Huashan on the sword | car market folding

"Factories have resumed work, and sales should return to work after the May Day holiday." Recently, a friend of FAW Audi told "Huashan On the Sword V" that although it has lost more than a precious month, it is still necessary to remain optimistic and determined, "We will speed up the follow-up and catch up."

From the discovery of the epidemic in Changchun on March 3, to the lockdown on March 20, to the social clearance on April 13, Changchun and the people living in the city have experienced too many unknown sufferings.

In order to cooperate with the overall situation of epidemic prevention and control, FAW Group began to partially stop production from March 13, and began to resume work and production in an orderly manner on April 22, the largest automobile group in China that originally planned to produce and sell 4.1 million vehicles this year, losing hundreds of thousands of production capacity and making huge sacrifices.

Also making great sacrifices are many car companies and parts suppliers in Shanghai.

Although on April 22, Shanghai announced that 666 key enterprises can resume work on a priority basis, most of which are automotive industry chain enterprises. However, due to the relatively small number of workers who can resume work, there is still a long way to go before the real resumption of work and production. More importantly, due to the impact of the epidemic, Shanghai logistics is not smooth, the upstream suppliers' material supply is cut off, and many downstream factories can only be forced to stop production.

Affected by it are all the car companies in the country. In this sense, the entire automotive industry is a grasshopper on a rope, one prosperous and one lost.

Weilai Automobile, whose factory is located in Hefei, has not been able to withstand the shortage of spare parts, and announced on April 9 that it will suspend vehicle production. Although production resumed after 5 days, the relevant person in charge of Weilai also admitted that the recovery of production capacity depends on the recovery of the supply chain, and if the supply chain cannot improve, it may face the problem of suspension of production in May.

On April 14, Xiaopeng Automobile Chairman He Xiaopengfa's words in the circle of friends have been widely forwarded: "If The supply chain enterprises in Shanghai and the surrounding areas cannot find a way to dynamically resume work and production, all Chinese automakers may have to stop work and production in May." The good news is that some ministries and authorities are doing their best to coordinate, and we expect the support and joint efforts of more governments and authorities. ”

Yu Chengdong, CEO of Huawei's consumer business and CEO of Smart Car BU, also responded: "Indeed, if Shanghai continues to fail to resume work and production, after May, all technology/industrial industries involving Shanghai's supply chain will be completely shut down, especially the automotive industry!" The economic loss/cost of the industry will be very large! Since mid-April, some companies have begun to cut off supply and production due to closures such as Shanghai. ”

In a recent interview with the media, Yu Chengdong has admitted that in the absence of chips in global cars, the previously proposed sales target of 300,000 is too difficult, "the first year to achieve 100,000-200,000 units is already a miracle." ”

Some people say that Yu Chengdong's statement makes Xilis the first company to publicly admit to lowering its sales target this year. In fact, for the automotive industry, which sharpened its knives at the end of last year, it was like being beaten with a stick since the epidemic began to fight back in March this year.

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According to the data, in March this year, the mainland passenger car production and sales of 1.881 million units and 1.864 million units, up 22.4% and 25.1% month-on-month, down 0.1% and 0.6% year-on-year. The reason for the sharp increase in the month-on-month period is that there are only 28 days in February, and there is a Spring Festival holiday in the middle. In November and December last year, mainland passenger car sales were 2.192 million units and 2.422 million units, respectively.

But March was by no means the worst. Judging from the current statistics of April sales, in addition to BYD, the decline of other mainstream car companies is close to or more than 50%.

According to the data of the Federation of Passenger Vehicles, the retail sales of major domestic automobile manufacturers in the first and second Sundays of April fell by 32% and 39% respectively year-on-year, affected by production stagnation and terminal closures, the narrow passenger car market fell by a large margin, and the Association expects that the market will recover in the third week under the impetus of the resumption of work and production, down 35% year-on-year, and the fourth week of the year-on-year decline was further narrowed to 26%, and the comprehensive estimate of retail sales in April was 1.100 million units, estimated to decline by 32% year-on-year.

This sales figure, close to 2011 levels, was the biggest decline in April in Chinese automotive history. There is really a feeling of "hard work for more than ten years, one night back to before liberation".

Magic has become the key word in 2022. Some incredible things are constantly refreshing our cognition and three views; the automotive industry is in it, and it is difficult to be alone. Although, the efforts of the Autobots have exceeded the imagination of the outside world.

"I've been at the Anting base for 20 days." Sun Yijiong, deputy general manager of SAIC Passenger Vehicles, said in an interview with the media that since mid-to-late March, more than 500 R&D related personnel of SAIC Passenger Vehicles have eaten and lived in the park for closed management and work.

Also moving into the company urgently before the city was sealed was Chery Automobile. On April 17, in response to the call for static management in Wuhu, while fighting the epidemic together, and doing our best to reduce the impact of the epidemic on the company's production and operation, many employees rolled up their covers overnight and lived in the company. According to statistics, during the static management period, Chery Group's rework rate was close to 50%, and this state continued until April 23. That is to say, these Chery people eat and live in the factory area in a closed loop and struggle for 150 hours continuously.

All efforts are just to recover some of the losses caused by the epidemic.

"I've been locked up in my home for more than a month, and I can only do it in a hurry." A is an executive of a car company in Shanghai, because his home is in a foreign country, usually a person in Shanghai is a full-fledged "workaholic", either eating in the canteen, or eating out, and has not tried to open his own gang at all. This time, he was sealed in a rental house, and he did not prepare enough "grain and grass" and did not have the ability to live at home, which was quite passive.

He said that at present, he is partnering with a young man in an isolated neighbor, and if the epidemic continues like this, he may soon train himself to become a chef.

This is of course a joke. At this time, he was extremely anxious. The epidemic has disrupted all the marketing rhythms, new cars have been postponed, brand voice has shrunk day by day, there are fewer and fewer dealers in the country that can operate normally, and many urban dealerships are also in the state of "cats and dogs for three days", which may be forced to close at any time because of the sudden epidemic.

More importantly, the number of stores entering the store is also visibly declining. "Confidence is more important than gold. Now, many people have postponed or even cancelled car purchase plans because too much uncertainty has affected consumer confidence and spending power. ”

epilogue

This is probably a rare scene in the history of the automotive industry: on the one hand, manufacturers have to worry about sales while worrying about production capacity; on the other hand, consumers have to worry about not having money to buy a car at the same time, but also have to worry about buying a car and not being able to lift it.

In this context, if the government rescues the market is still just a simple car to go to the countryside is far from enough, but should really cancel the purchase restriction, encourage automobile consumption, support the consumption of new energy vehicles and increase the construction of charging piles as the focus, it is possible to let the automotive industry slowly return to the normal track in the second half of the year, and truly play the role of a pillar industry of the national economy.