After four years, the Beijing Auto Show kicked off again, and on the day of the media day, it can be described as three more: many participating brands, many models on display and a large number of participants.
Judging from the experience of the first day of new car release, there are many expected products and more surprising products, not only from the design and technical level, but also from the price is one of the reasons for the huge surprises, and it also echoes the price war that came at the beginning of this year. So far, the price fluctuation seems to have reached a stage to follow, except for Tesla's rise and fall is more "capricious", the rest of the brands can basically find the same price change routine.
This year's Beijing Auto Show has seen a large number of models that can lead the way, covering different levels and categories, and the latest round of market segment price trends are also beginning to take shape.
Pricing power, favoring Chinese brands
The Beijing Auto Show has not yet opened, and the rim has ushered in a small climax. Some car companies took the initiative and came up with blockbuster products before the auto show.
The first move is the ideal L6 with high attention, and the Beijing Auto Show announced its launch a week before the opening, with a price starting at 249,800, which is consistent with the starting price previously speculated on the Internet.
The successor is the M5, although the two cars are positioned in the level, one is medium and large, and the other is medium-sized, but they are direct competitors. The starting price of the M5 is also 249,800, and the whole system can achieve high-end intelligent driving, while the ideal L6 two configuration models can only be achieved with high configuration.
In addition, the representative blockbuster model, Buick GL8 Luzun PHEV has a starting price of 359,900 yuan, and after the throne of MPV sales that has been the first in sales all year round was pulled down by Denza, GL8 started a counterattack in a way that Denza is good at.
Toyota Prado is back, with a starting price of 459,800 yuan, and the starting price of Jietu Shanhai T2 is 179,900 yuan.
At the Beijing Auto Show, several models that can change the market pattern, including Qin L, Tiguan L PRO, Magotan, Xiangjie S9, and even Zhidou Rainbow, etc., compared with the price war at the beginning of the year, the market pattern after the auto show, there will be a new round of changes.
In the market segment, the price of A00-level products further lowered by Zhidou Rainbow, which was listed a week ago, and the battery life of Wuling Hongguang MINIEV is almost the same, but the starting price after subsidies is 1000 yuan lower than the price after the discount of Wuling Hongguang MINIEV. In other words, in the A00 market, the starting price of models with a range of about 120km will be reduced to less than 30,000 yuan.
In the medium-sized car market, the BYD Qin L, which has attracted much attention, although the auto show is only unveiled and the price has not been announced, it is reported that the starting price of the Qin L will be around 120,000 yuan, benchmarking Camry, Accord, Passat, Magotan and other joint venture cars. At present, the above-mentioned joint venture car, from the official guide price, the starting price is basically maintained between 160,000 and 180,000, the lowest price after the terminal discount, the lowest Accord can reach less than 130,000, and other models remain between 130,000 and 150,000. The new Sonata launched last month, the starting price has dropped to below 140,000, once the starting price of the Qin L is set at about 120,000, the ninth-generation Camry that has been on the market has no chance to reprice, and models such as Accord and Passat can also refer to the pricing of a wave of Qin L. It can be predicted that the mainstream B-class car, under the next round of price war, will collectively discount below 130,000 yuan, which is a high probability event, which is equivalent to about 10,000 yuan more than the current discount.
Medium and large cars, several representative models have been demonstrated, the typical is the ideal L6, the price of medium and large SUVs has been lowered to less than 250,000 yuan. Previously, the prices of models of the same level were almost all above 300,000. It means that the mid-size SUV will be fully reduced to less than 200,000, which refers to the top model at the 200,000 level, and the compact SUV will be reduced to less than 150,000. The two new cars at the Beijing Auto Show, the dark blue G318 medium and large SUV, although the price has not been announced, judging only from the trend, as a range-extender model, the starting price is not expected to be higher than the ideal L6.
In any case, the pricing power in the Chinese market is currently in the hands of Chinese brands, who have the ability to stir up the market in addition to the C-segment and D-segment, and in the A00 to B-segment models, which sell more efficiently.
The price war after the auto show, how to fight
Before the auto show, the price war has begun. Tesla cut the price, the ideal price cut, but the strength is not enough.
An example shows that the Chevrolet Explorer PLUS, as a medium-sized SUV with a pure electric range of more than 100km, is priced at a relatively overlapping price with a compact plug-in hybrid SUV and the BYD Song PLUS Glory Edition, which shows that the price of a plug-in hybrid mid-size SUV can be the price of a compact model two months ago, and it is also a joint venture car "counterattack" domestic car, which is relatively rare in the previous price war.
Another model that has attracted much attention, the Volkswagen Tiguan L PRO, opened pre-sales at the Beijing Auto Show, but the price was not announced. According to the current pricing rules of Tiguan L, the official guide price of Tiguan L PRO will be at the level of 250,000, and combined with Volkswagen's current high discount strategy, the terminal price will come to the level of 200,000. Tiguan L PRO is likely to appear as a benchmark, a mid-level SUV with a low-cost intelligent driving system, if the price can come to the 200,000 level, or can lead the trend of 150,000 compact intelligent driving fuel vehicles and 250,000 medium and large intelligent driving fuel vehicles, to achieve price parity between fuel and plug-in hybrid intelligent driving models. However, how the intelligent driving level of the Tiguan L PRO compares with the plug-in hybrid model, and whether it can achieve price parity and effect equality, depends on the effect of user feedback after the launch.
Judging from the Beijing Auto Show, there are currently more mainstream models on the market, B-class and B+-class, and even C-class models, which also reflects the market's demand for products. From another point of view, the last round of price war started because of BYD Qin PLUS, and the price war after the Beijing Auto Show may be caused by B-class cars. After all, in the B-class car market, sedans are still the world of joint venture brands, and SUVs and Chinese brands have not won against joint venture brands. At the same time, in the B-class pure electric market, except for Tesla, which has a good demand, the rest of the cars with large demand basically tend to be in the C-class. Therefore, if Chinese brands want to expand their market share, B-grade is a very important breakthrough.
Of course, the price war does not mean that the price will only be beaten down, there are prices down, and there are also high. Hongmeng Zhixing Xiangjie S9 debuted, with an estimated price of 500,000 yuan, but the core configuration will not be released until the summer. Recently, Huawei released a new intelligent driving solution brand, Qiankun, and announced that ADS has been upgraded to Phase 3.0. In other words, the intelligent configuration of Xiangjie S9 is stronger than that of WenjieM9. In terms of hardware, Xiangjie S9 will also use all of Huawei's current top technical solutions, which is also the confidence of Xiangjie S9. High-end pure electric cars can empower product value through the latest technology at the moment, but unless it is continuously updated, for electric cars, 500,000 is likely to be the price ceiling, after all, including batteries, intelligent driving software and hardware, and the cost of electronic and electrical systems, either remain stable or continue to decline, which means that it is not easy to rush up, but it is simple to reduce prices.
Whether the price after the auto show is chaotic depends on the above-mentioned models that have not yet been released and how they can enter the market.
Epilogue:
After the Beijing Auto Show, the next round of price war may be opened, and the price war will be updated to play, and it is estimated that it will have to wait until the Guangzhou Auto Show. Of course, Xiaopeng previewed the MONA brand today, which has the ability to trigger a price war, but whether it will form a seismic influence like BYD and Tesla depends on the effect at that time.
In addition, although there is no sign of recovery of fuel vehicles, there is still a certain market impact after being able to drive intelligently, not to mention, fuel vehicles have greater profit margins. But just as B-segment cars may determine the price trend, what can feel the fuel and pure electric gameplay depends on the development of hybrids.