The author | Mizuki Gong
Editor| Liu Wei
When it comes to smart, I believe that many people always have in mind the two-door small displacement fuel car. Sometimes it will appear outside the school gate after school, and sometimes it will appear at the discounted market entrance, mixing with all kinds of old men.
I believe that most people who buy smart friends will not use it as the main family car, at best as a grocery cart, or a baby car.
▲ Image from the Internet
Recently, the smart genie #1, co-created by Mercedes-Benz and Geely, was officially unveiled and opened for pre-sale. But in terms of this look, this design, is this really still the two-door car?
So today, Jiguojun will take you to analyze and analyze what this new smart has.
Can you imagine that smart has always been a heart disease of Mercedes-Benz.
According to Evercore ISI, a well-known financial research institute in the United States, smart loses between 500 million euros and 700 million euros per year. Since the establishment of the smart brand for 21 years, it has been in a state of loss.
Since the beginning of the brand, it has maintained its unique identity as a mini car brand. However, over the years, Smart has not failed to break through, it has tried sports cars, compact cars and four-door cars, but in the end because of the market acceptance, it lost everything.
▲ Four-door smart
When smart was in the North American market, Daimler once wrote in an official statement: The main reason for the delisting is the decline of the mini car market, and the reduction in production has led to a significant increase in certification costs.
But after coming to China, smart has been unsatisfactory for a long time. Confusion in sales channels is another big reason smart loses money.
▲ The cart is very convenient
It is understood that mercedes-benz previously had a sales company in China, if the dealer wants to open a new Smart 4S store, it needs to be agreed by two companies (Mercedes-Benz China and the sales company) at the same time.
In addition, Smart also has strict requirements in the choice of store location, and even the local cultural atmosphere needs to be taken into account, which objectively hinders Smart's expansion in China.
▲ Fly as soon as you touch it, and the safety is not good
In the past, smart cars were imported mini cars, characterized by expensive and small, two words to summarize: niche. Coupled with poor practicality and poor safety, it is understandable that the sale is not good. But since the Wuling miniEV is on fire, the practicality of going to ** turns out that everyone just doesn't like expensive cars.
▲ Landing 13W, on this interior?
Under the influence of the tide of new energy, the market for such smarts, niche fuel scooters, will shrink rapidly, so smarts have gradually withdrawn from the Chinese market after 19 models.
▲ It is also easy to be regarded as an old man
Have been losing money, this deal for you can do it? So in order to reorganize the smart majestic, Mercedes-Benz found Geely.
The cooperation between Mercedes-Benz and Geely was laid in 18 years, when geely Group acquired 9.69% of Daimler's shares, becoming Daimler's largest single shareholder.
From the perspective of positioning, smart wants to go to the volume, certainly can not use the S-class pure electric platform; of course, the development of a pure electric small car platform, but also need a lot of costs.
Therefore, at this time, the ready-made Geely's vast architecture platform can be said to be the most appropriate.
▲ Haohan platform product planning
Then just to say this vast structure, everyone may not be familiar with it, here Jiguojun to give you an example, everyone must understand at once: Extreme Krypton 001.
Yes, the new Smart Genie #1 and Extreme Kr 001 come from different platforms with the same architecture, the former from the SEA-2 small car platform, and the latter from the SEA-1 medium and large car platform, and the two cars can be said to have a deep relationship.
On March 28, 2019, Daimler AG and Zhejiang Geely Holding Group announced that the two sides will establish a joint venture company to jointly operate and promote the transformation of the Smart brand on a global scale, and are committed to building Smart into a world-leading high-end electric intelligent car brand. The joint venture is headquartered in China and each holds 50% of the shares.
Then, in order to comply with the trend of electrification, and second, in order to help smart salted fish turn over, Geely joined the smart transformation of this project.
Smart Genie #1 is a global cooperative model designed by Mercedes-Benz in Germany and developed and manufactured by China's Geely Group.
The difference with the traditional joint venture car is that it is not a product that is completely designed and developed by foreign countries, and China is only responsible for manufacturing, but a new Sino-foreign cooperation project that the main engineering development work is completed in China, and the Germans are only responsible for the exterior interior design.
▲ The promotional video is very personal
The biggest change in smart this time is mainly in the model positioning and product positioning. It should be known that the two-door smart was designed at the beginning just to facilitate parking, and then it was inseparable from his own product characteristics in the female market.
The appearance is young and in line with the current aesthetic
But now it seems that Smart is really identifying its own applicable market: the young/Z era.
As a young and fashionable car, the design of Genie #1 must be a top priority. From the outside, the new car is highly recognizable, getting rid of the smart's past model design.
The running light strip that runs through, combined with the rounded triangle light group, presents an overall "X" shape, which has a bit of a taste from the future.
Colour-blocked bodies, frameless doors, concealed door handles, and tyres with aerodynamic housings all give the car a more personal look.
Due to the positioning of the young and fashionable personality, the color of Genie #1 is not only tonal, but also has up to 11 color combinations, as well as 3 roof colors to choose from, forming a variety of personalized color combinations.
Size upgrades for greater practicality
In terms of vehicle size, the new Smart Genie #1 has reached 4270/1822/1636 mm in length, width and height, with a wheelbase of 2750 mm, making it the largest model in the entire Smart family, with a wheelbase longer than the classic Smart Fortwo (2695mm in length).
Larger models also significantly improve the practicality of smarts in everyday driving.
It is worth mentioning that the front cover part of the car was not made into a one-piece cover as shown at the Munich Motor Show at that time, and the huge seams slightly destroyed the beauty of the whole car.
The interior is full of "Mercedes", and the cockpit configuration is rich enough
Smart cockpit part, Genie #1 equipped with 9.2-inch full LCD instrument + 12.8-inch floating touch central control screen (12GB memory, 128GB storage space, resolution 1920x1080) + HUD, the car machine uses the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 chip, the overall function and fluency are guaranteed.
In addition, in the interior design, I have to say that Mercedes-Benz is still Mercedes-Benz, and it feels like the grade of the whole car will go up in an instant.
Classic pocket block design, screen opening and closing, air conditioning opening and closing, front and rear windshield defogging and other shortcut buttons, air conditioning outlet below the area storage compartment with cover, also very "Mercedes-Benz characteristics".
The interior provides two USB TYPE-C ports and a 12-volt power connector, and the rear handrail box also has a switchable air-conditioning outlet for common scenarios such as storing drinks in summer.
Support L2 level assisted driving, the mainstream level of the industry
In addition, in terms of intelligent driving assistance, it has also changed from the previous one to smart Pilot's intelligent assisted driving system, which can meet the intelligent driving level of L2+.
The car's visual solution should also come from Mobileye, the driver assistance chip is from Veoneer, and it is also a mercedes-Benz driver assistance chip supplier, supporting ACC adaptive cruise, LKA lane keeping assist, BSD blind spot monitoring system, TJA traffic congestion assist, APA automatic parking assist, adaptive near high beam and so on.
Powered, CLTC has an endurance of over 500 kilometers
In terms of power configuration, the rear axle of the new car is equipped with an electric motor with a maximum output of 272 horsepower (200 kW) and a peak torque of 343 Nm, with an acceleration time of only 6.7 seconds from 0 to 100 km/h.
In terms of batteries, Genie #1 is equipped with a 66-degree ternary lithium battery pack, and the CLTC operating range is equipped with two specifications according to the height: the low configuration is 535 kilometers, and the high configuration is 560 kilometers.
The reason why the same capacity and motor power have two different endurances is that the high-endurance silicon carbide (SiC) electric drive system has higher conversion efficiency and lower energy loss.
Overall, it can be said that the overall change can be said, the practicality of smart is stronger than the original, and the configuration is more abundant than the original. So in the current market, who will be the biggest competitor of the new Smart?
If you look at the current models on sale, the biggest competitor of the new Smart may be the Great Wall Euler, which is also aimed at the young/female market.
▲ Euler Good Cat GT
From the perspective of vehicle positioning, the new smart level is higher and becomes a small SUV, so it is naturally more dominant in size and space.
▲ The front trunk is a feature
But because of the brand premium and longer endurance, it is naturally more expensive than good cats.
In addition, in the cockpit configuration, smart is slightly superior, with a larger screen and more speakers, which can add a lot of points to the car experience of car owners.
In the competition of assisted driving, smart can also be regarded as the mainstream level at the same price, but the specific situation can only be revealed after the actual experience.
But when it comes to the opponents of the new Mercedes-Benz Smart, in addition to Euler under the Great Wall, there is also his old enemy BMW MINI.
But smart has been overpowered by MINI a long time ago. According to the sales data released by Daimler's official website, in 2018, the sales volume of smart was 129,000 vehicles, compared with BMW's mini sales of three times the sales of smart.
▲ Pure electric MINI spy photo
Now it seems that these two pairs of happy enemies have competed all the way from the fuel era to the pure electricity era.
You Mercedes have auspiciousness, my BMW has the Great Wall. In order to promote the pure electrification of MINI, BMW and Great Wall Motors have established a joint venture to set up Beam Motors, and public information shows that the two sides each hold 50% of the shares, with a total investment of 5.1 billion yuan.
From the perspective of brand value, Smart and MINI are preparing for Mercedes-Benz and BMW respectively, and there is not much difference in grade.
From the price point of view, Jiguojun expects that the price of BMW MINI may also be closer to the 200,000 level, but it may be slightly higher than the new smart.
From the spy photos, the new BMW MINI and the fuel version of the appearance is almost the same, but the interior made a large circular screen, even the dashboard has been removed.
There is not much news in terms of parameters, and I look forward to the day when the Great Wall-empowered MINI will be unveiled.
But then again, originally Mercedes-Benz and BMW competed, how confused it became Geely and the Great Wall.
Whether a car is good or not, it is not the car critic who decides, and the consumer's real money and silver vote is the last word.
According to official news, within 24 hours of opening the pre-sale channel, the new smart genie #1 blind order has exceeded 10,000 units, and sales are hot.
The reason for the popularity is naturally due to the rich configuration of the model and the partial consumer-level pricing.
In addition, because smart does not have a lifetime warranty for the first owner, no matter how many owners can enjoy the warranty rights, then the residual value of the second-hand car is relatively guaranteed.
At present, it seems that the biggest problem with this car may be the production capacity. Because smart's factory is located in Xi'an, where the automotive industry is not developed, it takes time to test the late production capacity.
Is this smart your dish? Would you recommend Geely OEM? Welcome to discuss it together in the comments section.~