Author 丨 Cui Liwen
Responsible editor 丨 Cui Liwen
Edit 丨 Chic
This time, Musk may be breaking his word again.
"Tesla and Weilai are two car companies with very different personalities, the former wants to do more like the era of traditional fuel vehicles, more like the Ford of that year, through the continuous expansion of production capacity, reduce manufacturing costs, and completely popularize electric vehicles into thousands of households." The latter may want to be a BBA-like luxury car company, in addition to the product itself, but also want to pass on more additional things, and then enhance the brand premium. ”
A few days ago, after discussing with friends around him what is the difference between the two most sought-after "players" in The current Chinese new energy market, he threw out the opening paragraph without much hesitation.
But in my opinion, it may only be agreeable to a small part.
Because from Tesla's point of view, what it wants to do is not a Ford, but itself. Manufacturing is just one of its many "longboards". In contrast, the three electric technology, intelligent reserves and even the founder Musk's own aura are the key to its real foundation.
On the other hand, weilai, from the current situation, it has indeed firmly established the "high-end, luxury" brand image in stages, but if it wants to become an electric track BMW and Mercedes-Benz, there are still many things that need to be proved, so it is impossible to jump to conclusions for the time being.
However, it is foreseeable that for a long time to come, the discussion of similar topics will continue.
The protagonist of today's article wants to talk about the absolute "star model" that Tesla currently holds in his hands - Model Y. Because in recent times, whether in the local market or in China, the iconic events and nodes that have happened to it are not few.
01
4680 edition, officially entered
On April 7, local time in the United States, as he stood in the spotlight of the center of the stage, Musk, who incarnated as a "cowboy of the west", once again raised his arms and shouted.
Tesla,Located near Austin Airport in Texas, Tesla officially opened another 12,140-acre gigafactory at a cost of $1.1 billion, making it the largest of the four gigafactories the automaker currently owns.
"We will use this as a starting point to create more milestone moments."
It is undeniable that although Musk, as the head of the company, often likes to judge some things without any cover, and will also throw out many controversial views, I believe that the above statement is from the heart.
Because, with the completion of the Texas factory, Tesla has truly ushered in many aspects of innovation. Among them, the most important thing is that the Model Y equipped with the latest 4680 battery has finally begun to be delivered to users. However, judging from the information disclosed by foreign media, it is currently only for its internal employees and will be open to the public in the next few weeks.
As evidenced by that, tesla technician Regan Janssen announced at the LinkedIn that she received the first Model Y equipped with a 4680 battery made at the Texas plant.
Seeing this, I think there will be readers who will wonder, how is such a new car that has aroused many people's expectations and discussions different from the Model Y currently on sale? Will there really be a qualitative leap and progress in the level of product strength?
It is a little regrettable that because the specific parameters are not officially disclosed, after synthesizing the current known information from all parties, the answer seems to be concentrated: it may not be subversive in imagination.
First of all, regarding the price, according to Tesla's internal employees, as an entry-level standard endurance version of the model, the Model Y with 4680 batteries starts at $59,990 (about 381,000 yuan). Compared with the standard endurance version Model Y currently on sale in the United States, it has decreased by $3,000 (about 19,000 yuan).
At the same time, the EPA will have a range of 279 miles (about 449 kilometers), an acceleration time of 0-60 miles (about 96.5 kilometers) will be less than 5 seconds, and the top speed can reach 217 kilometers/h. As for the battery capacity, according to the content posted by a netizen on Twitter, the standard endurance version model Y equipped with a 4680 battery has a battery capacity of 68kWh, and the long-endurance version that has not yet been officially launched has a battery capacity of 82kWh.
At the same time, the fundamental reason for choosing to start the former, rather than the latter, is speculated that due to the relatively limited production capacity of the 4680 battery, Tesla can only choose this way to transition in order to make more new cars.
So far, as far as the above-mentioned known product forces are concerned, although compared with the current model, the Model Y equipped with 4680 batteries has not made significant progress in endurance and acceleration, but it has achieved great optimization in manufacturing costs, especially with the blessing of CTC and front and rear integrated die casting.
However, due to the lack of official announcements, as a bystander, it is not possible to determine what kind of amplitude the Model Y equipped with the 4680 battery has achieved in dimensions such as battery attenuation and durability, charge and discharge speed, etc.
But one thing is for sure, the shrewd Musk will never make a "loss-making deal." Since it chooses to invest a lot of manpower, material and financial resources for research and development, and put into large-scale production, and even build a power battery factory, there must be a significance of 4680.
At the opening event of the Texas plant, he also said that with the blessing of a number of new technologies, the single-year production capacity of the new Model Y alone will reach 500,000 units.
At present, through various ways and means, reducing costs and increasing efficiency and expanding the scale is what the American new energy vehicle company cares about most, just like the outside world is ridiculed: new cars are not enough, production capacity to make up. As early as last year, Musk had set up a Flag about this product.
02
In March, behind the "double crown"
"The Model Y has the potential to become the world's highest-selling car in 2022 and break the record set by the Model 3 in the future."
The above ambitious speech comes from Musk on the conference call after the release of Tesla's first quarter 2021 financial report, the ambition has reached the point of being called out, and it is its biggest long-cherished wish to let the former become the "world's first" as soon as possible in the sales of fuel vehicles.
In my more superficial cognition, I always feel that the task undertaken by the Model 3 after the arrival may be to help Tesla achieve profitability at the operational level, and to let the whole world realize what the car company wants to do.
After the Model Y was born, the mission was to launch a real subversion and revolution for fuel vehicles.
Although they were born from the same platform and a large number of parts are exactly the same, the inherent properties of cars and SUVs are different, which is destined to have a huge difference in their popularity and the range of potential users.
Model Y's larger interior space and practicality, coupled with the fact that the price is not much higher than the Model 3, are its advantages.
However, it also needs to be noted that in the eyes of many ordinary consumers, it may be due to preconceived concepts and impressions, as well as the pricing strategy of car companies, it is always believed that for example, BMW X3 is higher than BMW 3 Series, BMW X5 is higher than BMW 5 Series.
However, in the real situation, from the definition of the birth platform and the beginning of the product design, the biggest difference between the two sides may be the difference in the shape and parameter configuration of the car and the SUV itself.
Turning the eye back to Tesla, the Model Y, although a few years after the release of the Model 3, there is no distinction between the two.
But even so, it is still impossible to stop the end consumer, for the "latecomer" or for the SUV, that kind of innate preference.
As can be seen from the March sales just announced by the Association of Automobile Manufacturers, Model Y in China sold a total of 39,730 new cars, an increase of 291.4% year-on-year, and won the "double material sales crown" in the overall list of new energy SUVs and SUVs including fuel vehicles. Throughout the first quarter, a total of 74,681 new cars were sold, also winning the "double crown".
Time to pull back to January 2021, when the first domestic Model Y slowly drove out of the production line of the Shanghai factory, no one would have expected that the shock effect brought by this "catfish" would be so violent.
In just one year, it has achieved a reversal of players such as Haval H6, Honda CR-V, BYD Song, Changan CS75 Plus, which have long occupied the top of the SUV sales list.
Obviously, data doesn't lie. If you still think that the rapid attack of Model Y is more due to the short-lived flash of luck, the tilt of some first-tier city policies, and even the result of Musk's personal aura, then please continue to live in the illusion of self-deception.
And for those car companies that are really sober and self-aware, they should calm down and think about why they can win. Why can a pure electric SUV perform like this today?
After all, not all consumers are fools, and there must be enough convincing reasons behind making the same choice. When cognition is gradually improved, a product is good, and bad is bad.
At the end of the article, I want to talk about the last topic: 2022, just like Musk's Flag, do you think Model Y can become the global sales champion?
For reference, let's start by listing a set of data.
In the past year, the world's most sold single model was the Toyota Corolla, reaching 1.155 million units. Model Y, on the other hand, has sold nearly 170,000 new cars in the Chinese market and more than 410,000 units worldwide. Horizontal comparison, there is still a big gap.
In the first quarter of this year, Tesla did not release data on the single model of the Model Y, but delivered a total of 295,324 new cars along with the Model 3. For the full year, Tesla expects a total sales target of 1.5 million units.
However, combined with the cumulative shutdown of the Shanghai factory for nearly half a month during the epidemic, as well as the Berlin factories and the Texas factories in Germany, it will take a certain amount of time to climb the production capacity.
It cannot help but say that even if toyota Corolla has a certain degree of year-on-year decline, it should still be a nail in the coffin to maintain millions of global sales.
So Model Y wants to achieve a reversal of it in 2022, and it is almost impossible to win the championship in one fell swoop.
In other words, Musk is likely to renege on his word again.
As for when Model Y will be able to win the "global sales crown" it has in mind, it seems that it is still full of variables and unknowns.
Personally, I would like to say: "The fastest, will it be next year?" ”
Cui Liwen
Love the car as fate,
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