2021, and gross profit margin rose to 21.3% in 2021.
In this regard, Ideal Auto said that the average selling price of products has increased mainly due to the improvement of cost control in supply chain management and the increasing delivery since the launch of the Ideal ONE in May 2021.
In addition, the new forces adopt the direct store model, which is different from the situation of traditional fuel vehicles, and the gross profit margin cannot be directly compared with traditional fuel vehicles, but the ideal gross profit margin is basically higher than that of other new car-making forces.
Some people in the automotive industry said that for the automotive industry, the positive gross profit margin means that the company's cost control ability and hematopoietic ability have improved. For the new forces of car manufacturing, the positive trend of gross profit margin means that it is one step closer to achieving large-scale production, after all, only by realizing large-scale standardized industrial production and batch delivery can we achieve substantial profitability.
As the first enterprise in the new car-making force to achieve a positive gross profit margin, ideal can basically be said to have got rid of the situation of "selling one and losing one". But accelerating expansion is a "double-edged sword", in addition to the growth of sales, it has also brought rises in expenditure and losses, which means that the ideal also has to bear greater financial pressure.
(Image from Oriental Fortune Network)
According to the financial report, the ideal operating loss in 2021 was 1.02 billion yuan, an increase of 52% year-on-year; the net loss was about 322 million yuan, a substantial increase of 111.9% year-on-year. In terms of expenditure, the ideal expenditure on sales and management expenses in 2021 was 3.49 billion yuan, an increase of 212.1% year-on-year.
In this regard, Ideal Auto admitted that the increase in sales and management expenses was mainly due to the increase in employee compensation due to the increase in employees, as well as the increase in marketing and promotion activities and rental expenses with the expansion of the company's sales network, and the increase in sales also made the cost of sales in 2021 increase by 168.7% year-on-year to 21.25 billion yuan.
And this year, ideal car is expected to be in the first quarter of 2022: vehicle delivery volume of 30,000 to 32,000 vehicles, compared to last year's overall target, ideal car chooses a steady strategy, but it may be far from the real profitability of ideal cars.
R & D is difficult to change the style of a single?
It is worth noting that the increased investment in research and development of the ideal car has also contributed to its high cost. Although the ideal car only relies on one model to bet on the range extension route to open the market, but the dividend ideal of a model has been eaten for three years, if there is no more dimensional layout of the front, follow-up sales power is insufficient or inevitable.
According to its financial report, the ideal R&D expenses in the fourth quarter of 2021 were 1.23 billion yuan, an increase of 38.4% month-on-month and 228.7% year-on-year. The ideal R&D expense for the whole year of 2021 was 3.29 billion yuan, an increase of 198.8% year-on-year. Ideally, the increase in R&D expenses was mainly due to the increase in R&D personnel and the increase in the company's research and development activities for new models.
Ideal also made it clear in the prospectus that it plans to launch a full-size luxury smart range extender electric SUV in 2022 and two other SUV models in 2023. Ideal is also developing platforms for its future high-voltage pure electric vehicles, Whale and Shark, and plans to launch at least two high-voltage pure electric models per year from 2023.
In fact, the development of the range extender route before the ideal is also from the perspective of the actual needs of consumers and the slow construction of the charging network before. And now the entire charging network is developing rapidly, the country is also vigorously supporting the charging pile industry, the ideal naturally does not want to lose this opportunity, and more and more car companies have clearly announced the time to stop selling fuel vehicles, the next ten years of a single fuel vehicle is likely to withdraw from the mainstream stage, only the development of the range increase route is certainly not feasible.
However, at the critical moment when it is necessary to increase research and development and develop new technologies and launch new models, Ideal announced the departure of Chief Technology Officer Wang Kai for personal reasons, and said that the company's chief automotive engineer Ma Donghui will be responsible for the development of intelligent car-related technologies, and Wang Kai will continue to serve as a senior consultant for Ideal Automobile until the end of this year.
It is worth mentioning that this is also the highest level of management that the ideal has left since its inception. It is reported that Wang Kai became the chief technology officer of the ideal in September 2020, although the reason for the departure is unknown, but only 17 months after taking office, it can not help but speculate that the ideal car wants to make a breakthrough in new technologies.
Today's ideal car has been among the head camps of the new car-making forces, but now the competition in the new energy track is becoming more and more fierce, and the camp reshuffle is playing out at any time. Expanding competitive advantage is an ideal imperative, and the next question to be considered for the ideal of only one or two models may be how to maintain the position of the head camp.
In addition, several automakers are about to enter the range extender and PHEV space. This is undoubtedly a big challenge for the ideal car. Although at this stage, the ideal target group for home users is successful, the question is, in the face of a surge of competitors, the ideal trick can still eat for how long?
concentrate:
The relevant data information comes from the company's announcement
"Ideal Car Rises to Top Of Auto Complaints List, Suspected of False Publicity and Sales Fraud," China.com, June 7, 2021
"Ideal car or cancel lifetime warranty, "cutting leeks" to attract the dissatisfaction of old car owners", Caijing Network, December 30, 2021
Will the Ideal Car Be Left Behind? Increasing financial pressure and CTO departure at key R&D points," China Times, March 4, 2022
The author | Quotient packets
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