The combination of Huawei + Toyota has made independent brands start to sweat?
No. 1 car alliance
2024-04-10 18:03Posted in Fujian Automobile Creator
When the first step of cooperation between the domestic and even global first-tier players and the world's first car manufacturer is officially taken, does it mean that there will be more "independent + joint venture" cooperation in the future, if so, can independent brands remain calm?
Finally "cracked the case", the news that one of the three major Japanese brands that was rumored two days ago will adopt Huawei's intelligent driving technology has finally been decided, and this brand is Toyota.
In fact, many people are not surprised that it is the result of the cooperation between Toyota and Huawei, because before this, Toyota had already launched a cross-border linkage with Huawei when the Camry, the "evergreen model" in the B-class car field, was replaced. Specifically, with the help of Huawei, the ninth-generation Camry has readjusted the voice system of the car machine, improved the accuracy and response speed of voice commands, and cooperated with the 8155 chip, so that the sensitivity of the car machine has been qualitatively improved, and it has received a lot of praise. Xu tasted the sweetness of Camry, and Toyota hurriedly started the next step of cooperation with Huawei.
However, it should be noted that unlike the two sides that will adopt the Hi model for cooperation, the "marriage" between Huawei and Toyota will adopt the tripartite joint cooperation model of "Huawei + Toyota + Momenta", and it is also a model for the world. The specific division of labor is that Huawei is mainly responsible for providing hardware solutions, while Momenta, an autonomous driving company, is responsible for software technology, and is more inclined to cooperate in the single procurement of hardware. In this way, Toyota has not completely opened up to Huawei and still has reservations.
For such a new way of cooperation, many netizens feel unacceptable, some of them said, "This feels like buying an Apple mobile phone and installing an Android system", and some netizens said that "I don't know whether to refuse or embrace the products that will be launched in the future". Of course, some netizens said that Huawei's goal is to go global, so that more car companies in the world can use our intelligent driving system, which is definitely an affirmation of our technology.
Leaving aside the nature of this collaboration until the official results of the collaboration are produced, it is foreseeable that the impact of this collaboration will be enormous.
In the automotive industry, Huawei's influence is undeniable, and Huawei has previously cooperated with small factories that are not well known, but Huawei can help the brand turn the situation around. For example, with the blessing of Huawei, the new Wenjie M7 has become the single model of the new force with the highest delivery volume at present, and the Wenjie Automobile has dominated the sales list of the new force for three consecutive months. This time, Huawei's cooperation object has been replaced by a world-class car manufacturer like Toyota, which has a lot of influence, and the explosive power under the strong alliance should not be underestimated.
More importantly, the combination of "Huawei + Toyota" is just the beginning, and it is likely that there will be a combination of "Huawei + N foreign brands" in the future, so the impact is not just as simple as the cooperation between the two brands.
Different from the era of fuel vehicles, in the era of electrified and intelligent new energy vehicles, the current performance of independent brands is significantly ahead of joint venture brands. However, we must admit that even so, the joint venture brand also has many advantages that the new domestic brand does not have, such as strong brand potential, strong market heritage, many supporters, and high fan loyalty, so once the joint venture brand catches the express train of Huawei's intelligent driving/intelligent cockpit, it is simply "like a tiger with wings" for them, at least at the current backward intelligent level, they can achieve "equality" with their own brands in this way , and even with the brand's own advantages, it can also win back a game in terms of comprehensive product strength.
As for the process of electrification, although on the surface, Japanese brands are relatively slow in the entire joint venture echelon, but the fact is that most Japanese car companies have invested in electrification in recent years. While not optimistic about electrification, they are increasing investment in technology research and development of lithium batteries, so it is not possible to say that they are really lagging behind their own brands, and they may still hold back some "big moves". However, their profound market skills and independent brands cannot catch up with them for a while.
More importantly, at present, the decline of joint venture brands is only in the Chinese market, and in other automobile markets, joint venture brands still occupy a great advantage and right to speak.
Therefore, the focus of this cooperation should not only be a matter of black and white whether to buy or not, but once this cooperation model is proven to be feasible, in the face of the "counterattack" of the menacing joint venture brand, how should many independent brands deal with it? By the way, not only Toyota, but also Audi has also announced that it will cooperate with Huawei, will the pattern of the new energy vehicle market change in the future? This is thought-provoking.