Reporter Ken Hanako
Edited by Gao Yulei
Avita, a new car manufacturer, is doing everything it can to boost sales.
This is a smart car brand jointly created by Changan Automobile, Huawei and CATL, and after two rounds of financing, CATL is still the second largest shareholder of Avita.
On August 8, 2022, the first model of Avita, the Avita 11, was officially released. The main selling point of this car is that the whole series is equipped with Huawei HI (Huawei Inside) full-stack intelligent car solution as standard, equipped with Huawei Drive ONE two-in-one electric drive unit, as well as integrated HarmonyOS vehicle operating system, Huawei AOS intelligent driving operating system, and Huawei VOS intelligent vehicle control operating system.
Avita announced sales figures on February 6, 2023, and as of February 5, Avita 11 had delivered more than 2,000 vehicles in 38 days. Considering that this is the release of the backlog of orders from the previous 6 months, it does not reflect the true sales and delivery capabilities of Avita.
Deep bundling with Huawei is one of the main means for Avita to increase sales.
In the past month, Avita has twice taken the initiative to release the visit of Yu Chengdong, Executive Director of Huawei, CEO of Consumer Business, and CEO of Intelligent Vehicle Solution BU, to the outside world, with the intention of highlighting "Huawei's strong support for Avita" to the outside world. But Huawei's support for Avita is obviously not strong, especially compared to another similar cooperative brand.
As early as October 2022, Changan Automobile revealed in response to investors' questions on the interactive platform of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange that Avita had reached an agreement with Huawei, and Avita 11 settled in two Huawei flagship stores in Beijing and Shenzhen in December.
On December 18, 2022, Avita 11 officially entered the Huawei flagship store in Beijing Yintai Center. On February 23, 2023, the power plant reporter visited this store. In addition to the Avita 11, the store also displayed three models on sale from the Alpha S and Horizon.
Like the Alpha S, the Avita 11 is still not currently available in Huawei stores. An employee of Huawei's Yintai store told the power plant: "Avita 11 is only a show, it cannot be sold, and there is no test drive. "Even in the store display, the status of Avita 11 is very low - more than two months after entering the store, Huawei Yintai store still does not have Avita 11 product color pages and promotional display shelves, and the store sales staff are not clear about the battery capacity and related sales rights of Avita 11.
If a consumer requests a test drive, the sales staff of Yintai store needs to contact the staff of the Avita Sanlitun store to drive to provide a test drive experience. Strictly speaking, Huawei Yintai stores are draining Avita's self-operated stores, but the effect is not good.
"Since entering the store, there has not been much drainage from Huawei's Yintai store." An employee of the Avita Sanlitun store said. As for the exact amount, he did not know. On the other hand, the sales of the Avita Sanlitun store have been trying to invite potential customers to the store for test drives, but the number of visitors is not large. Even on weekends, when the Sanlitun business district is at its peak passenger flow, Avita Sanlitun store can be tested on arrival.
"The price of Avita cars is generally 300,000-400,000, and the range extension version is only in the early 200,000s, and the extended range version has no mileage anxiety." During the power plant visit, Huawei's sales staff will take the initiative to introduce the boundary instead of Avita and Extreme Fox.
"Qianjie is the sales channel of Huawei, and Huawei is profitable." The sales of the Avita Sanlitun store said. The power plant learned from a person from Cialis that Cialis and Huawei will determine the sales share ratio of both parties according to different levels of urban stores, in addition, Cialis also purchases intelligent components such as motors and Hongmeng vehicle systems from Huawei.
Under ideal circumstances, the higher the sales volume of the Qianjie series compared to Avita and Extreme Fox, the more parts sales revenue and vehicle sales share will bring Huawei, and the more quickly Huawei intelligent vehicle solution BU can realize the transformation from investment to profit.
"Cialis has given up the window period for building self-operated channels, whether it is vehicle research and development or sales, it is deeply tied to Huawei, which is obviously different from Avita and Extreme Fox that use Huawei's HI model." The aforementioned Cialis source said.
Qianjie has successively entered thousands of Huawei's directly operated and authorized stores. After the increase in store density, the sales volume of the company has also steadily increased. According to official data, in 2022, the annual sales of the three models of the Qianjie series exceeded 75,000 units.
Avita still insists on building its own channels. As early as August 2022, Benhong Tan, chairman of Avita Technology, said that Avita has three channel models - Avita Experience Center, Avita Center and Avita Sheet Spray Authorization Center.
An employee at the Sanlitun store said Avita plans to add 17 stores in Beijing this year, but will not enter Changan Automobile's dealership channel. As of the end of February 2023, Avita has 3 stores in Beijing, located in Sanlitun, Zhongguancun and Olympic Sports Center.
To build self-operated channels, Avita requires huge investment. Taking Sanlitun store as an example, less than 100 meters away is the flagship store of Xpeng Motors, with an annual rent of more than 30 million yuan in the first year. Avita's Sanlitun store is located at the entrance of the first floor of the 3.3 building, which is one of the most densely trafficked areas.
The power plant learned from an insider that the annual rent of the store has exceeded 40 million yuan.
Wang Jinhai, vice president and deputy general manager of the user development center of Avita, revealed, "In 2023, Avita plans to cover 110 cities and reach 500 channel contacts. "By the end of 2022, Avita had 60 directly operated stores and 200 channel contacts.
In terms of products, Avita can only firmly choose to cooperate with Huawei. The power plant learned that Avita and Huawei have a five-year agreement, during which the two companies plan to jointly launch four models. The Avita 11 is the first, and a single-motor version of the Avita 11 is expected to be launched in March this year, followed by a sedan, and the fourth may be an MPV model.
A Sanlitun store sales believes that the current Avita does not rely on Avita 11 rush sales, because the price of this car is high, even if there are various rights, the average price is more than 300,000 yuan, for many consumers is still a high threshold for buying a car, and Avita's brand ability is not enough to support such a high price. "The single-motor version of the Avita 11 and the sedan model are the beginning of the impulse." He said.
Avita tried his best to tie up Huawei, but Huawei's attitude may still waver. Whether it is Extreme Fox or Avita, sales have not yet met Huawei's expectations - which means that it is difficult for Huawei to benefit too much from HI mode cooperation.
On February 22, at Huawei's flagship store in Futian, Shenzhen, Yu Chengdong was interviewed by media including interface. He talked about the difference between the HI model and the smart selection model - the former is mainly dominated by car companies, and Huawei only provides full-stack intelligent car solutions, and the success or failure of the car company depends on the ability of the car company, if the car company is not strong, it will die; The smart selection model is led by Huawei, which is deeply involved in product design to channel sales, and is directly responsible for the success of products.
This is also the biggest difference between the two car companies that use the HI model, Extreme Fox and Avita, and Cialis. In the interview, Yu Chengdong is still reviewing, and the current layout of Cialis and Huawei stores is still unreasonable and needs to be optimized. But in the process, he rarely mentioned Huawei's attitude towards Avita and Extreme Fox.
At the end of 2022, at an internal meeting of Huawei, Yu Chengdong, who had basically decided to hold the power, proposed the goal of making Huawei's smart car BU profitable in 2025. "To achieve this goal, Huawei must first help car companies sell 1 million vehicles. We are confident that we can do it. Yu Chengdong said in an interview with the interface.
Huawei quickly implemented specific "help" car companies. On February 25, Cialis and Huawei signed a joint business deepening cooperation agreement, and Yu Chengdong also attended the signing. However, unlike public relations activities such as visits to Avita stores, the two companies announced a joint business goal of producing and selling 1 million new energy vehicles by 2026.