The progress of NIO's new brand has begun to come out.
As early as the middle of last year, there were media reports that Weilai will launch a new brand, in view of the previous Weilai president Qin Lihong clarified that it will not launch low-end products, will always maintain high-end positioning, so after that, the speculation left to the outside world includes:
How different is the new brand positioning and the NIO brand? Where will the production base be selected? When will it be officially announced and mass-produced? Which other brand will be the most "flustered"?
Now, nearly a year later, Weilai's new brand has finally had new news.
On May 10, the WeChat public account released by Hefei released a message saying that Niolai's new mid-to-high-end brand production base settled in Hefei.
Hefei Economic Development Zone and NIO signed a cooperation agreement on the second phase of the NeoPark Xinqiao Intelligent Electric Vehicle Industrial Park and the supporting project of key core components. The project covers an area of 1860 acres, and according to the agreement, it will introduce the new high-end brand intelligent electric vehicle products of NIO Group, and is scheduled to be completed and put into operation in 2024.
Yes, the new brand is coming, and the ally is Hefei.
In 2019, Hefei's 7 billion yuan of funds saved WEILAI from the ICU, helping it enter the positive cycle of research and development, sales and delivery, and for a long time, it helped Weilai to sit firmly in the position of "big brother" of new car companies.
Because of this precision investment, Hefei has once again confirmed the title of "Venture Capital City", and the new energy industry has also expanded its scale with the entry of WEIlai's production base and R&D center, enhancing its confidence in competing with Shanghai, Wuhan, Guangzhou and other cities for "new energy capital".
And after weilai's delivery was stable, it did not follow the practice of other new car-making forces - opening sub-factories in multiple cities.
For example, the ideal factory was originally in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province, in order to expand production capacity, and took over the Beijing Hyundai first factory, and recently there is news that the ideal third factory will be located in Chongqing; Xiaopeng's three factories are also located in Zhaoqing, Guangzhou and Wuhan, Guangdong.
The production of WEILAI has always been rooted in Hefei, and the way to increase production capacity is to upgrade the production line and establish a second production base, and both sides are very "single-minded".
Therefore, it is a reasonable decision for the new brand NIO to choose to join forces with Hefei again.
Looking at the positioning, according to the introduction, the new brand positioning is high-end, the core team has been built, and the first batch of products has entered the key research and development stage.
Before this, the average price of Weilai's models reached about 430,000, and even the ET5, which was regarded as a volume model by the outside world, was "stubbornly" priced at more than 300,000 yuan, and there were not many direct competitors.
Referring to other models, the price of the middle and high-end will most likely be 200,000-350,000 yuan, that is to say, Weilai's new brand will compete head-on with Brands such as Xiaopeng, Tesla, and Volkswagen, and the Xiaopeng P7, Tesla Model 3/Y and Volkswagen ID family series models at this price point are all currently hot hits.
In 2024, several Internet manufacturers have also pushed into the market independently or participated in the construction of cars.
It is difficult to say whether WEILAI, a new brand that is close to starting from scratch, can be widely accepted by the market and continue to write a glorious history of sitting firmly in the position of "big brother".
From another point of view, accelerating the development of new brands may also be a choice that Weilai has to make.
Although it was successfully listed in Hong Kong, since the second half of last year, NIO's delivery volume has been repeatedly surpassed by the ideal and Xiaopeng behind it, and this year should have been a big year for the delivery of three new cars, and it is also an important year to win the "turnaround battle".
However, in the face of rising raw material prices, insufficient supply of parts and components caused by epidemic containment measures and production suspension, the delivery cycle has been extended, which has had a certain impact on WEILAI's sales volume and delivery performance.
Therefore, the launch of new brands is not only based on the strategic layout of long-term development, but also in the short term, it also undertakes the heavy responsibility of helping WEIlai bring more sales and cash flow, giving the capital market more imagination space, and thus stimulating stock prices.
Produced by ZAKER News
Text / Bao Xingwa
Editor / Zeng Xiantian