In July 2021, the listing of Xingyue L allowed Li Shufu to break the agreement of "not standing on the platform easily". In this regard, Li Shufu said, "Xingyue L is an epoch-making and leading product, which inherits the advantages of tradition, absorbs the highlights of new energy, forms its own distinctive characteristics, and opens up a new road for the transformation and upgrading of traditional automobiles."
Prior to this, Li Shufu revealed, "Because Geely Holding Group has many automobile companies, there is an internal agreement that I will not easily participate in the new car launch of any company, but today I broke this agreement."
In fact, in recent years, except for Xingyue L, Li Shufu has indeed rarely appeared at the launch conference of any of Geely's new cars, until this time the glory of Zeekrypton 009.
On April 19th, Li Shufu also went to Wuzhen, although he did not appear at the press conference, he expressed through a video that "the brilliance of ZEEKR 009 is my dream car", such a clear banner is rare.
Li Shufu is 61 years old. There is a book called "Jiren Tianxiang Li Shufu", which is his "official" biography, and many industry celebrities have written prefaces and praised them. When it comes to the stage of life when the book is published, many things have a symbolic meaning.
Li Shufu is undoubtedly extremely successful, especially considering that he is self-made. His entrepreneurial story has been told badly - he worked in a photo studio, a refrigerator, an aluminum-magnesium plate, and a motorcycle business, and entered the automotive field in the 90s, fighting his way through the cracks between the times and the market.
Today, with more than 20 years of car-making career, Geely has become the first in the sales volume of its own brand for many years, making Li Shufu's business territory large enough. In terms of development stage, Geely has entered a state of equilibrium and stability, and Li Shufu has become famous. Now that he doesn't need topics and reading, he has passed that stage.
In recent years, Li Shufu's public appearances have gradually decreased, and the once signature sharp words are almost inaudible. His words became more and more crowned, serious, as if he was standing on the commanding heights, with the temperament of an exemplary pacesetter.
Just like Li Shufu said at the beginning of CCTV's 2024 "Dialogue" this year, all the talks are about thinking about industry development and corporate strategy.
For example, on the development strategy:
He said, "We will not easily say that we will not produce traditional cars, we must do a good job in the production and research and development of traditional cars, whether it is technology, quality, cost, and service, this is stability." In the field of new energy, the application and development of new technologies and new products such as electric, hybrid and methanol cannot be left behind, which is to seek progress while maintaining stability. Then, under the premise of stability, we should develop better, seek breakthroughs as much as possible, promote stability, and study some new technologies, such as low-orbit satellite Internet, and green methanol production, manufacturing, and research and development. ”
For example, with regard to the automotive industry:
He said, "The intelligent electrification transformation of the automotive industry is the general trend, but we must see a reality: users buy cars with economic considerations. We need to strike a balance between these two aspects, taking into account not only the transition to intelligent electrification, but also the cost structure and cost performance for consumers. The automotive industry is firstly high-tech, and the second is large-scale. These two things are indispensable, and everything we do now revolves around these two aspects. Small-scale automobile companies are relatively easy to form and manage, but in order to be sustainable in the long term, they must be large-scale automobile groups, and they must continue to invest and lead the development in science and technology. ”
For example, about the future of humanity:
He said, "Those who do not plan for everything cannot seek a moment, and those who do not plan for the overall situation cannot seek a corner." What should human society do after the destruction of the earth? Everyone should open up the universe, and theoretically everyone can have an infinite number of planets, and planets like the earth should still exist in the universe, but people have not discovered them yet. ”
This conversation is impressive, and many people even say, "Today's Li Shufu can no longer be simply summarized as a businessman, he is becoming more and more an entrepreneur." ”
However, Li Shufu still faces challenges. First, the new energy revolution of automobiles is becoming more and more intense, and Geely has not yet entered the top ranks in the new energy battlefield; second, Li Shufu's high-end dream has not yet been realized.
"Li Shufu has always wanted to be a high-end positioning pure electric brand. "It's a well-known thing.
In March 2021, ZEEKR was established and became a card for Li Shufu to have high hopes. In terms of staffing, he himself directly served as the chairman of ZEEKR.
Within Geely, ZEEKR is the fourth new energy experimental sample and the most favored one. The first three test items were: Polestar, Geometry and Lynk & Co. Among them, Lynk & Co transformed from a fuel vehicle and released its first plug-in hybrid vehicle in July 2018. In September 2020, Lynk & Co launched a highly completed pure electric concept model, the Lynk & Co ZERO Concept. In order to accelerate the breakthrough, ZEEKR came into being and inherited the "ripe fruit" of Lynk & Co.
Next, in less than 3 years, ZEEKR has successively launched four models, including ZEEKR 001, ZEEKR X, ZEEKR 009 and ZEEKR 007, but the market performance can probably be described in one word - not up or down, it has accumulated a certain reputation, but it has not continued to become a hit.
This is far from Li Shufu's expectations.
In 1998, when Geely's "pride" imitating Xiali rolled off the assembly line, the young Li Shufu thought at that time "to build the cheapest car in China". Later, he not only built cheap domestic cars, but also sold more than a million units a year. In terms of scale, this is a glorious moment created by Li Shufu in the era of fuel vehicles. And when he ambitiously said that he wanted to build new energy vehicles, he began to hit a wall one after another, so that he has not yet gained the same status as in the new rivers and lakes.
The big guy is also trapped.
A few years ago, some people said they couldn't understand Geely's new energy strategic layout. At that time, Geely Automobile was running several technical routes in parallel and making a variety of attempts. Li Shufu's response to this is that some strategies are multifaceted, and it is difficult for everyone to understand new models and innovative ideas at a glance, and it is not surprising that they cannot be understood. This confident car-making maniac has taken Geely into the unknown step by step, and still needs to continue to play for a ticket to a new era of automobiles.
Li Shufu is a person who is good at capturing the "outlet" - now, he still maintains this market sensitivity, and has long realized the huge allure of the high-end new energy vehicle market, but unfortunately his car kingdom has not yet reached the expected height.
Li Shufu, who is working hard to promote Extreme Krypton, when will he be able to realize his ultimate dream?