The meat that makes a car is actually not delicious
Photo: Ling Xiaofeng
Edit: Mei Mei
On March 28, 2022, Huawei released its 2021 annual report.
Whether it is the revenue data disclosed in the annual report or the public appearance of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, it is worth interpreting, the reason is naturally Huawei's influence and reputation, but the focus of our attention today is that at this annual report conference, Huawei's rotating chairman Guo Ping once again reiterated that he does not build cars. If from January 2019, Ren Zhengfei set the tone of "Huawei does not build cars", Guo Ping should be at least the ninth time that Huawei has expressed the "no car" view in public.
Why has Huawei repeatedly reiterated that it will not build (whole) cars? Obviously, Huawei already has the "soul" of the car, but why is it slow to go down in person?
This actually shows the current Huawei Schrödinger-style car-building situation, frantically trying on the edge of car-making but not daring to break through.
Notice that I'm talking about "current".
As early as the background of Sino-US trade frictions in 2018, Huawei has a new strategic plan for its future business, and in April 2019, Ren Zhengfei made a speech within the company on "Those who do not understand strategic retreat will not strategically attack", which mentioned that the Internet of Vehicles, artificial intelligence, and edge computing will be Huawei's three major breakthrough points in the future, and it is clear that these businesses are closely related to automobiles.
Also at the Shanghai International Auto Show in April 2019, Huawei's automotive business was officially unveiled, and Xu Zhijun, then rotating chairman, personally stood on the platform to help, and its scene was like Huawei's entry into the mobile phone and cloud business markets, but at this time, Huawei's automotive business gave people the impression of being professional, confident and friendly. But the next development and the speed of Huawei's track change, caused concerns among car companies, today, Huawei has built seven intelligent car solutions, and has listed more than 30 intelligent car parts, has developed more than 300 industrial chain partners, its technical solutions almost cover all the core components of smart cars, such as lidar, intelligent cockpit, intelligent electric, intelligent driving system, etc., it can be said that in addition to the vehicle design, chassis, four wheels, shell and seats, Huawei has done almost everything.
Although domestic technology giants, such as Baidu, Ali, Tencent, etc., have also officially announced that they have built cars or are involved in automobile-related industries, Huawei's addition has made many car companies smell the threat. As Chen Hong, chairman of SAIC Motor, said before, if you cooperate with Huawei, car companies will lose their "soul" and become foundries. This is obviously not what car companies hope, at present, many traditional car companies cooperate with suppliers in various fields, still leading their own development, suppliers cooperate, and the new forces of car manufacturing are more radical and tend to be full-stack self-research, which obviously has a deep conflict of interest with Huawei's packaging "thinking". Therefore, Huawei has repeatedly reiterated that it does not build cars, but helps car companies to build good cars, in fact, it is to be a friend of car companies, because if Huawei directly announces car manufacturing, it will stand on the opposite side of car companies, and if it does not build cars, it can embrace the automotive industry.
This contradiction and dilemma, in fact, Huawei's current "survival" instinct, since being included in the "entity list" by the United States, the continuous increase in sanctions and blockades on China as one of the core business of the mobile phone business has had a major impact, today's Huawei has been unable to let TSMC OEM self-developed chips, nor can it buy 5G chips from the outside, the current domestic chip production can not be counted on, the inventory of 5G chips has also been exhausted, if you buy it, you can only use the 4G chip approved by the US government. As a result, Huawei's entire range of mobile phone products has dropped from 5G to 4G since 2021 and forced to withdraw from the high-end market, which is also the reason why Huawei's mobile phone shipments in 2021 are only 35 million units, a plunge of 81.6% compared with 2020, and Huawei's mobile phone shipment ranking has also fallen from the world's third in 2020 to the ninth in the world in 2021.
The extreme pressure of the United States has led to a sharp decline in Huawei's mobile phone business, which has directly led to a sharp decline in Huawei's profitability, although the financial data was not so ugly last year because of the sale of glory, but in the case of the situation not improving this year, Huawei's financial data is estimated to be less optimistic. The previous "Nanniwan Production Self-Help Plan" also shows that Huawei is hedging the impact of US sanctions by seeking breakthroughs in coal, steel, music, smart screens, PCs, tablets and other fields, but there is no doubt that at the moment when smart cars have shown broad prospects, the automobile business will naturally become the most optimistic part of Huawei's "Nanniwan Plan", not to mention that this is most closely related to Huawei's main business and the lowest transformation costs.
Will Huawei build cars in the end?
Huawei has repeatedly reiterated that it will not build cars, but has never said that it will never build cars.
Therefore, we have two conjectures about the future development of Huawei's automotive business: one is that Huawei will be the "Bosch" of the intelligent car era and help car companies build good cars as an "incremental supplier"; the other is that Huawei is currently accumulating its own technical strength and will one day break through the window paper of "car manufacturing".
Let's start with the first conjecture. Huawei does not build (whole) cars at present, and maintains caution, restraint and low profile, which is the result of the joint action of enterprise mechanisms and survival wisdom and mutual game.
From the practical level, Huawei will not cut off the "financial road", in the vigorous tide of new energy, Ren Zhengfei, the wise man, looks at the essence through the phenomenon, and sees that the core track of new energy vehicles is not vehicle manufacturing, but a battery track and an intelligent track, so Huawei's automotive business is positioned as an "incremental supplier", that is, to be Bosch, Continental, and ZF in the new energy era. Because the car-making logic of intelligent electric vehicles and traditional internal combustion engine vehicles is very different, the core technology of traditional automobiles is concentrated in the engine, chassis, and transmission system, while intelligent electric vehicles have subverted the core technology safety of the car because there is no traditional engine and gearbox, but it is Huawei's advantage areas, such as chips, ICT technology computing platforms, operating systems, motor electronic control and lidar, etc. to become the incremental component suppliers of intelligent electric vehicles.
And the key is that Huawei is not concentrated in a certain field like Baidu, Tencent, and Ali, but the layout of the stall covers almost all areas of smart cars, mainly promoting integration, complete intelligent car solutions, including hardware, software packaging and sale, which is where Huawei's advantages lie, and Huawei also sees that the overall solution is done well, and the premium space is also not cheap. But if involved in vehicle manufacturing, Huawei needs to integrate the upstream and downstream industries of automobiles, time-consuming, laborious, costly, costly, like BYD, Great Wall Motors, etc. Annual revenue of more than 100 billion, but the profit is only four or five billion, in the current situation of the United States constantly sanctioned and suppressed, important revenue business has been hit hard, Huawei's primary consideration is to change the revenue structure and change the industrial chain, and think about the sustainability of future development under limited funds and resources.
From a strategic point of view, even if Huawei has the strength to build cars at present, Huawei knows that its boundaries are there and knows what its strengths are. The success of traditional auto giants depends largely on Bosch, Continental, Aisin Seiki and other suppliers, today's new energy vehicle track, is the best time for Huawei, through its own core technology, to promote the Chinese auto industry to the world, such a sense of achievement, far greater than their own personal production of cars. Therefore, at present, Huawei makes shovels for miners, both famous and profitable, and it is good to be a smart parts supplier like Bosch.
Let's talk about the second conjecture. However, here are the two ways to intervene in the current Huawei automotive business, one is the "Huawei Smart Selection" model under the consumer BG, which is a To C business, that is, Huawei provides sales channels in addition to providing a full set of intelligent car solutions, etc. In this mode, Huawei has a heavier voice in the development process and commercial layout. The Q&I M5, which Huawei and Cilis have cooperated to create, is such a model. The other is the "Huawei Inside" model under the intelligent car solution BU, that is, the "HI" model, which is a To B business, car companies purchase Huawei intelligent car solutions, and integrate according to their own needs, at present, BAIC Jihu, GAC Aean and Changan Avita all belong to this cooperation model.
However, when cooperating with Xilix to create the M5 model, Huawei did not participate in the production and manufacturing of the whole vehicle, after-sales maintenance and other businesses, and even took over the product planning, styling design, technology research and development, sales channels, brand promotion, delivery power, etc. Although Huawei repeatedly insisted that it did not build cars, the actual action was to do anything except not hang the Huawei logo. It is precisely because Huawei's participation is too large that it is regarded as a precursor to car manufacturing in the industry. What many car companies are worried about is that if one day, Huawei gets rid of the current survival considerations, really makes cars, and with Huawei's strength, it seems that it is not a problem to become the new "Tesla" in the automotive industry in the industry.
It is worth mentioning that in 2020, when Huawei's car manufacturing is very popular, Huawei sacrificed the management team (EMT) document, which is the famous "007 document" (Huawei EMT resolution [2020] 007), which is harshly worded to show that "who will propose to build a car in the future, interfere with the company, can be transferred from the post, and find another post." But those who have the heart to see the words "valid for 3 years" at the bottom of this document (document No. 007 is released on October 26, 2020), the 3-year period means to go 3 years first, and then make decisions after 3 years according to the current situation and their own situation.
Therefore, Huawei has not promised never to build a car.
Write at the end
Just as Huawei declared that it would not do mobile phones and would not enter the cloud business, whether Huawei built a car or not did not depend on commitments and documents, but on the actual situation of Huawei's own development and the external environment. Therefore, Huawei has repeatedly reiterated at the moment that it will not build cars, appease the military internally, and appease cooperative car companies externally; as for whether Huawei will build cars in the future, walk and see - a fierce tiger, only by promising not to eat meat, can we get closer to meat.