The next door that pure electric is about to knock on is the MPV.
At the 2021 Chengdu Auto Show, Toyota Xena has aroused people's attention to the MPV market.
At the Guangzhou Auto Show a few months later, models such as the pure electric GL8 concept version, the Lantu Dreamer, and the SAIC Maxus MIFA 9 once again made MPV the focus of the entire automotive market.
This year, Extreme Kr, BYD, Hongqi will release their MPV models; ideal, Weipai, Geely and other brands will also enter the market, conservative estimates, in the next two years there will be no less than 9 electric MPV into the market.
At present, a blank high-end pure electric MPV market is ushering in a fierce beach battle. For China's new energy market, the impact of pure electric on the pattern of cars and SUVs in the fuel market may be replicated in the MPV market.
According to the 2020 China MPV Market Consumption Insight Report, 57.1% of users hope to buy new energy MPV, and the proportion of users who prefer hybrid among these users is 39.3%, and the proportion of users who are willing to choose pure electric MPV has reached 38.5%.
Domestic MPV market demand has always existed, and with the opening of the birth policy and the rise of large family travel, the demand will continue to increase, although buick GL8, Honda Odyssey, Toyota Xena and other strong enemies such as the forest, but a real suitable for home, young personality, and electric intelligence support of MPV models will surely get attention.
The trend of MPV high-end is obvious
For a long time, the market pattern of MPV is very fixed, the overall dumbbell growth structure, low-end and high-end hot sales, Wuling Hongguang and Buick GL8 respectively in two positions to lead the MPV market.
However, in recent years, as China's auto market has changed from an incremental market to a stock market, the market is undergoing restructuring.
One of the obvious phenomena is that the low-end MPV market began to shrink, the mid-to-high-end MPV became popular, and the MPV market began to adjust structurally.
To make a simple comparison, in 2016, the sales volume of the MPV market reached its peak, with sales of 2.49 million vehicles, of which Wuling Hongguang sold 650,000 vehicles and Baojun 730 sold 370,000 vehicles.
In 2017, the MPV market sales were 2.07 million units, of which Wuling Hongguang sales fell to 532,000 units, and Baojun 730 units decreased to 275,000 units, a decline of more than 25%.
Even with a sharp drop in sales, the two cars still accounted for 26.52% and 13.76% of the MPV market in 2017. In other words, MPV below 95,000 yuan accounted for 80% of sales in 2017.
Compared with the shrinkage of low-end MPV, mid-to-high-end MPV is in a state of explosion. Taking the leading Buick GL8 as an example, in 2016, the sales of the Buick GL8 were only 79,600 units, which increased sharply to 146,000 units in 2017, and by 2021, the GL8 sales were 170011 units. In 2021, Wuling Hongguang, as a representative model of low-end MPV, has only 210,000 vehicles sold.
From the perspective of price range, in 2021, the share of MPV above 200,000 yuan in the MPV market has reached 41.5%, which is the largest market segment of MPV. The average sales price of MPV reached 175,000 yuan, and the trend of high-end MPV has been very obvious.
Opportunities brought by new energy MPV
In fact, the market potential of MPV in China is still very large, the huge population base, the rise of the concept of large family travel, the trend of increasing purchases... Compared with foreign auto markets, such as Europe, the MPV market share is 30%, Japan is 25%, and South Korea is also 20%, compared with the current Chinese MPV market share of only 7%.
More critically, at this stage, whether it is a Chinese brand or a joint venture brand, there are very few high-end MPV available, which is also the reason why Toyota Saina is hot after being introduced into domestic production. From January to February this year, the terminal sales of Xena were about 4,000 vehicles, which was the average monthly sales level of Odyssey and Alexon last year.
At present, in the sedan and SUV markets, the choice of new energy models is very much, but the pure electric MPV is almost a blank, the market segment products are very few, only a few oil to power and low-end models, such as Changan Auchan A600EV, Lingzhi M5EV, and BYD D1, Pentol NAT is a model developed in cooperation with Didi.
It can be said that the current high-end pure electric MPV is a blue ocean of new energy vehicles, and the comfort, tranquility and sense of technology brought by electric are not available in fuel MPV.
And with the development of technology, batteries have become less and less constrained by MPV.
Jia Xinguang, an analyst in the automotive industry, said: "The traditional MPV is mainly for official cars and high-end family second vehicles, large and medium-sized MPV has high requirements for power, so the original electric vehicle MPV is difficult to meet the endurance requirements, with the advancement of battery technology, endurance will no longer be a problem that restricts the development of electric MPV." ”
At the same time, the tool properties of the MPV are decreasing. In the view of Zhang Xiang, a researcher at the Automotive Industry Innovation Research Center of North China University of Technology, the positioning and design concept of electric MPV is very different from the MPV of fuel vehicles.
"Electric MPV has a lot of characteristics, the first is quiet, not as loud as the engine. In addition, the business attributes of fuel MPV are more obvious, and electric MPV is more reflected in home performance. Taking the screen in the car as an example, usually the fuel MPV is mainly driven by the driver, the leader sits in the back seat, and the demand for the screen is not large; the electric MPV space of the private car is very large, and there can be many infotainment systems, which provides a large space for the design and layout of the large screen. ”
From the perspective of intelligence, the large space of MPV is the best landing platform for the concept of the third space, and in the future, MPV will no longer be just a multi-person carrying tool, but will become a mobile intelligent space, or even an extension of a home. With the advent of electrification, there will be more PPV models that subvert people's perceptions to meet market demand.
Zhao Changjiang, director of BYD's high-end brand preparation office, also said on the social platform: "What I hope to create (MPV) is a seamless connection between the user's home, work scene, hotel, and car scene." ”
Electric MPV "Card Battle" is coming
High-end has become a key breakthrough in conquering the MPV market, and the MPV models planned to be launched by Lantu, Extreme Kr, BYD and so on are all above the high-end positioning.
Coupled with the identity of electric, these products cater to the high-end, electrification, intelligence of these major outlets, car companies have been the main electric MPV is not surprising.
"Electric MPV has broad prospects in the private market, and many car companies invest in it as a main model, in fact, from this perspective." At present, it is a blue ocean, there are many opportunities, and whoever launches the model first can preconceived and seize the market opportunity. Zhang Xiang explained.
Lantu Automobile will launch the first MPV Dreamer on April 7, for Lantu, which is currently supported by only one FREE model, the positioning of the second mass production model should be more cautious, but it has chosen the MPV market, which can be said to be very optimistic about this market segment.
Lantu put the advantages of intelligence and automatic driving assistance capabilities on this MPV, including through the 5G in-car entertainment system, L2+ intelligent driving assistance and support for vehicle OTA, etc., all of which are displayed in The Landu Dreamer.
Due to its larger body than the Buick GL8 and the characteristics of the pure electric and extended range dual versions, the Lantu Dreamer attracted great attention as soon as it appeared. According to the latest exposed news, Dongfeng Lantu Dreamer will be listed at the Beijing Auto Show in April, priced between 400,000 and 600,000.
The same brand also has Extreme Krypton Automobile, whose second production model, also a pure electric MPV, is expected to be released within the year.
BYD, a major new energy user, has also focused on this market segment that has not yet exploded. Since the end of last year, Zhao Changjiang, who is responsible for byd BYD's high-end brand of Automobile, has continuously revealed on the Internet that BYD is ready to make an MPV and discuss with netizens what the needs of high-end MPV are.
Similarly, Weipai, which is currently transforming into a high-end new energy brand, will also launch high-end MPV products this year, after the red flag and ideal have also been exposed, and will launch a high-end new energy MPV model in the future.
Buick GL8 will not ignore this market, last year's Guangzhou Auto Show, has brought the next generation of flagship MPV models of the new GL8 Flagship flagship concept car. The VCS intelligent cockpit system is highly integrated with innovative hardware and cutting-edge interactive technology, especially the ring-screen retina screen and the refractive secondary screen, reflecting Buick's understanding of future travel intelligence, and the new generation of V2X intelligent transportation technology realizes the interconnection of "people, vehicles, roads and clouds".
Judging from the actions of many car companies that have launched electric MPV, the momentum of full electrification of the MPV market has been unstoppable, especially the major blockbuster products launched by China's own brands, which integrate the latest technology and their own advantages in the direction of new energy, and the product strength is not bad. It can be said that once the domestic new energy MPV market breaks out, it will be a scene of a hundred flowers and a hundred boats competing for the current.