To ask which car brand can be called the boss in the field of new energy vehicles, in addition to Tesla, it must be our BYD. In the past 2021, BYD's sales of new energy vehicles in the Chinese market have soared, successfully surpassing Tesla and becoming the sales champion of new energy vehicles in the mainland. Of course, this has aroused the pride of many Chinese people, and at the same time, a large number of articles praising BYD and optimistic about BYD have emerged in an endless stream.
However, happy to happy, we have to admit that this "glorious list" also carries certain restrictions - the domestic market. Because globally, the sales champion of new energy vehicle brands still belongs to Tesla with a score of 930,000 units (2021 data), and BYD is closely followed by 600,000 new energy vehicles, and the sales gap of 330,000 units is still a big challenge.
Therefore, carrying the expectations of countless Chinese people, BYD, this year is still carrying the label of "catching up with Tesla", in the autumn of 2022, political turmoil, epidemic suspension and other events have frequently hindered the development of car companies, and under the influence of many uncertainties, the competition between BYD and Tesla has also progressed to the most critical white-hot stage, that is, Tesla and BYD Who will be the first car company to achieve the milestone of annual sales of millions of new energy vehicles?
From our own point of view, it is understandable to be optimistic about the development of BYD, since BYD has focused on the study of the three-electric system, the strength has made it occupy a large position in the market. Sales in the first quarter of 2022 showed that BYD's sales of pure electric passenger cars were 143,200 units, an increase of 271.05% year-on-year; the cumulative sales of plug-in hybrid passenger cars were 141,500 units, up 857.40% year-on-year; and its total sales of new energy vehicles totaled 284,500 units.
Tesla's global deliveries totaled more than 310,000 units in the first quarter, up 67.7% year-on-year. It can be seen that compared with the sales volume of up to 330,000 units in 2021, there is a certain gap between the two sales in the first quarter of 2022, but if you have to say "BYD has not caught up yet, the more it falls in the next three quarters is also an inaccurate thing", then I have to give you a good break.
It is undeniable that Tesla has a high brand value, after all, for a large part of the people, the so-called "imported car" seems to be more high-end than the "domestic car", here, Xiaobian is not to borrow the topic to play, play the emotional card to promote patriotism, our lack of confidence in the domestic brand is composed of a variety of factors, which in addition to subjective prejudice, there is no lack of objective reasons.
Tesla was born in the capital of the United States Imperialist Home, by 2020, the US capital market for Tesla to raise more than 17 billion US dollars, and born in China's "simple boy" BYD, although in 2003 with Tesla into the automotive industry, in 2008 with Tesla also launched its first new energy vehicle, but Tesla sitting on more than 17 billion US dollars for the same period of BYD what does it mean? It meant that it could buy the entire BYD according to the market value at that time.
So the two brands from the early days of their establishment, it has decided that they are completely opposite brand strategy: Tesla, who is not worried about money, started with an electric sports car Roadster, how many people buy it is not important, polishing the signboard and making a reputation is something it cares more about; and BYD starts from F3 in order to open up sales to occupy the market, after all, "smart women are difficult to cook without rice", and earn enough funds to better assist the subsequent development of the company.
However, the consequence of such a decision is to leave a completely different brand impression on consumers, and this is also the biggest problem that BYD is currently facing - how to change the stereotype of "low" in consumers.
Since 2022, BYD has also laid out many times to attack the high-end road of the brand. At the beginning of April, BYD announced that it had stopped production of fuel vehicles since March, and as the earliest brand in traditional car companies to abandon fuel vehicles, it was the accumulation of strength that gave it the courage to "break away": in 2020, BYD's sales of new energy vehicles accounted for 44.4% of total sales, and by 2021, this proportion directly increased to 81.2%. After the suspension of fuel vehicles, BYD's sales in March surged by 160.9%, exceeding 100,000 units, reaching a record high. Since then, the BYD seal that benchmarks Tesla Model 3 and the launch of the new medium and large MPV Denza D9 have demonstrated BYD's determination to impact the high-end road of the brand.
Coincidentally, during the Shanghai epidemic in April, the shutdown of the Shanghai Gigafactory forced rival Tesla to slow down its pace of progress. According to the financial report, Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory deliveries in 2021 are as high as 484,130 vehicles, almost comparable to Tesla's global deliveries in 2020 (499647 vehicles), such a huge production capacity, because of the epidemic and shutdown, is expected to lose 48,000 vehicles, and the impact is still continuing, even if the Shanghai factory has resumed work, but to restore to the previous capacity, it still has to face the test of supply chain, logistics and other aspects.
Previously, due to the shortage of chips, the epidemic shutdown and other factors, a number of new energy vehicle companies announced the price increase of their models, of which Tesla's models rose the most, three times the price increase, each increase of more than 10,000 yuan. Subsequently, Tesla officials announced the cancellation of the mobile charging cable included with the car, and the price of the whole vehicle was not reduced, which is equivalent to another disguised price increase. And these behaviors have undoubtedly aroused the indignation of the people, and also made Tesla's wind evaluation decline again.
On April 25, Musk announced the acquisition of Twitter, the news came out, Tesla's stock price fell, and even Tesla's shareholders doubted whether Musk could concentrate on the operation of the Tesla brand in the future.
2022 will still be a year of reshuffle of new energy vehicle companies, and then Tesla's Berlin Gigafactory and Texas Gigafactory have also been put into operation, and production capacity will gradually rise. According to Musk's own speculation, the capacity of the Berlin plant in 2022 is 54,000 units, and the Texas plant is also in a state of capacity climbing, so there is still suspense in the sales dispute between it and BYD.
And BYD has prepared a number of new cars, using the "car sea" tactics, raiding various types of consumers on the market, and has planned to build more than ten new factories in 2022-2023, of which the production capacity under construction is 2.3 million, it is reported that it will be put into production around August, and on the order for DM-i series models, IT is rumored that BYD still has a backlog of hundreds of thousands of orders, so it depends on whose production capacity climbs faster, I think the answer to the time we will not wait too long, maybe the situation in August this year should be clear.
Write at the end
More than a decade ago, the "second generation of the American Emperor Rich" and the "Poor Boy of China" are now Tesla on the cusp of the storm and BYD with a smooth transition, and we have reason to believe that this competition, which was never conceived, is about to usher in a happy ending for us. But whoever wins the final victory in this game of chasing after each other has confirmed the rise of China's own brands.