In 2023, most of the new car-making forces that are still on the table have handed in a brilliant answer.
On January 1, 2024, a number of new EV manufacturers, including Li Li and Wenjie, successively announced the delivery information for December 2023, and the 2023 annual report card was also released. Li Auto ranked first with 376,000 units, while NIO ranked second with more than 160,000 units, and in terms of year-on-year growth, Li Auto reached 184.6%, far exceeding the industry average.
There is no shortage of frustrated people in the "rising voice". Among the seven car companies that were counted, Nezha Automobile was the only new force that experienced a year-on-year decline, and the delivery volume in December plummeted to about 5,000 vehicles.
Drawing: The Paper reporter Wu Yuli
"Price war" is the key word throughout the auto market in 2023, and new forces are inevitable, and they have also experienced many price wars and sales ups and downs with the auto market. In the face of 2024, the industry has generally given the expectation of "more volume", and the "giant" Tesla has opened a new round of price reduction promotion on January 1, and the competition pattern in 2024 may be further differentiated.
Ideal "Far ahead"
Whether it was in December last year or throughout the year, Li Auto ranked first. Li Auto delivered more than 50,000 new vehicles in December 2023, a year-on-year increase of 137.1%, successfully achieving the monthly delivery target of 50,000 vehicles. A total of 131,800 units were delivered in the fourth quarter of 2023, a year-on-year increase of 184.6%.
For the whole year of 2023, Ideal delivered a total of 376,000 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 182.2%. As of December 31, 2023, Li Auto has delivered more than 600,000 vehicles.
Drawing: The Paper reporter Wu Yuli
The AITO Wenjie, jointly developed by Huawei and Cialis, also exceeded the 20,000 ceiling at the end of the year. According to AITO's official WeChat, in December 2023, 24,500 new cars were delivered for the AITO Wenjie series, and a total of 94,400 units were delivered in 2023.
Xpeng delivered a total of 20,100 new vehicles in December 2023, a year-on-year increase of 78%, and the cumulative deliveries in the fourth quarter exceeded 60,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 171%. In 2023, Xpeng Motors will deliver a total of 141,600 vehicles, and the cumulative delivery in history will exceed 400,000 vehicles.
The delivery volume of Leapmotor was 18,600 units, which continuously set a new record high in deliveries and achieved a year-on-year increase of 119%. In 2023, a total of 144,200 vehicles will be delivered, a year-on-year increase of more than 29%, and the cumulative delivery has exceeded 300,000 units since its establishment.
NIO delivered 18,000 new vehicles in December 2023, up 13.9% year-on-year, and delivered 50,000 vehicles in the fourth quarter, up 25% year-on-year, exceeding its quarterly delivery guidance. In 2023, NIO delivered more than 160,000 new vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 30.7%. As of December 31, 2023, NIO has delivered a total of 449,600 new vehicles.
ZEEKR delivered 13,500 vehicles in December, a record high and an increase of 18.9% year-on-year. The cumulative annual delivery volume of ZEEKR reached 118,700 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 65%.
The "disappointed" Nezha Automobile will only deliver 5,135 new cars in December 2023, a year-on-year decrease of 34.1%, and is the only new car-making force with a year-on-year decline in sales in December. In 2023, Nezha Automobile will deliver a total of 127,500 new vehicles, a year-on-year decrease of 16.16%. By the end of December last year, Nezha Automobile had delivered nearly 400,000 vehicles.
Interestingly, a few days ago, Daniel Zhang, CEO of Nezha Automobile, posted, "Our domestic car companies are still selling a few more cars than others, and when they are engaged in a weekly data ranking, others are making a lot of money." Data growth is worthless if it comes at the expense of profits or even negative gross margins. ”
The overall growth momentum of the seven automakers surpassed that of the new energy vehicle market
Judging from the growth curve of the above seven new car-making forces in 2023, all new forces except Nezha Automobile have maintained their growth momentum from the beginning of the year to the end of the year.
Among them, the most eye-catching is undoubtedly Li Auto, which has maintained a steady upward trend throughout the year on the basis of a high base. Facing 2024, Li Auto is still ambitious. On January 1, Li Xiang, CEO of Li Auto, posted on Weibo, saying, "All the goals for 2023 have been achieved: 376,000, 50,000, 20,000, and 300." In 2024, we will challenge higher goals: 800,000, 100,000, 30,000, 2,000. Based on its contextual correspondence, it can be seen that the target mentioned by Li Xiang is 800,000 annual sales, 100,000 monthly sales, 30,000 single model sales, and 2,000 charging stations.
Unlike the steady rise of new forces such as Ideal, Wenjie reversed the decline with the new M7 and quickly increased sales.
On September 12, 2023, the new M7 was officially released and pre-sale began. According to official data, AITO Wenjie new M7 delivered 20,600 new cars in December, with a cumulative delivery of 48,600 units and a total of 120,000 units, in addition, the cumulative number of Dading units in the seven days of the launch of the M9 has also exceeded 30,000 units. Previously, it was revealed that the monthly delivery capacity is expected to exceed 30,000 units from 2024.
Drawing: The Paper reporter Wu Yuli
The inflection point of Xpeng Motors is the endorsement of Volkswagen, a veteran German car company, and the large-scale delivery of the G6, the main cost-effective model.
At the end of July 2023, Volkswagen and Xpeng Motors officially announced a strategic cooperation, the two sides will jointly launch two B-segment pure electric vehicles for the Chinese market, and at the same time, Volkswagen announced that it will invest about 700 million US dollars in Xpeng Motors to acquire about 4.99% of the equity of Xpeng Motors. As soon as the news came out, the stock price of Xpeng Motors skyrocketed, and the delivery of the new model G6 began in July 2023, and its sales also turned over.
On the whole, the total annual delivery volume of the seven new forces is 1,162,400 vehicles, an increase of nearly half from 787,900 vehicles in 2022. According to the forecast data released by the China Passenger Car Association, China's new energy vehicles may increase by 36% in 2023 compared to 2022. Compared with the broader market, the growth rate of new EV manufacturers is better.
2024 has been "opened"
In 2024, China's new energy vehicle companies, including new forces, will undoubtedly face a more brutal environment.
On January 1, Daniel Zhang, CEO of Nezha Automobile, said in his New Year's speech that in 2024, the new energy vehicle market will turn to multi-dimensional competition integrating technology, products, ecology, and price. At the same time, 2024 will also be a new era for the global auto market.
Industry experts' expectations for the market environment in 2024 are basically consistent.
On December 27, Zhang Yongwei, vice chairman and secretary general of the China Electric Vehicle 100 Association, said at the media communication conference that the industrial competition pattern has entered a "deep reshaping period", and "next year should be a year of more fierce competition and more differentiation." The next two years are too critical, and the companies that should withdraw will basically withdraw in these two years, and the companies that should be successful will rise rapidly. ”
On January 1, Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the passenger association, concluded that in the context of the withdrawal of the halving policy of fuel vehicle purchase tax at the end of 2022 and the end of the new energy vehicle subsidy, China's auto market will start weakly in 2023, and then continue to strengthen. Driven by the joint promotion of exports and new energy, the annual sales volume in 2023 will hit a record high.
For 2024, Cui Dongshu believes that the market growth of new energy vehicles in 2024 is relatively optimistic, and it is expected that the wholesale sales of new energy passenger vehicles will reach 11 million, with a net increase of 2.3 million units, a year-on-year increase of 22%, and a penetration rate of 40%, and new energy passenger vehicles will maintain a strong growth momentum.
However, he also pointed out that from the perspective of industry benefits, it is difficult for enterprises that lack stable cash flow to grow sustainably. At present, the development of new energy vehicles of traditional independent brand car companies is getting stronger and stronger, and strong companies such as BYD, GAC Aion, and Changan Automobile have come out. In addition to the leading enterprises, new energy vehicles are still facing certain loss pressure, and it is difficult to continue to expand the scale of loss-making car sales.
In 2024, there is another variable that the new energy vehicle industry cannot ignore, and that is Xiaomi Auto. On December 28, the press conference of Xiaomi Auto aroused onlookers from all over the Internet, and Xiaomi Auto will also officially start delivery in the first half of this year.
It is worth noting that on January 1, the surging news reporter learned from Tesla's sales stores that the "Big Mac" Tesla has opened a new round of price reduction promotions for the "New Year", including 6,000 yuan time-limited insurance subsidies, financial discount policies, etc. In 2024, the auto market has been "opened".