Dongfeng Motor Group's passenger car segment is slightly more difficult to rely on autonomous passenger cars and new energy vehicles alone.
Geely, BYD, Great Wall and other independent brands announced their 2021 financial reports at the end of March, which are basically in a profitable state, but in the financial report, the gross profit margin of the product is not high. In order to improve the gross profit margin, many car companies choose to launch a number of high-end products this year, thereby improving the brand premium ability.
A few days ago, Dongfeng Motor Group also announced its 2021 annual financial report. The report shows that Dongfeng Group's revenue in 2021 was 113.008 billion yuan, an increase of 4.2% year-on-year, gross profit was 14.19 billion yuan, and net profit attributable to the mother was 11.387 billion yuan, an increase of 5.8% year-on-year, achieving double growth in revenue and net profit. Of course, it is worth celebrating such a performance, but looking closely at this annual financial report, Brother Reel found a hint.
Joint venture brand and commercial vehicle sales declined
According to the official sales data, Dongfeng Motor Group sold about 2.7751 million new vehicles, of which the overall sales of passenger cars reached 2.2525 million units, down 2.6% year-on-year, accounting for more than 80% of the overall sales.
In terms of joint venture brands, the two major Japanese joint ventures of Dongfeng Nissan and Dongfeng Honda both experienced a certain degree of decline last year. Among them, Dongfeng Nissan (Nissan and Venucia) sold 1134889 vehicles in the whole year, down 6.4% year-on-year; Dongfeng Honda sold a total of 793272 vehicles, down 6.7% year-on-year. The decline in sales of these two Japanese joint ventures was mainly affected by the tight supply of chips and parts, while Dongfeng Nissan and Dongfeng Honda were more dependent on the market performance of older models such as Xuanyi and Civic.
As for Dongfeng Infiniti, the degree of decline is more obvious, with only 8697 vehicles sold in the whole year, down 66.15% year-on-year. In addition to the impact of chip shortages, the product matrix is not rich enough to make Infiniti's market share cannibalized by other brands. In addition, Dongfeng Motor completely withdrew from the shareholder status of Dongfeng Yueda Kia at the end of last year, further compressing the brand's revenue source.
Dongfeng Motor Group's business scope is wide, in addition to passenger cars, its business also covers commercial vehicles, new energy vehicles, military vehicles, key automobile assemblies and components, and automotive equipment and other related businesses, which is different from other automobile groups. According to the official disclosure of commercial vehicle sector information, Dongfeng Commercial Vehicle sold a total of 522561 vehicles, with a market share of 10.9%, down 5.8% year-on-year. Officials said that the decline in commercial vehicle sales was mainly affected by the change of national regulations and the decline in the industry demand environment.
The autonomous sector becomes the main profit point
According to official sources, the main sources of Dongfeng Motor Group's revenue growth last year were Passenger Car Company, Dongfeng Citroen, Dongfeng Liuqi, Lantu and Dongfeng Finance Company. Among them, the development of autonomous passenger cars is very rapid, Dongfeng Fengshen, Dongfeng Fengxing, Dongfeng Fengxing/ Xilisi sales are outstanding, with annual sales exceeding 120,000 units, an increase of 71.4%, 26.8% and 2.3% respectively. Among them, Dongfeng Fengshen's Yixuan series and Dongfeng Fengxing's T5 EVO sold the best, with annual sales of more than 50,000 vehicles.
Dongfeng Peugeot and Dongfeng Citroen) sold a total of 100,600 vehicles last year, an increase of 100% year-on-year, although the growth rate is gratifying, but the market sales base of Dongfeng Peugeot Citroen itself is small, and it is not the main profit point of Dongfeng Motor Group.
It is worth noting that Dongfeng Motor Group has shown explosive growth in the new energy sector. According to statistics, Dongfeng Motor Group sold 161,000 new energy vehicles in 2021, up 260% year-on-year. It should be known that Dongfeng Fengshen Automobile's Fengshen E70 has improved in the shared travel market, market sales increased by about 5 times year-on-year, Dongfeng Motor Group's high-end new energy brand - Lantu began to exert force, the first model Lantu FREE since its listing, sales have increased month by month, and the second product Lantu Dreamer will also be officially listed in April this year.
Looking back at 2021, Dongfeng Motor Group has invested a lot in electrification, the first e-POWER drive motor and controller, hybrid electric drive assembly C15TDR+HD120 official mass production application, the first mass production full-power fuel cell passenger car Dongfeng Hydrogen Boat also officially opened demonstration operation.
However, the joint venture brand of Dongfeng Motor Group has not gained much say in the new energy market. Japanese brand plug-and-mix models currently only account for about 20% of the brand's total sales, market performance needs to be improved, DPCA's new energy vehicle market feedback is general, Xuanyi e-POWER listed only a short time ago, the official has not yet announced its market sales data.
As the world's largest new energy vehicle market, China's joint venture brands will naturally not miss this opportunity. Last year, Dongfeng Honda released the pure electric honda e:NS1, which has now officially rolled off the production line and is expected to be officially launched in April this year. Dongfeng Nissan Aria has been debuting for a long time, and its listing time will be delayed until the second half of this year. In the view of Brother Rudder, the entry time of the joint venture brand of Dongfeng Motor Group is relatively late, and now the domestic new energy market has many strong opponents, in the end, whether it can highlight the siege, it is indeed only possible to see the quality and price of the product.
By 2025, the scale will enter the industry TOP3
In terms of new car planning, a number of brands of Dongfeng Motor Group have revealed relevant information. Among them, Dongfeng Honda will launch eight new cars this year, in addition to the first electric vehicle e: NS1, but also launched a new XR-V, a new CR-V, a new Civic Hybrid, a new Civic Hatchback and other new cars, so as to achieve an annual sales target of 1 million vehicles. Dongfeng Nissan will further promote the application of e-POWER technology, and will also launch Nissan Ariya.
In terms of independent brands, Dongfeng Fengshen will launch a new SUV Haoji, and Dongfeng Fengxing will launch a new model in the first half of this year - Fengxing Yacht.
In order to accelerate the transformation of enterprises, Dongfeng Motor Group announced the "Oriental Wind Rise" plan last year. According to the plan, by 2025, Dongfeng Motor's sales volume in the three major areas of commercial vehicles, autonomous passenger cars and new energy vehicles will reach 1 million, and the scale will enter the top three in the industry. At the same time, Dongfeng further increased its investment in research and development, and by the end of the "14th Five-Year Plan", it would independently control more than 2,000 key core technologies, with a control rate of 95%.
Write at the end
For Dongfeng Motor Group, operating income and net profit have both harvested, but the sales of its joint venture brands and commercial vehicles have declined, and it is slightly difficult to rely on independent passenger cars and new energy vehicles alone. The second quarter of 2022 has arrived, Dongfeng Honda and Dongfeng Nissan two major Japanese joint venture brands have made a new car launch plan, and a high probability in the new energy vehicle market to exert force, the independent plate is the focus of dongfeng motor group's development, the upcoming new products can continue the current growth momentum?
(Text: six)