The second quarter of 2022 has just begun, and BYD has caused a hot discussion on the whole network with a heavy news.
On the evening of April 3, BYD said through official channels that the company had stopped production of fuel vehicles in March 2022 and would focus on pure electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles in the future. Looking at the entire camp of independent brands and even the global automotive market, BYD can be described as the most daring traditional car company. When we still feel that the electrification transformation road of many traditional car companies seems very far away, BYD has taken the lead and become the world's first traditional car company to stop production of fuel vehicles.
It is worth noting that on the night of announcing the suspension of fuel vehicles, BYD also released sales figures for March. According to the data, BYD sold more than 100,000 full-brand models in March, up 160.9% year-on-year. At the same time, the sales of hybrid DM models and pure electric EV models have exceeded 50,000 units, so that the historical total sales of new energy passenger cars under the brand have exceeded 1.79 million, and it is believed that in the near future, it will also reach the mark of 1.8 million new energy passenger cars, or even 2 million units.
Oil prices rose in March this year, new energy vehicles are difficult to find, BYD became a beneficiary. Judging from the sales performance in March and earlier, BYD itself has excellent achievements in the fields of hybrid and pure electricity, and the discontinued fuel vehicles have indeed shown confidence and strength. Many people will say that BYD's fuel vehicle sales are not as good as Geely and Changan, but it is undeniable that BYD's new energy vehicle business is better than Geely and Changan.
In March this year, the sales volume of its Han family models reached 12,359 units, of which Han DM increased by 524.9% month-on-month, continuing to lead the Chinese brand medium and large car segment. At the same time, the Tang family model, which is the flagship model of DM-i super hybrid technology, reached 9625 units, of which the new generation of Tang DM increased by 565.9% month-on-month. In addition, other Dynasty family models, as well as E-series and Dolphin series models, have also achieved good sales feedback in the end market.
As the head of the new energy vehicle business of traditional domestic car companies, BYD's action also indicates a turning point in history. From this day on, more and more forward-looking independent brands will also seize the time to give up fighting with multinational brands in the fuel vehicle market. Since the founding of New China, Chinese people have almost developed their own automobile industry on the basis of poverty and poverty. However, with the development of the market economy over the years, the level of national income has increased, and the automobile has become the standard of more and more ordinary families, but with it, there are a series of development problems such as travel safety, traffic congestion, air pollution, and noise pollution that plague many cities.
In the early years, Mr. Qian Yilao, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a professor at the School of the Environment of Tsinghua University, was deeply impressed by a kind reminder from foreign friends when he exchanged views with american experts and scholars. According to Qian Lao's recollection, the foreign friend pointed out that if Chinese had 3 cars for every 4 people like the Americans, then by the time the Chinese reached 1.45 billion, China's 1.1 billion car ownership would exceed the world's 800 million units at that time. At the same time, too many cars also mean the expansion of parking lots, roads and other supporting facilities, up to 29 million hectares of total area even catch up with the total area of domestic rice fields. In addition, the more cars, the more fuel needs to be consumed, but at that time, the demand for oil in the Chinese market will far exceed the supply of the global market.
Admittedly, the foreign friend's statement is only a reasonable inference based on his own cognitive range. But we can also undeniate that the reason why China's local automobile industry has chosen to concentrate on the field of new energy vehicles in recent years is not just to achieve catch-up and surpassing of multinational car companies.
Compared with traditional internal combustion engine vehicles, the lightweight advantages of new energy vehicles also give many intelligent technology configurations more space to "display their talents", and the development of new energy vehicles cannot be directly equated with pure electric vehicles, because intelligent cars are the real protagonists of the future automobile world. Thanks to the promotion and popularization of smart cars, problems such as road traffic congestion and frequent accidents will also be effectively alleviated or even solved. This is also of positive significance for improving the quality of life of chinese people.
In addition, as traditional internal combustion engine vehicles are gradually eliminated by the domestic market, the domestic demand for oil reserves will also be fully alleviated. In this way, oil resources, as a scarce strategic resource, can also be more invested in the industrial production field that is truly related to the national economy and people's livelihood, which is also of positive significance for the upgrading and transformation of domestic manufacturing. Instead of discussing whether IT is too early to stop production of fuel vehicles, we should think about such a question, that is, after BYD, which independent brand can be bold and announce the transformation of electric vehicle companies as soon as possible?