Years later, Wu Bing, the former CEO who single-handedly built Feifan Auto, may remember the spring of 2024, when Feifan Auto, which had been aiming to "become a leading influential company" only three years after its establishment, fell rapidly, and even survival became a problem.
Recently, some media reported that Feifan Automobile's advanced intelligent driving team has been integrated into Zerobeam Technology, a subsidiary of SAIC.
At the same time, Feifan expects to lay off more than 70% of its workforce, and even if any employees survive the layoffs, they are highly likely to suffer a pay cut.
Although Feifan Auto denied the news, some industry insiders revealed that Feifan Auto had problems last year, and employees either changed jobs or returned to work at Roewe or other subsidiaries.
Change of leadership, layoffs, integration - this series of actions was interpreted by the outside world as SAIC's abandonment of the Feifan brand, and almost announced the failure of Feifan as an independent brand of SAIC.
#01 Change of manager, downsizing, consolidation
The direct trigger for the failure was obviously the unsatisfactory sales of Feifan Automobile.
Throughout 2023, Feifan sold more than 20,000 units, of which 14,000 were sold for the F7 and around 7,000 for the R7.
In the three years since its official independence, the total sales volume of Feifan Automobile has been about 50,000 units, and considering the initial investment of 7 billion yuan, Feifan Auto's business has been losing money.
Therefore, since last year, there has been no interruption in the adjustment of Feifan Automobile, some are rumors, and some have happened:
- In September 2023, it was reported that some business units of Feifan Automobile will be merged into SAIC Passenger Vehicle Company, and dealer management, procurement and other departments will be integrated into the operation system of SAIC Passenger Vehicle, while Feifan Automobile's user development center, user operation center and new retail center will remain independent operations.
- At the beginning of 2024, SAIC Motor made personnel adjustments, announcing that Wu Bing, the former vice president of SAIC, would no longer serve as the general manager of SAIC Passenger Vehicle Branch and the CEO of Feifan Automobile, and would be replaced by Wang Jun, the former general manager of Huayu Automobile.
Two weeks ago, on March 16, Feifan even sent a thousand-word letter to its dealer partners.
Feifan tried to convince Volkswagen that it would remain independent, although the letter did not specifically mention the "asset-light operation" model, nor did it specify where it would "integrate resources" with SAIC and which core businesses it would "focus on" in the future.
But through these details, we indirectly know that Feifan Auto is downsizing its business, and even its independence is weakening.
In order to dispel the public's doubts, the letter also mentioned an important message - "In the middle of this year, Feifan Auto's new blockbuster model will be presented to the majority of users...... At the dealer conference on March 28, we will communicate with you in more detail about the company's overall plan for the future. 」
This may also be the reason why Feifan did not directly respond to the rumors of layoffs, and chose to summarize the current situation with "everything is fine".
However, at the Geneva Motor Show in February this year, the Feifan's F7 and R7 models have been rebranded as MG's MG9 EV and MG S9 EV on display.
Combined with various actions, the signs of the failure of the Feifan brand have become more and more obvious.
#02 Internal Horse Racing: Feifan vs Zhiji
From Roewe New Energy, to the renaming of R Automobile, and then to the independent operation of Feifan, after three renaming changes in four years, Feifan Automobile's predicament has not changed since its birth.
In addition to joint venture brands such as SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC Audi, SAIC-GM Buick, etc., SAIC-GM's independent brands including Roewe, MG, SAIC Maxus, Wuling, Baojun, etc. are relatively inferior.
In SAIC's already weak independent brand camp, Feifan Auto has always been in an awkward position in the face of the "original root" Zhiji brand.
Shortly after Feifan became independent in 2021, SAIC Motor launched Project L, which later became Zhiji Automobile.
As a multi-billion-level major project jointly built by SAIC, Zhangjiang Hi-Tech and Alibaba, Zhiji represents the image of SAIC and even the Shanghai automobile industry.
In the later "price war", due to the fierce competition in the market, Feifan was inevitably "placed" by Zhiji.
In September 2022, Feifan's first model, the R7, priced at more than 300,000 yuan, is directly benchmarked against Tesla's Model Y.
Who knows that in 2023, Tesla started a "price war", and Feifan Auto dropped twice, but only sold 1251 vehicles in the first quarter.
After that, Feifan Motors pinned its hopes on the second model, the Feifan F7, to change the situation.
At that time, there were media reports that Feifan's internal employees said: "If the sales of the F7 are still poor, Feifan Auto is more likely to be integrated back into SAIC and belong to the Roewe brand than Zhiji." 」
At the end of March 2023, the F7 was officially launched, and the official guide price was significantly reduced by about 50,000 yuan from the pre-sale price, and the starting price was set at 229,900 yuan.
While Feifan Automobile is trying to survive, the brother brand Zhiji Automobile has made a killer move.
In October 2023, the Zhiji LS6 will be launched, with an official guide price of 229,900 yuan, directly entering the price range of Feifan Automobile.
In this regard, "Zhiji is doing this, how can we live?" said a Feifan car salesman.
#03 Epilogue
Reducing prices alone cannot save Feifan, and the lack of core competitiveness and unclear positioning are the biggest problems of Feifan Automobile.
Feifan Auto once tried to label itself as intelligent and comfortable, but after the occurrence of problems such as false battery life, battery failure, and abnormal chassis noise, coupled with continuous price reduction, the brand image was difficult to recover for a while.
This brand, once highly anticipated by SAIC, is at a crossroads of fate.
But the more realistic problem is that for the more than 50,000 owners of Feifan Motors, no matter whether Feifan Motors is abandoned or internally restructured in the future, there will be no less trouble for the value retention rate and even the long-term holding experience of their vehicles.
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Resources:
"Lei Jiayin's endorsement, once benchmarked against Tesla!Now it is revealed that more than 70% of employees will be laid off?Industry insiders: the brand has a high probability of failure", 21st Century Business Herald