Text丨Automobile connoisseur comprehensive
欢迎供稿 | 请添加微信shaoyanlin412
On April 19, local time, Chinese automaker Chery signed an agreement with Spanish car company Ebro-EV Motors to establish a new joint venture in Barcelona, Spain, to jointly produce new electric vehicles, with a total investment of 400 million euros.
At present, the Chinese Embassy in Spain and the Wuhu Municipal People's Government have announced that Chery and Ebro-EV Motors have reached an agreement, but as of press time, Chery has not officially announced this news.
It is understood that Chery is the second Chinese automaker to set up a factory in Europe after BYD. In contrast to BYD's approach to building a plant from scratch in Hungary, Chery is manufacturing and distributing by acquiring an existing plant in Spain, the former Nissan plant that closed in 2021, when Nissan shut down the plant and left about 2,500 workers out of work. In March this year, EV Motors acquired the rights to the Zona Franca plant in Barcelona, which will create 1,250 jobs after the joint venture is signed.
According to the agreement, the plant will start operations this year and is expected to produce 50,000 units a year by 2027 and 150,000 units in 2029. After production, the pure electric and gasoline versions of the Omenda 5 will be the first production models.
Omenda is a new product line of Chery Automobile, launched in July 2022, positioned as a compact SUV, with a current price range of 79,900-114,900 yuan. As the first model of Chery 4.0 product evolution, Omenda also launched four-wheel drive, hybrid and pure electric versions. It is worth mentioning that the sales volume of Ou Mengda in the domestic market is difficult to say ideal. Retail data shows that from January to March this year, the cumulative sales of Ou Mengda were 862 vehicles, of which the sales from January to March were 443, 226 and 193 respectively. However, in the international market, Omenda has been sold in more than 30 countries around the world, and according to statistics, in the first half of 2023, the cumulative wholesale sales of Omenda will exceed 60,000 units, of which nearly ninety percent will be contributed by overseas markets.
In addition to the Omenda model, the joint venture will produce the Jaecoo 7 plug-in hybrid model (the "Exploration 06" model in China), and will restart the Ebro, a long-established Spanish car brand that has been discontinued since 1987, using the technology and production platform shared with Chery.
According to the data, Ebro-EV Motors is a Spanish automobile company, founded in 1954, early production of agricultural vehicles and machinery, after which it was acquired by Nissan in 1987, and began to transition to electrification in 2015, and released the Ebro pure electric pickup truck at the end of 2022.
At present, China has become the number one exporter of passenger cars, and at the same time, more and more Chinese car companies are planning to build factories overseas. It is understood that the overseas factories of Chinese car companies are mainly concentrated in Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Latin America, Africa and other regions, and the overall number of factories has reached dozens of them. Among them, Chery is the Chinese car company with the largest number of overseas factories, with KD factories in Malaysia, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, Russia, Iran and Egypt.
According to the data, Chery Group's cumulative sales in 2023 will be 1,881,300 units, a year-on-year increase of 52.6%, of which the cumulative annual export sales will be 937,100 units, a year-on-year increase of 101.1%, and the growth rate is particularly obvious. As a comparison, in 2023, Great Wall Motor and Geely's overseas markets will be 316,000 and 274,100 respectively, a year-on-year increase of 82.48% and 38%, respectively.
According to the latest data, from January to March 2024, Chery Group's cumulative sales volume was 529604 units, a year-on-year increase of 60.3%, of which 253418 vehicles were exported, a year-on-year increase of 40.9%, accounting for 47.85% of total sales.
As for why Chery chose to set up a joint venture in Spain to build cars, it may be related to the development of local automobiles. According to the Financial Associated Press, data shows that Spain is the second largest car producer in Europe after Germany, with production of nearly 2.5 million units in 2023 and is expected to reach about 2.3 million units in 2024.
According to media reports, the head of Chery Automobile in the UK said that the company plans to enter the British market this year and build a factory there by 2030, when it will compete with South Korean automaker Hyundai-Kia Group for market share.
As for the future sales performance of overseas markets, CITIC Securities predicts that the overseas sales of Chinese automakers in 2025 and 2030 may reach 3 million and 5.5 million respectively, and the overseas market contribution of leading independent brands and new forces may reach 25%-40% in 2030.
Article source: Finance Associated Press, electric Zhijia, hereby thanks