Autonomy is no longer the autonomy of half a year ago ...

Written by|Wu Xue

Editor|Yu Jie

Produced by|Automobile Sankei

Since the market share of independent brands exceeded 50% in September last year, 10 months later, the market structure has once again ushered in a new breakthrough.

"In the first half of the year, independent brands achieved a half-year share of more than 50% for the first time, accounting for half of the market." Not long ago, at the press conference of the Passenger Association, Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the Passenger Association, said.

If nothing else, throughout this year, the market share of independent brands will continue to rise, reaching an unprecedented height.

After all, from the wholesale sales ranking from January to June, the brands with year-on-year sales growth in the TOP10, except for Tesla, are all independent brands.

The strong rise of independent brands has become an indisputable fact. Another noteworthy change is that differentiation is also quietly occurring within independent brands.

NO.1

[11 years later, Chery once again opposed the Great Wall and Geely]

In June, BYD continued to set new sales records:

252,000 units, not only the only brand with sales of more than 200,000 units in a month, but also pulled the monthly sales record of car companies to a new height.

From January to June, BYD's cumulative sales reached 1.26 million units. This data is more than twice that of the Great Wall.

Another change worth noting is that Chery, which once lagged behind in its own brands, has also risen strongly this year.

According to data released by Chery, in the first half of this year, Chery Holding Group sold a total of 741,400 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 56%.

Among them, Chery, Jietu and Xingtu sold a total of 694,000 units, surpassing Great Wall and Geely and ranking third among independent car companies. At this time, 11 years have passed since Chery was first surpassed by the Great Wall.

After many years, it has achieved a reversal again, behind which there are long-term deep cultivation and opportunities created by the situation.

From the specific data, Chery's reversal this year is largely due to the pull of overseas exports.

According to data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, in the first half of this year, Chery's overseas exports alone reached 394,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 1.7 times. The share of exports has also increased from 12.9% in 2019 to more than 50% today.

In fact, it's not just Chery. Since the beginning of this year, the export volume of the entire Chinese automobile industry has exceeded 2 million units, a year-on-year increase of 75.7%. While the growth rate of the domestic car market is much higher than that of the domestic car market, it has also surpassed Japan to become the largest automobile exporter.

Among its own brands, BYD's export volume increased by more than 10 times year-on-year, and Great Wall's export volume also increased by 97.3% year-on-year.

However, it is worth noting that although the export volume of new energy vehicles increased by 1.6 times year-on-year, it only accounted for a quarter of the total exports. Fuel vehicles are still the absolute workhorse of exports.

Taking Chery as an example, its main export areas are still concentrated in developing countries such as Russia, Mexico, Peru and Brazil. Export models are also dominated by traditional fuel vehicles such as Tiggo 8, Tiggo 7, and Jetu X70.

NO.2

[New energy is surging, but there are still people who can sell fuel vehicles well]

If the market pattern of overseas exports is still continuing the accumulation of the past era of fuel vehicles, then in the domestic market, the performance of car companies in the field of new energy is becoming the existence that determines everything.

According to the Passenger Association, the domestic retail penetration rate of new energy vehicles reached 35.1% in June.

This is an unprecedented data. Specific to independent brands, the transformation performance in the new energy market has determined the ranking of enterprises to a certain extent.

Chang'an, which ranks second in the TOP5 of its own brands, is also the one at the forefront of new energy transformation in addition to BYD.

Judging from the data of the first half of the year, Changan's new energy models, both in sales and penetration, are better than Geely and Great Wall.

A few days later, on July 20, the first model of Chang'an New Energy Sequence Kaiyuan, A07, will make its debut.

As a brand new sequence in Chang'an, Kaiyuan will be on the same level as the "V" standard, UNI sequence and Auchan.

In terms of products, Kaizen A07 will be based on the EPA1 architecture like the navy SL03. Judging from the parameters announced so far, the two models are very similar, and they will take the technical route of pure electric + extended range in the future.

In this context, how can the two be differentiated? By the time the brand is officially released in August and September, perhaps the mystery will really be revealed.

Some analysts believe that one of the reasons why Changan launched Kaiyuan with similar positioning after launching Deep Blue is to rapidly increase the sales of new energy models. After all, according to Changan's plan, fuel models will be discontinued by 2025. At present, Changan's fuel vehicles still account for more than three-quarters.

And in the first half of this year, Changan's fuel vehicle sales are still growing: the UNI-V, Auchan Z6, and Auchan X5 models launched last year have performed well.

At the moment when fuel vehicles are losing ground, this is a very rare performance.

From the data of various companies in the first half of the year, the sales of fuel vehicles in Geely and Great Wall have more or less declined. Looking at the entire market, the sales of fuel vehicles fell by nearly 3% year-on-year.

Just as Chang'an's new energy transformation continued to advance, in the first half of this year, Geely's transformation results also began to appear.

Among them, while the sales volume of new energy increased by about 44% year-on-year, the penetration rate also increased from 17.87% last year to 22.75%.

The all-new hybrid model, the Galaxy L7, which was launched on May 31, sold more than 10,000 units in 33 days after its launch. As previously predicted, it has become the most potential model in the compact SUV market to challenge the BYD Song Plus DM-i.

NO.3

[ Transformation is beginning to bear fruit,

The Great Wall is still groping ]

Just when people are concerned about which hybrid model can break the monopoly of BYD Song Plus DM-i and become the next "national car", the record of more than 100 monthly sales champions created by Haval H6 in the SUV field seems to be a thing of the last era.

Since being first surpassed by the Model Y in September 2021, the Haval H6 has not performed well.

By June, its monthly sales ranking among SUVs had fallen to 12th place. In addition to being surpassed by a number of new energy vehicles, its performance is not comparable to the old rival Changan CS75 Plus, Honda CR-V, and even Velanda, Haoying and other models.

As a totem-like existence of the Great Wall, the performance of Haval H6 is like a miniature of the entire Great Wall.

After a year-on-year decline in sales in the first five months of this year, Great Wall finally achieved a slight year-on-year increase in sales in the first half of the year, relying on its performance in June.

The growth is mainly due to the help of two new models, the Weipai Blue Mountain and the Haval Thunder Dragon series.

After Chen Siying became the CEO of Weipai and the launch of Blue Mountain DHT-PHEV, Weipai was finally reactivated. Before Blue Mountain's monthly sales exceeded 5,000 for two consecutive months, Wei brand had not had such a performance for a long time.

On the other hand, the sales of the Haval Thunder Dragon series also exceeded 6,000 in June, becoming another sales responsibility of Haval in addition to H6 and Big Dog.

However, in the two most competitive segments in the automotive circle, whether it is the six-seat medium and large SUV Blue Mountain or the compact SUV Thunder Dragon series, they all face strong competitors.

After taking the first step, the pressure of Great Wall's new energy transformation is still not small.

At the same time, in the pure electric sector, in the first half of this year, Euler's sales fell by 20% year-on-year. In the final analysis, after the production of the two small cars of black cat and white cat, Ballet Cat and Lightning Cat launched last year did not achieve ideal sales.

Even in the first quarter of this year, Ola once again strengthened its female brand positioning, but there was no improvement in sales, and the departure of former CEO Wen Fei put more question marks on Ola's road to soaring.

NO.4

[ Write at the end ]

After the end of the competition in the first half of the year, since July, various car companies have successively announced many new car news, preparing for the arrival of the golden nine silver ten.

In addition to Changan's new series of origins, on July 12, Chery also announced that it will release a new hybrid brand in October.

In terms of new cars, after the Galaxy L7 and Haval Dragon series, Galaxy L6 and Haval Xianglong will also join the battlefield one after another.

After experiencing the fancy involution in the first half of the year, the fierce competition in the second half of the year may "become more intense".