When it comes to going overseas, many people are accustomed to aiming for Japanese cars and German cars, and it is generally believed that only by surpassing either of the two series can they become an automobile powerhouse. There is nothing wrong with this point of view, but there is still a big mountain ahead of the German and Japanese systems, and it is an opponent that we cannot surpass in a short period of time.
In 2023, China's total automobile exports will reach 4.91 million units, squeezing out Japanese cars and taking the first place in automobile exports. This is only the first step towards becoming an automobile powerhouse, and it is still far from success, not to mention that the 4.9 million vehicles also include the contribution of foreign brands such as Tesla, Buick, and Ford. Due to the strong localization strategy of international car companies, their main sales volume does not depend on exports, which allows us to obtain better export data. The current reality is that in the international market, domestic cars still play the role of catch-up, and the first opponent in front of us is Korean cars.
In China, the sales of Korean cars fell from the highest 1.7 million to 300,000 units, which made everyone very indifferent to them, but in terms of total sales, Korean cars are still giants in the international market. The domestic brand with the largest sales volume is BYD, 3 million is a proud achievement, but it is less than half of Hyundai-Kia's.
The top three global automakers in 2023 are Toyota (11.2 million units), Volkswagen (9.24 million units), and Hyundai-Kia (7.3 million units). In the post-epidemic era, Korean cars have performed the best among global car companies, with total sales exceeding the level of 2019 and climbing from fifth to third place in the global ranking.
Although Korean cars lost millions of sales in China, the three markets of the United States, India and Europe made up for the loss, with the three markets increasing by 400,000, 300,000 and 200,000 units respectively in 2023. It can be said that Korean cars have achieved good growth in mainstream markets outside of China.
Korean cars also rely on cost performance to win, and most of the price ranges overlap with Chinese brands, so it can be said that the relationship between the two sides is in direct competition in the international market. In terms of new energy vehicles, our area of strength, Korean cars are also our biggest competitors.
In the overseas BEV market, Chinese brands are neither first nor second, but third. In 2023, Hyundai-Kia Group will sell 400,000 pure electric vehicles, most of which are overseas, and although we have nearly one million sales, most of them are absorbed by the domestic market. In the U.S. electric vehicle market, the Hyundai brand is second only to Tesla in terms of sales.
Some of our markets are also strongly challenged by Korean electric vehicles. For example, the Wuling Air EV has led the electric vehicle market in Indonesia for many years, with a market share of more than 70%. But in 2023, Hyundai's Ainikr 5 overtook Wuling, with its market share rising to 44.3%, and Wuling only has 43.5% left. Moreover, the price of the Ainikr 5 in Indonesia is three times that of Wuling's air EV, and the profit margin is even greater.
The advantage of domestic new energy vehicles lies in a strong supply chain system, but Korean cars also have a relatively complete supply chain, and only they can pose a threat to our new energy vehicles. In terms of power batteries, we have CATL and BYD, but South Korea also has LG, SK and Samsung SDI; in terms of intelligence, Hyundai has good performance in the fields of automatic parking, automatic driving, voice control system, etc., and is not too far behind Chinese car companies.
There are only three independent intelligent vehicle system platforms in the world, namely NVIDIA, Tesla and Huawei, and since Tesla mainly uses it for its own use, most car companies are based on NVIDIA platforms for independent research and development, or choose to cooperate with Huawei. In the field of smart cars, although the Korean system is one Huawei behind us, it can also develop a good system based on the NVIDIA platform.
The production capacity of Korean new energy vehicles is not as good as ours, but the supply chain is second only to China and Tesla, and the development speed is second only to us.
From the perspective of competition with Korean cars, their biggest advantage is that they have a firmer foundation for overseas localization, an earlier layout in Europe, the United States and other countries, and a more complete sales system. Their electric vehicles can be placed directly in the sales network of gasoline trucks, which not only saves the time and cost of launching new vehicles, but also realizes rapid distribution in the market.
Automobile localization has great advantages in terms of production costs, taxes and policies, which is also a problem that domestic brands have to face when going overseas, so in the past two years, major car companies have also accelerated the pace of overseas factory construction.
Another big advantage of Korean automakers is that there is less political resistance than us, with North America and Europe both opening their doors to Korean cars and becoming Hyundai-Kia's two largest consumer markets. However, these countries are making it difficult for our car companies, not to mention the United States, our car brands have not been able to enter so far, and the European Union has been clamoring for a countervailing investigation against China's new energy vehicles. Even India, the graveyard of multinational companies, is very tolerant of Koreans, and Hyundai Group's cumulative sales in India have exceeded 9 million, occupying the second place with a market share of 22.6%.
Although the Japanese and German are the ultimate goals, Korean cars are the more threatening opponents at this stage, especially in the field of new energy vehicles, Hyundai-Kia is the only car company that can compete with Chinese brands in an all-round way.