Recently, the bankruptcy review filed for bankruptcy review by electric vehicle brand Reading Automobile has aroused public attention. According to the Tianyancha App, from May 9 to 11, Reading Auto added 4 new information on the enforcee, with a total of more than 19.25 million yuan in enforcement targets, and most of the related cases were sales contract disputes.
Reading cars were enforced 19.25 million
Recently, Reading Automobile, once known as the "old man happy" brother, added a bankruptcy review case. The bankruptcy application and the respondent are both Reading Automobile, and the court is the People's Court of Changle County, Weifang City, Shandong Province.
Tianyancha App also shows that from May 9 to 11, Reading Automobile added 4 new information on the enforcee, with a total of more than 19.25 million yuan in enforcement targets, and most of the related cases were sales contract disputes, and the enforcement courts were all Changle County People's Court. Risk information shows that the company has multiple pieces of information on the enforceees, and a total of more than 92.69 million yuan has been executed.
According to reports, several business owners interviewed said that Li Guoxin and his family were already in Canada. Public information shows that Reading Automobile is an independent research and development of electric vehicle brand, with a total of 8 foreign investment enterprises. The main business is the research and development and manufacturing, production, sales and technology development of electric vehicles and key components, and its products are mainly low-speed three-wheeled/four-wheel electric vehicles, that is, "Old Man Le".
In fact, since 2021, Reading Automobile has been exposed to facing funding problems. It is reported that the company's top management has collectively cut salaries since May 2021, and the salary reduction ratio of some management has reached 60%. Since 2022, Reading Cars has reported that it owes dealers payment. A "Statistics on Reading Arrears of Dealers Nationwide" shows that more than 30 dealers have accumulated more than 20 million yuan in arrears. At that time, Reading Automobile replied that "due to the tight capital and production capacity, the delivered cars can only guarantee key markets and key areas, which has indeed affected some dealer partners." In order to get the car as quickly as possible, dealers should choose to continue to trust Reading. ”
In February 2023, an "Open Letter from Jiangsu Dealers to the Joint Investigation Group of Reading Provinces and Cities" signed and sealed by Reading Auto's Jiangsu dealers showed that Reading Automobile continued to deceive investment when it was unable to supply, and the average loss of each owed dealer was close to one million yuan.
The founder had reported the current county party secretary
The last time Reading Car attracted much attention was because founder Li Guoxin publicly released a video in January 2023 to report Wang Xiao, secretary of the Changle County Party Committee in Weifang City, Shandong Province. In the video, in order to highlight his personal achievements and make the report card of economic operation look better, in order to obtain promotion and reuse, the secretary of the county party committee has forced local large enterprises such as Reading to falsely report the industrial output value and sales output value of tens of billions of yuan since March 2022. In 2022, Reading Automotive Group reported a total of 6.728 billion yuan in industrial and sales output value locally, but the financial data showed that the actual data of the company was 2.045 billion yuan, and the cumulative overstatement was 4.683 billion yuan. Not only that, Li Guoxin also reported that after the loan guaranteed by the Changle County government for the acquisition of Mustang Automobile expired in July 2022, Wang Xiao did not renew the goods of Reading Automobile, and when the company urgently needed a loan renewal solution, he never met, ignored, did not speak, and was completely isolated from the enterprise. This move by the Changle government has also brought about a chain reaction in the capital market and upstream and downstream, and Reading enterprises are currently in a state of shutdown. In addition, Li Guoxin said: "Reading Automobile sought investment from external capital and received financing support of 3.2 billion yuan, but the Changle County government has been unwilling to provide collateral renewal support for Reading, which has greatly affected the confidence of investment institutions, and the financing funds have not been in place as scheduled." ”
In response to the report, the Weifang Municipal Government Information Office's WeChat official account "Weifang Release" responded, saying, "In response to the real-name report by the founder of Reading Automobile Group on the main person in charge of the Changle County Party Committee in Weifang City, Shandong Province has set up a joint investigation team composed of relevant provincial and municipal departments to enter Changle County to investigate and verify the relevant situation and deal with it in accordance with laws and regulations."
The company has won the "Old Man Music" sales championship three times
However, before the results of the investigation were released, the news of bankruptcy came from the car company. According to public information, Reading Automobile's main business is the research and development and manufacturing of electric vehicles and key components, and its products are mainly low-speed three-wheeled/four-wheel electric vehicles, that is, "Old Man Le".
In the past, in some places such as China's third- and fourth-tier cities and rural areas, low-speed cars such as Lao Tou Le were indeed welcomed by consumers because of their low prices. According to the "Analysis of the Development Status and Industry Development Opportunities of China's Low-speed Electric Vehicle Industry in 2022", in 2017, the production and sales of low-speed electric vehicles in mainland China exceeded 1 million, reaching the peak in recent years.
Reading cars also created sales myths during this "golden age". From 2016 to 2018, the annual sales volume of Reading Automobile reached 150,000 units, 210,000 units and 287,000 units, respectively, with annual sales exceeding 12 billion yuan, and won the sales champion of low-speed electric vehicles for three consecutive years, with a market share of more than 30%.
Under strict policy management, we will seek to transition to the production of new energy vehicles
However, in November 2018, the "Notice on Strengthening the Management of Low-speed Electric Vehicles" jointly issued by multiple departments stipulates that it is strictly forbidden to add new production capacity of low-speed electric vehicles, which makes Reading Automobile choose the way out of transforming into the production of new energy vehicles in the true sense. In April 2018, Reading Automobile acquired Shaanxi Qinxing Automobile Co., Ltd. and obtained the production qualification of new energy commercial vehicles and special vehicles. On January 18, 2019, Reading completed the signing ceremony with Mustang Automobile in Chengdu, acquiring Sichuan Automobile Mustang Automobile for 1.45 billion yuan, and obtained the production qualification of new energy vehicles, traditional oil passenger cars and buses. Li Guoxin revealed in the whistleblower letter that Reading Automobile's acquisition of Mustang had a loan of 1.3 billion yuan guaranteed by the Changle County government in Weifang City, Shandong Province.
But the road to transformation has not been smooth. Sales of the first i-series models introduced after Reading began to transition to production were not satisfactory. In April 2021, the two cars of Reading Mango and Reading Mango PRO were launched successively, giving the brand a certain degree of popularity, and the annual sales of 30,000 units exceeded that year.
Micro electric vehicles are replacing low-speed vehicles such as the "Old Man Le"
Compared with the traditional car companies that occupy the advantage, the gap between Reading Automobile is not small. At the information conference of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers held on May 11, Xu Haidong, deputy chief engineer of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, said that companies like Reading Automobile that have transformed from low-speed vehicles to mini vehicles have also launched some competitive models, but from the new energy vehicle rural activities, it was found that some companies did not come out, because China's new energy vehicles are fiercely competitive, with the listing of Wuling Hongguang MINIEV in July 2020, Changan waxy corn, Chery Little Ant, QQ ice cream, Geely Panda, etc. have also entered this market In the process of competing with these branded enterprises, the transformed enterprises do not have scale, technology research and development and brand advantages, and it is difficult to stand out.
Xu Haidong believes that low-speed cars such as Lao Tou Le have not had relevant laws and regulations in China to supervise its entire production and testing, and it is irresponsible to provide products without standards and testing means to consumers, and it is very correct to introduce relevant policies to restrict the production and use of this type of model.
The micro electric vehicle can be a good substitute for products such as the old man or the low-speed car, and at the same time as a regular car has passed the relevant laws and regulations testing, collision, etc., which is a protection for consumers, so the old man is restricted will usher in a good growth opportunity for the micro electric vehicle. In the future low-carbon development and low-carbon travel, micro-electric vehicles as a means of transportation can be applied in scenarios such as going to supermarkets and picking up children, and have a very good market prospect.
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Text/Beijing Youth Daily reporter Song Xia
Editor/Fan Hongwei