Auto market price war: starting at the beginning of the year and ending at the end of the year?
In February this year, BYD launched a large wave of Glory Edition models, officially kicking off the prelude to the price war in the auto market. Subsequently, many companies, including Changan, Geely, Beijing Hyundai, etc., followed up, which also made the car market in the Year of the Dragon enter a big volume from the beginning.
With the advent of a new round of price war, the cover news reporter found that the sales of many companies in February and the first half of March have declined significantly, especially some joint venture car companies, which have almost halved. Some executives also bluntly said in interviews that companies are experiencing a severe existential crisis. Although the competition is fierce enough, in the eyes of some industry insiders, the current is at most a calm before the storm, and the real storm has not yet come. In the future, with the addition of more new brands and the use of new technologies, the price war may become more intense.
As experts say, as experts say, as we enter 2024, we find that some new brands are entering the game at a rapid pace. For example, Dongfeng's Yipai, the first model eπ007 has been launched in mid-March, and with the lowest price of 136,600 yuan, to the pure electric high-end car market a "dismount"; on March 7, the Zhidou brand, which has disappeared for five years, announced its resurrection with the help of Geely Automobile and Emma Technology, and the first product will be launched in April; on March 28, the first product of Xiaomi Automobile, SU7, was officially launched ....... In addition, in order to cope with market competition, NIO and Xpeng also announced that they will launch new brands, among which the first new car of Ledao Automobile is expected to be unveiled in May this year.
New brands are constantly joining, and new technologies and products are constantly iterating. According to the first financial report, at BYD's 2023 financial report investor communication meeting held on March 27, BYD Chairman Wang Chuanfu said that the fifth-generation DMI hybrid technology will be launched in May this year, and the fuel consumption of models equipped with this technology will be reduced to 2.9 liters / 100 kilometers, and the range will be 2000 kilometers on a full fuel. On the same day, Zhiji Auto also announced that the Zhiji L6 equipped with an ultra-fast charging solid-state battery will be launched in May, and the new car will achieve an ultra-long range of 1,000 kilometers and a quasi-900V ultra-fast energy replenishment. The application of these new technologies will eliminate users' range anxiety and energy supplement anxiety, thereby bringing greater impact to the traditional fuel vehicle market.
In addition, the joint venture brand that has been silent in the new energy market for a long time is also accelerating its layout and fighting against the odds. At the media communication conference at the beginning of the year, the relevant person in charge of Dongfeng Honda said that a number of new energy models will be launched this year, including the e:NS2 launched in June and the Lingxi L launched in September, while SAIC-GM, which is beginning to take shape in the new energy vehicle market, also plans to launch new car ...... such as plug-in hybrid version GL8 and plug-in hybrid SUV Explorer Plus in 2024.
Therefore, it is foreseeable that in the future, with the addition of new brands such as Xiaomi, Ledao, and Zhidou, the use of new technologies such as fifth-generation DMI hybrid technology and ultra-fast charging solid-state batteries, as well as the back-to-back battle of joint venture brands, the price war that began at the beginning of the year may run through the whole year, or even longer.
Cover News Reporter Zhang Haijun