Today's new energy vehicle market competition is very fierce, a variety of old car companies, new car-making forces into it, tit-for-tat confrontation with each other, you come and go, but also jointly promote the prosperity of the new energy vehicle market.
In the domestic new energy vehicle sales data released some time ago in March, there is a car company that, although it is not very famous, has ranked in the forefront of the new car-making forces.
The name of this new energy vehicle company is also very interesting, called zero run.
According to the data, in March 2022, 10,059 zero-run cars were delivered, ranking 4th among the new car-making forces after Xiaopeng, Nezha and Ideal, and one place ahead of Weilai Automobile.
Some people may say that I don't feel that I have heard much about this brand, and how suddenly the sales volume is higher than that of Weilai.
In fact, looking back at the history of zero-run cars since the manufacture of cars, we will find that this new car-making force is indeed a little different.
Zhu Jiangming, the founder of Zero Run Auto, was previously the co-founder of Dahua Shares, a big man in the domestic security field, but he did not know anything about cars.
Around 2015, the momentum of domestic new energy vehicles has just risen, although Zhu Jiangming does not know much about cars, but he knows to seize the wind outlet, so he resolutely entered the game and established a zero-run car in December 2015.
Although at the end of 2017, zero-run cars debuted their first car, the S01.
But in the early stage, from figuring out all aspects of new energy vehicles, to finding upstream and downstream supply chains, setting up companies to recruit people, finding foundries, pulling investment, mass production and listing... It took more than three years for the layman to prepare for the zero-run car.
Because it was not until January 2019 that Zero-Run finally released its first production car, the S01, on the water cube, and was not officially delivered in June of the same year.
However, in fact, the S01 mass production in 2019 is actually produced by Changjiang Automobile OEM. Zero Run itself only began to invest more than 1 billion yuan in 2019 to build a factory in Jinhua.
Because of the new car-making force and layman zero running, at that time, it had not yet obtained the vehicle production qualification of the relevant departments.
In addition, from 2019 to the beginning of 2020, the zero-run s01 that has been delivered has frequent quality control problems and has been repeatedly complained by car owners. In 2019, the total sales of zero-run vehicles were only more than 1,000 vehicles, and the company's vice president also left in March of the following year.
For newcomers in any field, such a start is enough to make them retreat, but Zhu Jiangming wanted to hold out for a while, but he did not expect to survive it.
In 2020, Zero-Run Automobile finally obtained the vehicle production qualification through the acquisition of Xinfuda, and the factory it invested in has also had production capacity.
In January 2020, the second car T03 of zero-running was unveiled in front of the world and officially launched in May of the same year, this car looks like a Smartforfour car, but the price is only set at 70,000-85,000.
This T03 has a price of about 70,000 yuan, a super 400 km endurance, and a rare L2 driver assistance system in the same level, and the cost performance is quite good.
At that time, in the new energy vehicle market of the same price, there were very few competitors with zero running, so T03 was finally noticed by some consumers.
In 2020, T03 sold 7,013 vehicles in the whole year, and 39,149 vehicles in 2021, and T03 made zero run finally turn around.
In addition, in November 2020, Zero Run also steadily launched the new car Zero Run C11, which was officially launched in September of the following year.
This zero-run C11 positioning is "cross-level full of pure electric SUV", the price range is 179,800 yuan - 229,800 yuan, compared with the same level of "Wei Xiaoli" model, the price is still lower.
Of course, zero-run cars can reach the top four in March this year, relying on not exactly low prices, after all, the cost performance is not too bad.
Like its counterparts in the new car-making forces, Zero Run has been building its own core technology since its inception.
Since its establishment, Zero Run has already owned its own patents: intelligent power technology, intelligent network technology, intelligent driving technology, production base, factory, vehicle platform...
It can be said that although the fame of zero-run cars is small, from technology to production in terms of car manufacturing, there should be some, as if from the original layman, to a mature entrant.
The above all ensure the quality and configuration of the zero-run car, although the configuration can not be compared with the hundreds of thousands of "Wei Xiaoli", but it is not too bad.
Coupled with the people-friendly price, aiming at the low-end new energy vehicle market, it has finally won the current good development momentum.
Because the cost performance is good, there are many people on the Internet who ridicule zero run as the millet of the new energy vehicle industry.
However, for zero running itself, it is actually far from Xiaomi. In addition to maintaining the current momentum, it also faces another problem, that is, profitability.
Data show that in the past three years, zero-run gross profit margins were -95.7%, -50.6%, -44.3%, although it is improving but not positive, it is currently equivalent to selling a loss of half a car. In 2021, the zero run loss was 2.85 billion.
Write at the end:
Although it has been losing money, it has been listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in March this year, and it is clear that the development momentum gained from the cost-effective route can still gain the favor of capital.
Have their own technology, have upward sales, can pull to investment... For the current zero run, how to carry out the next step of planning and layout and solve the problem of profitability may be the premise of truly becoming "millet" in the field of new energy vehicles.
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