Produced by: Bullet Finance
News on May 12, Polestar, a listed company on the US stock market, released its financial report for the first quarter of 2023 on May 11.
In the first quarter of this year, Polestar achieved revenue of $546.0 million, compared to $452.2 million in the same period last year, an increase of 20.74% year-on-year. Net profit attributable to owners was -8.977 million US dollars, compared to -274.5 million US dollars in the same period last year, a year-on-year decrease of 96.73%.
Although Polestar achieved both revenue and net profit growth in the first quarter, according to financial website Seeking Alpha, the company's single-quarter revenue was still $62.68 million lower than market expectations.
In addition, according to Polestar's earnings report, they delivered 12,076 vehicles in the first quarter of 2023, a year-on-year increase of 26%, and now have more than 100,000 Polestar cars in 27 markets around the world. Polestar has also recently introduced Polestar 3 and Polestar 4 models.
Polestar had previously expected to deliver 80,000 vehicles in 2023, but because Volvo Cars needed more time for final software development on the shared all-electric platform, they delayed the launch of the Polestar 3, which will eventually begin production in the first quarter of 2024.
Given this situation and the economic environment affecting the automotive industry, Polestar reestimates global sales of 60,000 to 70,000 vehicles in 2023, up 16% to 36% year-on-year.
Since Polestar has been losing money for the past four years, they have increased their focus on cost management this year, have frozen global hiring, and will cut 10% of their workforce to improve the efficiency of their business.
Thomas Ingratt, CEO of Polestar Automotive, commented: "We are taking the necessary steps to strengthen Polestar in the short term. Although Polestar 3 will now begin production in the first quarter of 2024, the successful launch of Polestar 4 last month means we will have 2 competitive products in 2024. We will achieve our growth ambitions and path to profitability. ”
In the first quarter of 2023, Polestar's major market shares were in the United Kingdom ($157.2 million, 28.79% of revenue), the United States ($109.2 million, 20% of revenue), Germany and Sweden, which contributed 9.52% and 9.13% of revenue, respectively. Among them, the revenue of the Chinese market in the first quarter was 7.652 million yuan, accounting for only 1.4% of the revenue.
Polestar entered the Chinese market in 2017, and it is worth mentioning that since then, their China CEO has changed five times, namely Shen Feng, Wu Zhenhao, Gao Lang, Nathan Forshaw and Feng Dan.
During this year's Shanghai Auto Show, Feng Dan said frankly in an interview with the media: "In the Chinese market, Polestar has taken some detours before, so Polestar must first do brand and then do sales." From the entire brand level, I still didn't understand this market before. All the marketing methods, the way the brand works, came down from the headquarters, and nothing has changed. Although Polestar has its own advantages, it is not visible to consumers. ”
Feng Dan called 2023 Polestar's "first year of China", reasoning: "Polestar will have new cars on the market this year, and it will also be developed and prepared at the pace of one new car per year." ”
In the future, Polestar will continue to monitor whether Polestar Motors can increase its revenue share and market share in the Chinese market under the leadership of Feng Dan, and they will continue to explore different business strategies from those of global headquarters.
After the release of the first-quarter earnings report, Polestar's share price fell 12.34% on May 12, and finally closed at $3.48, and the company's total market value is now $7.343 billion.