Written by Wu Jing
Editor/ Zhang Nan
Design / Shi Yuchao
Just as the private consumer market for new energy vehicles ushered in a spurt of development, no one expected that new energy vehicle companies were stuck in the neck of upstream raw materials.
The sudden increase in terminal sales of new energy vehicles has increased the contradiction between supply and demand of raw materials, coupled with the geopolitics of the Russian-Ukrainian War and the impact of the new crown epidemic, resulting in the rapid rise in the prices of core raw materials such as nickel, cobalt and lithium materials for power batteries.
Take lithium carbonate as an example. At the beginning of 2021, the price of lithium carbonate is less than 50,000 yuan / ton, Wind data shows that on March 18, 2022, the domestic price of lithium carbonate was reported at 504,000 yuan / ton, a year later, it directly rose 10 times. This is one of the most direct reasons for the rise in the price of power batteries.
The "chip crisis" that has not been alleviated has also made the situation of car companies worse. Recently, Yu Chengdong, CEO of Huawei's consumer business and CEO of Smart Car BU, said in an interview, "When I first entered the automotive industry, I didn't know that the lack of cores in the automotive industry was so serious, and a chip of 10 yuan and 20 yuan was speculated to 2500 yuan." ”
Raw material prices soared, new energy subsidy policies declined, under the influence of multiple factors, the cost pressure of the new energy automobile industry has approached the limit.
When raw materials become unbearable for car companies, domestic new energy vehicles have to alleviate cost pressure through terminal price adjustments.
New energy vehicle companies have been collectively affected
Since March 2022, a number of car companies have announced price increases for their new energy products, with different price increases. Some car companies even directly made the decision to stop taking orders.
On February 23, Dong Yudong, CEO of Euler Automobile Brand, issued a letter to consumers saying that its black cat and white cat models stopped receiving orders, on the one hand, because of "lack of core and less electricity", on the other hand, due to the rise in raw material prices, the loss of black cats alone exceeded 10,000 yuan.
Since then, the price increase tide has continued to intensify.
"The increase in battery costs in the second quarter was very outrageous." Ideal Auto CEO Li Xiang said on his personal Weibo on the evening of March 19, "At present, brands that have contracted with battery manufacturers to determine the price increase in the second quarter have basically announced price increases immediately." If there is no price increase, most of them have not yet been negotiated, and the price will generally increase immediately after waiting for the negotiation. ”
On March 25, Li Bin, CEO of WEILAI Automobile, said at the fourth quarter and annual financial report meeting of WEILAI in fiscal 2021 that Weilai currently has no price increase and currently has no idea of price increase, but then it will see whether the pricing policy needs to be adjusted according to market conditions.
But the adjustment came quickly. On April 10, NIO announced that it will adjust the prices of its products. In the Weilai APP response to the message, Li Bin said bluntly, "Raw materials, especially battery raw materials, have risen too much this year, and I can't see a downward trend in the near future, I originally wanted to carry it, the epidemic situation is even more unbearable, the price increase is also forced, please understand." ”
In fact, since the beginning of the year, more than 40 electric vehicles from more than 20 new energy vehicle companies have increased in price. It can almost be concluded that in this wave of fierce raw material price increases, no new energy vehicle company can stand alone. Recently, Extreme Kr finally can't hold back, and the official announced that it will increase the price of its models in the near future.
The Krypton 001 price increase plan takes effect on May 1
Limited by upstream supply chain enterprises, the price increase of new energy vehicles has become an industry phenomenon and is almost inevitable.
After fully considering the interests of users and digesting the cost pressure as much as possible, Extreme Kr decided to adjust the price and purchase rights of the Extreme Kr 001 model.
Judging from the price increase announcement released, the WE version of the model canceled the deposit expansion rights of the deposit of 5,000 yuan to 10,000 yuan; the price of the YOU version model was raised by 18,000 yuan, and the deposit of 5,000 yuan to 7,500 yuan was cancelled, and the price of the YOU version model increased by 20,500 yuan.
Officials said that the adjustment of prices and rights will take effect from 00:00 on May 1, 2022, and users who pay deposits through official channels such as the Krypton APP before 00:00 on May 1 will not be affected by this price adjustment.
As a high-end luxury car, such a price increase can be said to be very conscientious.
Automobile manufacturing is a highly complex system engineering that involves the whole body. Every car involves thousands of parts, and these parts come from hundreds or even thousands of suppliers, and one of them is affected, which will affect the final production delivery.
Under the influence of the epidemic, many upstream supply chain enterprises at home and abroad have suffered from suspension of work and production, and the shortage of spare parts has affected the balance of market supply. Especially for high-end luxury products such as Extreme Kr 001, many of its parts and components are from overseas, under the influence of the epidemic, transportation and customs clearance will also be affected by the epidemic prevention policies in different regions, which will further push up the cost.
Although price increases have become unavoidable, as a user-based enterprise, Krypton fully takes into account the rights and interests of users.
As early as April 2, Extreme Krypton has announced that it will raise the price of its extreme Kr 001. While absorbing part of the cost itself, it reserves a buffer period of up to one month for users. This not only frees up enough time for users to make decisions and think, but also allows users to continue to enjoy their existing car purchase rights.
In this regard, some netizens even directly ridiculed Extreme Kr 001 as the "best financial management product of the year".
"Banking of the Year"
The reason why it is called the "best financial management product of the year" is because if a user sets the pole krypton 001 before May 1, he can save up to 20,500 yuan.
The first model of Extreme Krypton, the Extreme Krypton 001, was developed based on the SEA Haohan Intelligent Evolution Experience Architecture that took many years and invested more than 20 billion yuan to build.
The core advantage of The Krypton 001's continuous evolution ability is its construction based on the SEA vast architecture. Empowered by this architecture, Extreme Kr 001 exhibits an amazing iterative evolutionary ability.
Since the delivery of The Kr 001, Extreme Kr has upgraded it 3 times OTA and completed more than 500 optimizations.
On March 23, zeekr OS 2.0 official version began to push. This is another major upgrade of the Kr 001, involving 33 ECU units, adding the first ZAD Kr Intelligent Driver Assistance System functions, including ACCQA adaptive cruise with queuing function, AEB forward collision mitigation, LDW lane departure warning and FCTA front intersection traffic warning, as well as charging abnormality indication reminder function.
At the same time, in the official version of ZEEKR OS 2.0, for the user feedback of ZEEKR OS 1.1.1, 59 functions have been improved and optimized in many aspects such as One-pedal experience, automatic door experience, driving mode memory, vehicle version display, video software playback settings, boot response, Bluetooth and voice experience.
In terms of energy replenishment ecology, extreme krypton is also continuing to exert its strength. As of March 20, ZEEKR Power's self-built charging stations have been launched in 20 cities across the country; charging maps continue to connect to mainstream operators across the country, and third-party charging networks have covered nearly 320,000 charging terminals in 331 cities across the country; electrode delivery and charging services have been launched in 30 cities, mobile charging vehicle services have been launched in 6 major cities across the country; home charging installation services have served 281 city owners in 31 provinces, and 7kW's home charging piles are planned to be sold in April. Meet the needs of users in remote installation scenarios.
In the future, Extreme Kr Energy will also increase the construction of energy replenishment systems. It is expected that by the end of this year, the scale of the national extreme krypton stores will exceed 300, including the extreme krypton center, the extreme krypton space, the extreme krypton delivery center, etc., all-round service users' car life.
Affected by the epidemic and chip supply, in March this year, 1795 vehicles were delivered by Extreme Kr 001, and as of March 31, 2022, Extreme Kr 001 had delivered a total of 14,248 vehicles.
Products like The Krypton 001, which are fully configured and can continue to evolve through OTA upgrades, are a good choice for the moment, whether it is appearance, performance, control, or intelligent experience.
With the last 6 days left, the maximum "earned" is 20,500 yuan, and the "best financial management of the year" should be bought?
This article was originally produced by Automotive Business Review
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