Factors such as the epidemic, high oil prices, sluggish economy, and less trucks have caused heavy-duty truck sales in the first quarter of this year to decline sharply, with cumulative sales of only 231,900 vehicles, less than half of last year.
In the midst of difficulties, it is more heroic. In the domestic heavy-duty truck market facing such a dilemma, under the leadership of Chairman Tan Xuguang, Sinotruk successfully achieved a jump in the ranking, winning the first quarter of heavy-duty truck sales champion, "gold content" full.
Cumulative sales of 55,000 units in the first quarter Market share of 23.73%
In fact, going against the current has been the main theme of Sinotruk in the past six months or so. In July 2021, the emission regulations of the national VI of heavy vehicles were fully implemented, and the sales of heavy trucks also fell in response, almost waist cut, and most companies in the industry had different degrees of decline, but Sinotruk became an exception, with monthly sales of 21,000 vehicles year-on-year increased by 4%, winning the first monthly sales champion of the year.
In the following months, Sinotruk continued its efforts, and under the situation of continuous decline in the overall monthly sales of the heavy-duty truck industry, it won the monthly list championship for 4 consecutive times, reaching the "five consecutive championships". In the whole year of 2021, Sinotruk sold a total of 286,400 heavy-duty trucks, ranking second in the industry for the first time in recent years, and its annual market share exceeded 20%.
In January 2022, heavy-duty truck sales rose sharply month-on-month, but still declined year-on-year, Sinotruk successfully won the championship with a monthly sales of 27,700 vehicles, and among the top ten companies, only Sinotruk achieved contrarian growth, an increase of 7% year-on-year, and Sinotruk became the "one" of exceptions.
In February, Sinotruk finished second with monthly sales of 12,000 heavy-duty trucks. In March, it should have been the traditional peak sales season of the heavy-duty truck market, but due to the severe epidemic prevention and control situation, coupled with the high oil prices and declining demand, there was no "boom" at all in March, and the overall market monthly sales were only 76,800 vehicles, down 67% year-on-year. In this "cold" March, Sinotruk once again won the second place with a score of 15,300 vehicles. One quarter of "one crown and two Asia", with a cumulative sales volume of 55,000 vehicles, made Sinotruk successfully win the first quarter of the heavy-duty truck market. In terms of market share, Sinotruk's share in the first quarter of this year was 23.73%, an increase of more than 3 percentage points compared with the market share of the whole year last year.
To achieve such good results, it is inseparable from Sinotruk's "achievement" in 2022: in the first quarter, Sinotruk successively launched heavy products such as Howo MAX trucks, Shandeka C9H, And Howo MAX Light Luxury Edition, etc., constantly deepening the market segment, and exerting efforts in service, so that card friends can feel the brand temperature with "family service".
But to be able to maintain a posture of going against the current for a long time, it is certainly not enough to rely on this year's efforts. In the view of the editor, Sinotruk can go up against the current, mainly for two reasons, and these two points will also play a huge role in the future.
Lead the way Product iteration upgrade is faster
In September 2018, Tan Xuguang officially became the chairman of the board of directors and party secretary of China National Heavy Duty Truck Group, and since then he has carried out drastic internal reform and mechanism reconstruction of Sinotruk. This has attracted widespread attention in the domestic commercial vehicle market. Tan Xuguang's life credo is "do not fight for the first, it is in the mix", and his arrival has made Sinotruk also have this temperament of charging forward.
The impact of a good leader on a team and on a company is self-evident. In the process of Sinotruk's continuous improvement of the market share of heavy-duty trucks, Tan Xuguang's excellent leadership ability has played a very important role, which is one of the main reasons why Sinotruk has bucked the current.
Of course, the competition in the heavy-duty truck market is still the competition of product strength in the end, and another important reason why Sinotruk can "go against the current" is that its products are upgraded faster.
5 years ago, when the National Five era was just opened, million kilometers of no major repairs in the domestic heavy truck market is still a bright and beautiful achievement. Five years later, today, which has entered the era of national sixth, no heavy truck company has focused on publicizing the million kilometers without major repairs, because there are too many cars without major repairs for millions of kilometers. In the past 5 years, the progress of domestic heavy truck technology and quality is obvious, in the process of rapid progress, who can do one step ahead, who can win the market initiative, after all, the pioneer is always easier than the latecomer to get fans. Sinotruk's "upstream" road is opened from the release of new products at a high frequency.
In September 2020, Sinotruk officially released a new generation of "Yellow River" heavy trucks, which is a product that focuses on the high-end trunk logistics tractor market, with excellent performance and completely independent research and development. On October 28, 2020, Sinotruk's newly upgraded high-end standard logistics and transportation product, the Howo TH7 series tractor, was launched, and in March of the following year, the cumulative sales of the Howo TH7 exceeded 10,000 units. On October 7, 2021, Sinotruk Howo MAX was launched, a cool truck specially built by Sinotruk for the younger generation of truck drivers. On March 16, 2022, sinotruk Shandeka C9H was launched, which is equipped with an ultra-high reliability MC engine, AMT transmission and MAN technology transaxle, and has achieved more than 150 upgrades.
Between the launch of these blockbuster new products, Sinotruk is still continuously optimizing, upgrading and expanding existing heavy-duty truck products. In the past few years, Sinotruk can be said to be the heavy truck enterprise with the fastest product iteration speed and the largest number of new products launched in the heavy-duty truck market. Judging from the sales volume in the first quarter of this year, it means that Sinotruk has continued to invest in high-intensity research and development, and finally obtained a return, allowing Sinotruk to rise against the trend even when the market is down.
Editor's Note
After winning the heavy-duty truck sales championship in the first quarter of this year, the "rise" of Sinotruk may be far from over. In the remaining 9 months of 2022, Sinotruk may be able to burst out more powerful energy.