Some people ask, why are the central car-making enterprises blessed with unique conditions, but their development is difficult?
The comment that is often topped up is that the status quo of people is too serious.
In fact, this interpretation is not unreasonable.
After entering 2024, the high-pressure anti-corruption in the automotive industry continues.
With the deepening of anti-corruption in the automotive industry, some "terrible things" are gradually emerging.
On 20 February, Li Puming, executive committee member of Dongfeng Company's Xiangyang Da'an Automobile Testing Center Co., Ltd., was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law, and voluntarily surrendered and was investigated; on 19 March, Lv Weidong, honorary chairman of Dongfeng Design and Research Institute Co., Ltd., was investigated on suspicion of serious violations of discipline and law; on 21 March, Hu Xindong, former executive vice president of Dongfeng Renault Automobile Co., Ltd., was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and was investigated; and on 31 March, Xu Tiansheng, commercial director of Dongfeng Motor Group Co., Ltd., was suspected of serious violations of discipline and law and is currently under investigation.
In a quarter, a number of senior executives of Dongfeng Motor Company have been dismissed.
At the same time, the 2023 financial report announced by Dongfeng Motor Group is not good:
"In 2023, Dongfeng Group's revenue will be 99.315 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 7.2%, but the profit will turn from positive to negative, and the loss attributable to shareholders will be 3.996 billion yuan. In terms of sales, Dongfeng Group's sales have declined for five consecutive years, and the annual sales of the company's entire brand have declined from 3,052,200 units in 2018 to 2,088,200 units in 2023. ”
A number of executives have been dismissed, coupled with the decline in sales and profitability of the company, what happened to Dongfeng Motor after the "change of leadership"?
The first question is Yang Qing: What kind of helmsman does Dongfeng Motor need?
After Zhu Yanfeng retired, Yang Qing, the former general manager of Dongfeng Company, was promoted to chairman of Dongfeng Company.
Counting carefully, Yang Qing is also an "old man of Dongfeng". As early as 1988, he joined Dongfeng Motor Company and successively served as General Manager of Dongfeng Co., Ltd., General Manager of Dongfeng Commercial Vehicle, and Vice President of Dongfeng Company. It can be said that Mr. Yang Qing is one of the people who are most familiar with Dongfeng.
After he came to power, he directly started a drastic reform.
The new strategy of "the wind rises in the east, and the leap in science and technology" has become the core guidance of Dongfeng Company in the context of the new era. To put it simply, Dongfeng Company has made major management system adjustments to the new energy business of independent passenger vehicles, and the group will integrate the management of Fengshen, eπ and Nano brands under the Dongfeng brand.
Perhaps to put it more bluntly: in the future, Dongfeng will streamline its passenger car brands, so that the name of "Dongfeng" will be louder and more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people.
However, half a year has passed since the launch of the new strategy planned by Yang Qing.
However, from the current point of view, Dongfeng's reform measures have not been effective. The three brands of Fengshen, Yipai, and Nano, plus high-end brands such as Mengshi and Lantu are still "independent", and they do not seem to have much sense of belonging to the parent brand of "Dongfeng". Especially on the homepage of the official websites of VOYAH and Mengshi, we did not see any "Dongfeng element".
At present, the author can basically determine that the new strategy of enterprise development proposed by Yang Qing does not seem to have significant results.
As for the reasons, the author probably deduces two things: first, Dongfeng Company is too large and the interest chain involved is too long, so it is difficult to realize the streamlining and overall development of the brand for a while; second, Yang Qing can't control it, and other sub-brands are not in control.
It can be seen from the information released by Dongfeng Company that in its own brand camp, except for Dongfeng Fengshen, which is the vertical management of the group, the rest of the brands are basically operated independently. For example, VOYAH is helmed by Lu Fang, and Nano is helmed by Chen Meng...... The complex personnel management system and the group's inability to vertically manage all its own brands can easily lead to the lack of policy implementation and difficulty in implementation.
So, not long ago, Dongfeng Company, helmed by Yang Qing, ushered in a new "firefighter" - Zhou Zhiping.
With Zhou Zhiping becoming the general manager of Dongfeng Company, will the problems that Yang Qing is currently facing be solved?
Second question Zhou Zhiping: What are you going to do to become a "second-in-command"?
After Yang Qing became the general manager of Dongfeng Company, although he carried out drastic reforms at the enterprise management level. However, in terms of personnel management, it still adheres to the tradition left by Zhu Yanfeng: high-pressure anti-corruption.
From the perspective of people and things, after Yang Qing became the leader of Dongfeng Company, he carried out a high-pressure anti-corruption struggle with an iron-fisted policy, which will inevitably disperse some of the company's management managers. At this time, it is obviously necessary for a good deputy to be in charge. After the position of general manager of Dongfeng Company was vacant for more than five months, Zhou Zhiping, who rushed from the FAW Group to fight the fire, finally arrived. So far, all the new team members of Dongfeng Company have arrived.
However, after Yang Qing took office, Dongfeng Company promoted major reforms.
The new general manager Zhou Zhiping will also face a number of problems and challenges.
Generally speaking, in a central enterprise like Dongfeng, the number one leader like Yang Qing is the "tone-setter", while the second-in-command like Zhou Zhiping is the executor.
At present, the major management system adjustment of Dongfeng's independent passenger car business has not been straightened out, and Zhou Zhiping's first task after taking office is to think about and implement "how to build a Dongfeng brand for the mainstream market?"
From an idealistic point of view, Yang Qing would help Zhou Zhiping open the way to reform and remove "certain obstacles", while Zhou Zhiping could implement Dongfeng's new strategy at a predetermined pace and plan. But if we start from the worst-case scenario, Zhou Zhiping will face complex situations in the entire enterprise alone, and internal xenophobia and inadequate implementation may be encountered.
In fact, from the fundamentals, Dongfeng Company encountered the current problem, perhaps not because of the deviation of the strategy and the weakness of the product. The core of all lies in "people". Dongfeng company has a huge system, and it is a "society" internally.
There are all kinds of society and all living beings, and it is impossible for all people and all employees to be in one place. There are even times when there will be personnel struggles within Dongfeng that "we can't write". As the saying goes, "because of people, because of people", whether Dongfeng Company can finally get out of the predicament, I think the key lies in whether the team led by Yang Qing and Zhou Zhiping can achieve "harmony with the light and dust".
Three questions to Yang Qing and Zhou Zhiping: Does the new strategy need to be adjusted again?
After talking about "people", I would like to talk to you about the "strategy and tactics" of Dongfeng Company. Because in my opinion, Dongfeng's current strategic planning and ideas are very good, but there are big problems in the implementation rules.
First of all, it needs to be affirmed that "Dongfeng" brand cars have a very strong influence in China. Especially in the minds of the older generation of consumers, "Dongfeng Shuangfeiyan" gallops in the north and south of the river, and has extremely high quality and performance in the field of commercial vehicles. And if you choose Dongfeng Passenger Vehicle, it must be a "choice that can't go wrong".
But the reality is that it is often not so ideal. I have friends around me who have met it before. He originally wanted to buy "Dongfeng", but when he entered the 4S store of "Dongfeng Fengxing", he bought a "Liuqi...... Therefore, it is actually necessary for Dongfeng Company to develop the "Dongfeng" brand intensively and synergistically to create a stronger brand competitiveness.
But judging from the current situation, Dongfeng Company led by Yang Qing has not actually done a good job in this regard.
In the eyes of consumers, "Fengshen is still Fengshen", "Yipai is still Yipai", and "Lantu is still Lantu"...... Such a model is not only tantamount to the construction of Dongfeng's big brand, but also makes the enterprise lose the opportunity for collaborative development.
For example, in the current Dongfeng major independent brands, many technologies cannot be "circulated".
For example, the Yipai brand, which focuses on the family, has launched both pure electric models and hybrid models. However, this brand, which is not priced at a low price, only has range extender technology available in terms of hybrid technology, and VOYAH's DHT hybrid technology (Lanhai Power) and Fengshen's Mach MHD hybrid technology cannot provide assistance to Yipai.
Due to the formation of "technical barriers" between major brands, Dongfeng has become "bulk Dongfeng", which has also directly led to some problems with the product. For example, Dongfeng Fengshen's products are almost completely behind domestic models of the same grade. In the field of sedans, the Yixuan family is in an awkward position, and it cannot be compared with Qin PLUS, and it cannot be directly inserted into the hinterland of the "three Japanese mothers". As for SUV products, products such as Haohan and Haoji are even more difficult to form user memory points.
In the new energy market, although the VOYAH brand has initially entered the high-end camp, it has not promoted Yipai and Nano. For example, Dongfeng Nano, a low-end electric vehicle incubated by Easy Jet, entered the game late and had no accumulation, and suffered from the dimensionality reduction blow of models such as Wuling Binguo and BYD Dolphin Seagull, which can almost be regarded as "no way before".
Epilogue:
From the Zhu Yanfeng era to the Yang Qing era, Dongfeng is still the same Dongfeng, but the Chinese auto market has undergone drastic changes.
Independent brands are increasingly emphasizing technology, and Dongfeng also wants to use technology to achieve breakthroughs. Dongfeng Technology Center spends money every year, with a lot of patents and beautiful data. But in the end, the rise of new energy is much slower than that of private car companies, and the sales of independent passenger cars have never been able to get up.
In 2024, although the new leadership team of Dongfeng Company has been formed. However, as independent brands continue to squeeze joint venture brands, the profits of Dongfeng Nissan, Dongfeng Honda, and Dongfeng Citroen are constantly compressed, and the cash flow is getting smaller and smaller, and the situation faced by Dongfeng will only become more difficult. Therefore, if the new leadership team does not have the courage to break the wrist of a strong man to smash the "big pot thinking", it will only become more and more difficult for this car-making central enterprise.