Text | Karakush
Wang Chuanfu's biggest loss was Denza.
From the official launch of the first product in 2014 to last year, more than 20,000 vehicles were sold in total, with a cumulative loss of more than 5.22 billion yuan.
While some companies can lose this amount in a year, no one loses this desperate amount. Thanks to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange once sent an inquiry letter to BYD, what kind of thing ah, the greater the loss, is there a risk of impairment?
Denza's other shareholder, Daimler, felt that it could not be reduced. At the end of last year, Daimler transferred a large share of its shares to BYD, and the shareholding ratio between the two sides was changed from 50% to 10% of Daimler and 90% of BYD. The equity adjustment plan was completed in the first half of this year.
BYD believes that it can also kill back. Denza is fully dihua, the former general manager of BYD sales company Zhao Changjiang, as the general manager of Denza's sales division, concurrently serving as a Weibo product propaganda speaker, around the new products frequent and big Vs eyebrows to go for more than half a year.
The first bullet to make a comeback is a high-end new energy MPV, which was officially named Denza D9 last week. If it were not for the epidemic, Denza originally planned to unveil the new car at the Beijing Auto Show in April, and it would no longer be placed in the corner of Mercedes-Benz as a gold-plated product, but was ready to participate in the exhibition as an independent brand.
The only familiar old taste in the new identity is that the rumored price range of D9 may be higher than 450,000. The pricing boom marks the third time deforestation has stepped into the same high-end river. Many friends feel greatly in Wuhu: This time, tengshi can't afford to support it, is it not high, or how long will Lao Wang lose?
Take failure as a mirror
For a brand that has been established for 12 years, the future has to be found in the past failures.
All aspects of Denza have been mercilessly criticized, products, brands, marketing, channels... Such a comprehensive failure is not easy, and all the C can be corrected in several items. So the problem is more likely to point to a mistake in strategy.
The first is the mismatch between positioning and demand. Denza has a total of two generations of products: one is the Denza 300 launched in 2014, and then every two years to carry out a continuous modification, launching the Denza 400 in 2016 and the Denza 500 in 2018; the second is the Denza X launched in 2019. Neither generation has the gist.
Denza had a misunderstanding. It is undeniable that they are one of the first doers to realize the policy opportunities and act quickly, signing a joint venture in 2010, releasing the brand in 2012, and meeting the state in 2014 to introduce a series of favorable policies such as the exemption of purchase tax for new energy vehicles. Lian Yubo, then CEO of Denza, believes that "Denza has caught up with the best environment, and it is not the best time to be early or late at all." ”
However, what was stimulated at that time was actually the small car market with A00-level terminals below 70,000 yuan, that is, a large number of low-end low-end cheap electric vehicles under Jianghuai, Lifan, Zotye, Zhidou and BAIC, with high-speed growth lasting three years, reaching its peak in 2017, accounting for more than 53.3% of the new energy market share.
Denza is Daimler out of the Mercedes-Benz B-class body, BYD out of the three electricity to do the oil to electricity, the official price of 369,000 yuan, after the subsidy price of 255,000 yuan. Many reviews denounced it as blindly more expensive than Mercedes-Benz, which is very sloppy. At that time, the official price was Huo Fat, and only after the subsidy did he talk about true feelings. For example, the A00-class electric vehicle Zotye Cloud 100, which was listed in the same year, was officially priced at 158,900 yuan, and the price after subsidies was 48,900 yuan.
255,000 yuan is appropriate for the B-class joint venture car. Compared with the above iron sheet, deforestation 300 has a range of 300 kilometers, which is very decent in 2014, when the general range is 60-100 kilometers, and won 25 awards in the following year's various auto media selections (even if it does not explain the hardcore of the product, it also shows that it has been seriously sprinkled with coins and oversold).
However, in 2014-2018, when the series was active, the share of B-class electric vehicles did not exceed 1% of the new energy market. The segment began to take off in 2019-2020, and its share climbed rapidly to 3.6% and 18.7% in two years. Especially in 2020, it is by relying on Tesla's domestic production, coupled with BYD Han, Xiaopeng P7 and other explosive models, jointly driving market expansion. At this point, more than 200,000 electric vehicles have living space. However, the Denza series has been discontinued.
Denza was born six years prematurely, and the biggest misjudgment was to prematurely choose to cut in from the mainstream market, without considering the cultivation process of consumer acceptance, and completely shorted a product cycle.
Is it possible to stand firm on your own without the help of the general trend? Like Tesla and the BMW i3, they both entered China in 2014, with high prices and low prices, but they have found a foothold: the former has become a new toy for tech giants; the latter has become a scooter for the upper class to ration small nannies. In contrast, Denza lacks both product charm and brand appeal.
This stems from the second problem, the concept of joint venture car manufacturing is outdated.
Denza is a delicate joint venture, an attempt at BYD's high-end and An attempt to electrify Mercedes-Benz, which Lao Wang said "stands on the shoulders of giants." In fact, the oil is changed to electricity and then the shell is replaced, and BYD, which is endorsed by Mercedes-Benz's century-old experience and standards, is very similar to the Mercedes-Benz flat replacement.
Reflected in the product, the advantage of the car evaluation is that the battery life is real (in fact, it is a valuable quality)... It's like you look ugly, but ugly and real, and there's no more hurtful compliment than that. Mediocrity is not a problem, and mediocrity without a mark is very serious. Denza does not hang up the Mercedes-Benz logo, the same new energy brand and BMW and Brilliance joint venture promise, you do not remember very normal.
In order to correct the problem of insufficient Mercedes-Benz, until 2019, Denza X incorporated more Mercedes-Benz designs into the BYD Tang EV600, and even the body nameplate was affixed with "Mercedes-Benz Design" and incorporated into the Mercedes-Benz sales network. As a result, depressing desir has only increased Denza's annual sales from more than 2,000 to more than 4,000 vehicles.
The reality is that at that time, the joint venture is no longer a golden signboard, not to mention the joint venture of the screw bar, especially in the field of new energy, the strong rubbing of BBA, is not as convincing and motivated as the "independent high-end" with the intention of piling up materials. If nothing else, BYD itself has been able to achieve the range of the original momentum. In the early days, Denza did not catch up with the final brand advantage of the "joint venture", and the later "joint venture" became the negative asset of Denza's rapid adjustment.
Therefore, Dihua, whether from the operation of self-cutting, or market acceptance, is a progress.
Is "Teng erfa" the antidote?
Let's look at depressing D9, can it solve denza's dilemma.
MPV is not a traditional blockbuster section, but coincidentally this year, every family is ready to pounce, and we have combed through it in the article "There are always so many people, more concerned than your mother whether you want to have children". According to Denza's forecast, this year is the first year of the outbreak of the mid-to-high-end MPV market, and the next mainstream family vehicle configuration is a large-space new energy MPV + SUV/ sedan configuration.
From the currently public information, as a family MPV (or at least business-friendly IKEA), the advantages of the D9 are:
First, it provides pure electric and DM versions, divided into four-wheel drive and two-wheel drive, so the price band will be relatively wide. The technical level arranges the most advanced treatment of the Di factory, such as the pure electric version with a wide-area heat pump, which can solve the problem of winter endurance attenuation of electric vehicles. Supermix provides EV and DM modes, and the comprehensive endurance is more than 1000km to ensure the needs of long-distance travel.
Second, large space, 5.2 meters long, wheelbase more than 3 meters. Seven-seat layout, "to avoid the six-seater model adds the embarrassment of one person not being able to sit down". The second and third rows have very long slide rails, which can be manually implemented with large four seats.
Third, the design is more exquisite. For example, the design of the body side and the sliding door slit achieves the coherence of five faces and the different curvature of a straight line, "completing several world-class engineering design and process quality".
Fourth, the standard equipment is more abundant, including double sunroof, with double electric sun blinds and one-key switches; double-sided electric sliding doors; four-door double-layer silent glass; and high-end brand tires.
In the words of Zhao Changjiang, he summed it up: "No one in this world can remember the second, then we will do the first; according to the recent user feedback, the preparation of various work and the final comparison of the product!" I am confident that denza high-end MPV will be done. ”
Although the outside world, such as me, can not yet deduce from the above information where the "first" is, but I can more or less see the ambition in the product, the introspection of the strategy, and the more grounded response ability.
Another example is pricing. The 450,000 range visual inspection is aimed at pure electric four-wheel drive; the plug-in should be able to pull down the "relatively wide price band" to 350,000 or even 300,000, which is more fragrant. The left hand is held high, the right hand is seriously engaged in money, and the underlying logic of the independent high-end new brand is actually a destructive innovation that is far greater than the brand premium, and the correct posture is to use the cost performance to break through the competitors.
In addition to the D9, Denza plans to release another medium-sized SUV and a medium-sized SUV this year, and it is reported that the information of the SUV will begin to be released in May. This year's product line alone has been enriched in the previous eight years.
At the level of brand marketing, Denza is no longer sitting and waiting for empowerment as in the past. Fit the fashion, re-establish the direct sales channel system, develop app, and shout "user co-creation" at the same time to create a high and unproductive fan economy. The first creation is the march of the fan name, denza powder exclusive name is "Teng pepper"... It's not new, but it looks like a low-cost attempt at contemporary wealth cryptography.
Denza has not yet launched a large-scale campaign. However, Zhao Changjiang said that the voice of the Denza brand is growing rapidly, and many enthusiastic car owners have sent him a lot of consultation or advice information, estimated to have tens of thousands. Although this volume is only reflected in his personal Huang V Weibo, it is still desirable to see that the first batch of self-dried peppers can be circled without spending any money, with words, pictures and a small number of videos; and it has a diligent executive.
These are all good starts.
Denza is far from the end of BYD's high-end, this year will be BYD's high-end pioneering year, in its automotive business sector, from the bottom up, there will be Ocean Network, Dynasty Network, Denza and another high-end brand, the price range of the latter is expected to be 50-1 million yuan. Denza and the new brand are roughly equivalent to the relationship between Audi and Porsche and the public.
So if you think that Denza is dying in your works, this is where the duck goes.