Changan Automobile's product innovation and customer satisfaction have reached the best state in history, and the benefits of independent operation are also in the best in history. The high income is the biggest confidence for Changan to increase its investment in digitalization and new energy. "Transformation" should never be forced to break through, but on the basis of market victory. Chang'an textbooks generally explain what is meant by "active strategy."
Author 丨 Zhang Min
Edited by 丨 Dahua
Produced 丨 Automan Media
Changan Automobile has realized that the impact of its every move on the automobile market is not the same as that of 5 years ago. In the past few years, Changan Automobile has become a wind direction sign enterprise.
So much so that people are asking why Changan has not yet launched a complete new energy strategy.
On April 13, the mystery was finally revealed. Changan held the 2022 Global Partner Conference on this day, and Zhu Huarong, chairman of Changan Automobile, said that Changan will "accelerate the transformation to an intelligent low-carbon travel technology company and move towards a world-class brand.".
1
Landscape-changing tools
This seems to be a dual strategic goal, one is to transform the company, and the other is to expand globally and build a world-class brand.
But strategically, the two are one, because only by achieving smart, low-carbon (i.e., new energy) can global expansion become a reality for the first time.
Chang'an Is this floating? In the past, Changan's goal was to be the boss of Chinese brands. But the growth of strength is often not linear. Public opinion suddenly found that Chang'an has quietly become a regular customer in the top 5 of the sales list. In March, I accidentally took the first place.
According to the data of the Association, Changan Automobile surpassed the North and South Volkswagens with 132,000 units in March, up 20.0% year-on-year, and won the crown for the first time on behalf of Chinese car companies. The Association has called it a "milestone moment for Chinese brands".
But at the partner conference, Zhu Huarong barely mentioned sales. Perhaps in the eyes of Changan management, single-month sales do not mean anything. However, the management is also clear that the growth between Changan's strength and the strength of multinational enterprises has actually occurred. The so-called period of strategic opportunity has emerged. The result of this judgment is the release of the medium-term strategy.
Zhu Huarong, chairman of Changan Automobile
In the top 5 of the brand sales list in the first quarter of this year, Chinese brands occupy 3 seats, and the strong position is obvious. In addition to chang'an, which is the first, Geely and BYD performed well, ranking fourth and fifth respectively.
Whether it is retail sales or wholesale sales, Changan Automobile is a "brother" of Chinese brand passenger cars. Of course, the "one-brother dispute" is far from over, after all, it has not opened the grade of sales figures, and it also lacks the support of long-term data. However, although the group advantage of Chinese brands is not yet consolidated, it is at most a signal, but this is a striking signal.
This marks that the "rising" Chinese brand has initially possessed the strength to "change the pattern", or modestly, Chang'an has for the first time a "possible tool" to change the pattern.
2
How periods of strategic opportunity arise
In the past five years, the market share of Chinese brands was only 33.5% at the worst time, and it was actually set in June 2020, which is unexpectedly close to today.
But it turned out that the trough was breeding a turnaround. In less than two years, the strong rise of Chinese brands has become a phenomenon, and the trend is indisputably obvious. In fact, throughout 2021, the market share of Chinese brands was 44.6%, an increase of 6 percentage points, and this trend was further consolidated and strengthened in the first three months of 2022.
More telling than the numbers is momentum. After the entry of the younger generation of consumers, they did not continue their unconditional trust and admiration for multinational brands. This may stem from the growth stage of the post-95s and post-00s generations, which is closely related to the rise of China's national power. Their values and worldview were also formed at this time.
Moreover, the new generation of consumers generally has strong ability to obtain information and logical analysis. Non-profit third-party reviews and regulatory complaint data are more trustworthy.
This brings new opportunities for Chinese brands to accumulate under long-term technology investment, without the need to cross the brand premium of multinational competitors, direct confrontation.
We have seen that Chinese brand products continue to rise, the average unit price of Chinese brands has risen greatly, and the price ceiling has ceased to exist. The mid-to-high-end product market is no longer a one-man show for multinational brands.
Chinese brands have two outstanding contributions at this stage: creating more market segments and leading new energy. The penetration rate of the new energy business led by Chinese brands is rising, and the overall market share has hit a record high, which is likely to be achieved this year.
Looking back now, Changan Automobile's third entrepreneurship-innovation and entrepreneurship plan launched 5 years ago has seized the strategic opportunity period and achieved technological and strategic transformation.
Chang'an's two major strategies (Shangri-La and Beidou Tianshu) are essentially both technical and strategic.
The Shangri-La program has produced MPA architecture, EPA architecture and CHN platform, which represent the level of Changan's intelligent and electric technology.
Around the Shangri-La plan, Chang'an has accumulated more than 400 core technologies such as electric drive technology, battery technology, electronic control technology and low-carbon energy consumption technology.
In 2021, Changan developed a seven-in-one super-set electric drive, deep integration motor, reducer and other seven major assemblies in one of the electric drive system, integration, reliability, transmission efficiency are no less than the multinational Tier1 similar products, in the individual indicators are slightly better. As an OEM grabbed the Tier1 order, this is a very obvious signal.
The Beidou Tianshu plan is a strategic offensive action of Changan Automobile to break through the upstream technology barrier in the field of intelligent networking.
Under the Beidou Tianshu Plan, Changan Automobile has tackled more than 200 upstream technologies such as visual perception and multi-mode fusion. Downstream integration functions, Changan has mastered more than 30 key core technologies of L3-level intelligent driving assistance, realizing eight core functions; the proportion of intelligent and connected vehicle sales has increased to 72.4%, and the newly listed passenger cars after 2020 have achieved 100% networking.
Public opinion usually only sees that Changan has formed a product and brand matrix at the partner conference, but behind it is a long period of technical accumulation, and thick accumulation can be thin. After 5 years of hard work, Changan Automobile has thus entered what Zhu Huarong called the "most Chang'an" state in history - both scale, efficiency and sustainable development.
The next step is not to enjoy the fruits of victory comfortably, the new journey is at hand.
3
Create a new energy "attack camp"
Some people believe that the pace of new energy in Chang'an has slowed down. From the perspective of sales, changan new energy vehicle sales in 2021 are less than 10% of the sales of changan Chinese brand passenger cars.
However, as long as you take stock of the sales of electric vehicles in the past two years, you can know that even if the market is the head of the new energy enterprise, in addition to Tesla, the other companies are also increasing revenue and not increasing profits, and it is difficult for new energy vehicles to make money. Of course, there are reasons for the poor supply chain and the price increase of raw materials, but the main reason is that the brand is not enough to break through upwards, and the profit of bicycles is too low.
Nowadays, the mid-to-high-end electric vehicle market has developed and grown, and the task of the education market has been completed in stages. With the benefits of brand upgrading, Changan Automobile has entered the new energy market in one fell swoop with strong technology accumulation and capital investment, while at the same time exerting efforts at the high, medium and low ends. Enter in a big way, and this is the time.
At the Global Partnership Conference, Chang'an clearly described the territory of the new energy + intelligent strategy.
In the mainstream new energy market with the widest audience, Changan New Energy, which has independently obtained multiple rounds of financing, announced the official brand name - "Changan Deep Blue". Officially, it is called "the new digital pure electric brand", which indicates the two major points of strength of the brand.
The Deep Blue brand will launch 5 pure electric vehicles in the future, and the first new car this year will land, which can be described as a tight schedule. This is obviously based on the maturity of Changan digital and new energy technology.
In Zhu Huarong's vision, the new value of "Changan Deep Blue" will be reflected in the expansion of all-digital scenarios, more intelligent and interesting services, and the emphasis on experience, with the purpose of reconstructing "cognition and imagination of travel". It should be said that this vision is magnificent, and only a long-term strategy can take on such a large and far-reaching vision.
The UNI brand continues to transition to hybrid until the electrification of the entire range of products. The UNI sequence has already launched its first PHEV model, the UNI-K iDD, and the second PHEV model, the UNI-V iDD, is also expected to go on sale this year.
The hybrid field has now become the world of Chinese brands. Changan's technology accumulation in PHEV is also a leader even among Chinese brands. The product strength of the UNI series will be fully tested by the market this year.
Not only that, Changan said it will launch 21 new cars in the mainstream new energy passenger car market. Auchan brand Z6-PHEV and the first mass-produced hydrogen fuel cell sedan are also among them.
This year, Lumin, Changan's small tram brand, will also appear, and 4 new products have been planned in the future.
The Avita brand, released last year, focuses on the high-end market. The first mass-produced car, the Avita 11, based on the CHN platform jointly built by Changan, Huawei and CATL, will go on sale this year. The brand currently has 4 vehicle products planned, and Avita undoubtedly represents Changan's understanding of high-end brands.
Chinese brands can't do high-end products, which has never existed in the new generation's cognition. Changan's goal is to refresh everyone's cognition, and the pioneering role of the Avita brand is irreplaceable.
4
Overseas expansion, water and water
Under such a grand and meticulous layout, Changan Automobile plans to achieve total sales of 4 million vehicles by 2025, including 3 million independent brands and 1.05 million new energy vehicles, accounting for 35%; in 2030, Changan Automobile's sales reached 5.5 million, of which 4.5 million were owned brand sales, and new energy vehicle sales reached 2.7 million, accounting for 60%.
In 2022 alone, Changan has planned 36 new cars, of which 19 self-owned brand models include 9 new products, 10 new products, and 8 new energy products. For the goals of 2025 and 2030, in fact, Changan is currently approaching the goal every day.
On such a large scale, it is not feasible to continue to sit on the domestic market. The high-end and leading trend of Chinese brands in new energy can only be said to have just started overseas.
Chang'an's overseas expansion currently has only one outline. According to Chang'an's vision, first technology, then business; first research and production, then marketing; first domestic, then foreign.
The empire was not built in a day, and only overseas expansion could meet the scale needs of Chang'an's long-term development. The future of the brand is bound to be based on the establishment of global market awareness.
Changan Automobile will build 2-3 overseas manufacturing bases by the end of 2025 to complete the production capacity layout of the first phase of the global automotive market. At the same time, when the international business environment improves, the European headquarters and the North American headquarters will be established in the European and North American markets in due course. Changan plans to account for 30% of overseas sales in 2030.
"In the next ten years, world-class Chinese brands will be born in the world, and Changan Automobile will be among them." Zhu Huarong said this sentence at the Chang'an Science and Technology Ecology Conference last year, and everyone understood it as a "wish". From now on, Chang'an is very carefully planning the pace of development, step by step to achieve the long-term goal of survival, expansion and global existence for the camp.
In the short term, digital transformation is no longer the future, but the present reality. There are more and more digital products in the Changan product camp, and it has become possible to continuously provide intelligent experience and digital services throughout the life cycle of vehicles.
Under the introduction of the digital marketing front desk, the digital middle office is being built. Changan is already sorting out the resources at hand, and the digital supply chain, smart factory and all-digital chain of agile delivery are being built.
Changan plans to invest more than 80 billion yuan in key areas such as new energy, intelligence, scientific and technological innovation, and digital transformation by 2025 to accelerate the construction of core capabilities in the field of transformation. By 2025, the total number of R&D personnel in Changan will reach about 20,000 people, including more than 6,000 intelligent and software R&D personnel, more than 5,000 new energy R&D personnel, accounting for about 1/4 of R&D personnel.
Changan's product innovation and customer satisfaction in recent years have reached the best state in history, and the benefits of independent operation are also in the best in history. The high income is the biggest confidence for Changan to increase its investment in digitalization and new energy.
"Transformation" should never be forced to break through, but on the basis of market victory. Chang'an textbook generally explains what is called "active strategy".
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