Recently, it can be said that it has become easier and easier to build cars. From the technical barriers created by complex mechanical systems such as engines and gearboxes in the era of fuel vehicles, to the current batteries, motors, and electronic control systems, the technical threshold for building cars at the power level has been greatly reduced. Many forces that are traditionally considered "outside the circle", such as Internet companies, have joined the ranks of car manufacturing.
However, in the process of entering the field of car manufacturing, all the Internet bigwigs can be described as "eight immortals crossing the sea and showing their magic", in the end, what efforts have they made in order to build cars?
For new players, building a car is not a factory, building a car so effortlessly, to build a car, first of all, there must be qualifications.
A few years ago, car-making qualifications were quite difficult to obtain, but in order to promote automobile production and consumption, the state issued the "Measures for the Administration of Road Motor Vehicle Manufacturers and Product Access" in 2018, which clarified the legal status of the foundry model, and in 2020, in the revision of the measures, the relevant content about "design and development capabilities" was deleted, and the threshold for car manufacturing was further reduced. This means that as long as you can get the production qualification, you get the entrance ticket to build the car.
However, it is not easy to obtain production qualifications, and if you want to obtain production qualifications by acquiring the idle production capacity of bankrupt car companies, the problems such as their associated debts must be borne together. So don't look at so many companies 1 yuan to buy the production qualifications and factories of bankrupt car companies, the debt problem behind it is a very headache. However, the acquisition of bankrupt car companies to obtain production qualifications is a method for many Internet giants to enter the car manufacturing.
Xiaopeng, Ideal, Zero Run and Byton have all obtained production qualifications in this way, Xiaopeng started by acquiring the production qualification of Fudi Automobile, and the ideal is also to buy the production qualification of Lifan to build cars, and the two new force car companies are now developing well. Byton acquired 100% of the shares of FAW Huali for 1 yuan and successfully obtained valuable production qualifications. However, FAW Huali already had more than 800 million debts and employee compensation, so Byton actually spent at least 800 million yuan to buy this production qualification. But it is a pity that byton's end is still the same as the FAW Huali it acquired, ending in bankruptcy.
"1 yuan acquisition" with the precedent of Byton, latecomers do not dare to acquire the production qualifications of bankrupt enterprises in this way, before the network rumored that the production qualifications of Xiaomi automobiles should be obtained through the acquisition of Borgward Automobile, but at that time Borgward was seriously insolvent, and Xiaomi's bid did not satisfy Borgward, the transaction finally failed, Borgward Automobile also formally liquidated this year, and Xiaomi Automobile, although the factory site construction is hot, but the car-making qualification is still unresolved. However, the Beijing Municipal Government is actively striving for Xiaomi cars to settle in Beijing, and I believe that with the help of the government, it is not difficult for Xiaomi to obtain automobile production qualifications.
In addition, the new forces are responsible for automobile research and development, and the OEM model in which the production work is handed over to traditional car companies can help the new forces successfully build cars without obtaining production qualifications. The most typical example is Weilai, and the cooperation with JAC has made Weilai's new car offensive wave after wave, from the earliest ES8/ES6, to the current ET7/ES7/ET5, Weilai's product line covers cars, SUVs, and the category has been very rich. And Jianghuai also got a lot of foundry costs by giving Weilai OEM, in 2021, Jianghuai's total revenue is 40.2 billion yuan, net profit is 200 million, most of which are the foundry costs paid by Weilai, it can be said that Jianghuai and Weilai are win-win cooperation.
The great success of the FOUNDG model of JAC and NIO has led to the beginning of similar car-making routes for traditional car companies with independent production capacity and qualifications. Volkswagen (Anhui), a joint venture between Volkswagen and Jacques, is also discussing the OEM production model with JAC, and if it is finally landed, this will be the first time that traditional car companies have tried to build cars in the form of OEM.
Of course, whether it is OEM or acquisition, traditional car companies are in a relatively weak position in the process of cooperation with new forces, profits and core technologies are on the side of new forces, and traditional car companies can only eat surplus value. Traditional car companies want to get greater profits and discourse rights in cooperation with new forces, or they must reach a more equal cooperative relationship with new forces through their own strength.
Jidu Automobile, a joint venture between Geely and Baidu, belongs to this relationship. Until now, the investment of Jidu Automobile has come from both Geely and Baidu, Geely has taken a fancy to Baidu's Internet car-making thinking, and Baidu has taken a fancy to Geely's strength in car-making hardware and platforms, and the current cooperation between the two sides is relatively smooth. Jidu's first mass-produced product will debut in 2023, using Geely's SEA Haohan architecture, which is also the platform architecture used by Jikr 001. With strong hardware and Baidu Internet software support, I believe that the first mass production product of Jidu Automobile will not be bad.
But even if it is a joint venture, the new forces' right to speak in the joint venture is still greater, even if it is baidu and Geely in the joint venture relationship, Baidu still occupies the largest right to speak, and Geely only accounts for a small part of the equity.
This is mainly the difference in the idea of car building, the new forces of the Internet can decide, is the interaction between the whole car and the user, and this interaction is the most important when the user uses the car, and occupies the longest use time. This interaction, like the software of the mobile phone, will increasingly become the decisive factor for users to choose a car.
And car hardware such as batteries, motors, chassis, etc., is the part that traditional car companies (or the production capacity bought by new forces) are responsible for, and these factors are relatively not too direct in experience, and users will not feel it. Therefore, the value embodiment of this part is not as direct as intelligent, and the profits shared by traditional car companies will be less.
Of course, since it is cooperation, then profit sharing these are all negotiable, more often, traditional car companies and new forces cooperate, or look at each other's strength and resources, and then achieve a win-win cooperation effect. However, this kind of cooperation or OEM means that the new forces cannot fully grasp the whole process of car manufacturing, and once they encounter problems, the new forces will have to pay funds to traditional car companies or foundries. In 2018-19, WEILAI paid a loss compensation fee of up to 333 million yuan to Jianghuai, and the OEM agreement between JAC and WEILAI will only expire next year, and it is not known whether Weilai will still need to pay loss compensation fees after expiration.
Relatively speaking, the high price to obtain production qualifications, although the cost is relatively high, but can fully grasp the qualifications of car-making, factories and other resources, profits are also all won by the new Forces of the Internet themselves, so compared with the cooperation with traditional car companies, the new forces will eventually become independent car-making enterprises in order to have a future.
I believe that the Internet giants also understand this, and in the future, there will be more new forces that originally cooperated with traditional car companies and embark on the road of completely independent car manufacturing.