"The saddest thing is that the new force has fallen, and the car machine I just bought his car is down......" seems to be a self-mocking sentence, but it reveals the bitterness and helplessness of some owners of the new power brand.
Recently, in the U.S. market, more and more new car-making forces such as Fisker, Canoo, and Nikola have sounded the "alarm" one after another, and they are in danger. The same is true in the Chinese market, from Aiways to WM to Gaohe, the "knockout competition" of new forces is intensifying. With the collapse of new Chinese and foreign car manufacturers, what should car owners do with the electric vehicles that have been sold under these brands? "Software-defined vehicles" is one of the labels of these new car manufacturers, but if these car companies can no longer maintain the in-vehicle systems of their smart cars, will these cars become "bricks"?
In fact, from the recently "endangered" Gaohe to WM Motor, which filed for bankruptcy last year, the worst may not be the brands themselves, but their owners, many of whom have suffered from "car anxiety". Previously, a number of WM car owners said on social platforms that the WM car machine system "WM Zhixing" and the mobile app have been displayed as unable to load and are in a state of suspended service, and the mobile phone Bluetooth key "Xiao Wei Sui" cannot be used. Although it returned to normal shortly thereafter, WM owners, as well as owners of other new power brands that were on the verge of struggling, were still worried.
The industry knockout competition intensifies, and new forces meet the tide of bankruptcy
At present, many new American manufacturers are facing severe cash flow pressure, and some companies have come to the brink of bankruptcy. Among them, Canoo had to transfer from the main board of the New York Stock Exchange to the NASDAQ last year due to the collapse of its stock price, and its financial crisis intensified. Milton was sentenced to four years in prison and fined $1 million (currently $1 is about 7.23 yuan) for fraud in December last year, and the company's market value plummeted by 97%, and its stock price is now less than $0.7......
Liang Xiaolei, a researcher at the New Energy Application Technology Research Center of the Yangtze River Delta Research Institute, believes that in addition to Tesla, a number of new car-making companies in the United States have fallen into a survival dilemma.
"The imperfect supply chain and the difficulty of financing at this stage are the real shortcomings faced by the US electric vehicle industry. Lin Sen, a researcher at Guangdong New Energy Vehicle Development Research Center, believes that on the one hand, compared with China, the U.S. domestic electric vehicle supply chain is still immature and the ecology is not perfect, which not only restricts the concept, design, development and manufacturing capabilities of the new American car-making forces, but also pushes up its car-making costs. On the other hand, the financing environment for new U.S. automakers is also deteriorating. In order to curb inflation, the Federal Reserve has raised interest rates several times, making the capital market return to rationality. As venture capital gradually retreated, electric start-ups that "burned money" like running water, but were unable to achieve large-scale mass production and delivery, fell one after another.
Compared with the few new car-making forces in the United States, at least hundreds of new car-making forces have emerged in China in the past 20 years, but the "elimination rate" is also very high, and there are "laggards" almost every year, such as Byton, Bojun, Sailin, Aiways, Weimar, Gaohe, Evergrande Automobile, etc. Among them, WM Motor filed for bankruptcy with the court last year, Gaohe Automobile announced the suspension of production in February this year and tried to find the "next home" to take over, Evergrande Automobile has been insolvent and abandoned by capital.
"It is not so much that the new car-making forces are ushering in a 'bankruptcy wave', but rather that this is the result of accelerating industrial transformation and intensifying market competition, which is in line with the development law of the industry. According to Hu Fenglin, a researcher at the New Energy Innovation Technology Center of the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, the industrial chain and supply chain of China's electric vehicle manufacturing are relatively perfect, and it occupies a first-mover advantage in the global new energy vehicle industry competition.
At the same time, after years of relatively adequate market competition, the market performance of new domestic automakers has begun to diverge. It is an inevitable development trend for some new EV manufacturers with poor sales performance, most of them have weak core technology and R&D strength, lack of product competitiveness, and financing difficulties. Nowadays, domestic capital is very cautious in investment decisions in the automotive field, and pays more attention to the strength of enterprises and the quality of their products. Therefore, it is an inevitable law of the development of the industry that more and more underperforming new car-making forces are eliminated in the market reshuffle.
In the era of software-defined vehicles, the problem of vehicle downtime is big
After the fall of the new car-making forces, there is a "chicken feather" left behind, and the car machine has become one of the most headaches for the owners of these brands. In the era of software-defined vehicles, even many traditional car companies regard "vehicle-machine interconnection" as one of the biggest selling points of their models, not to mention new car-making forces.
Indeed, from smart keys, remote control, driving navigation, on-board large screens to intelligent cockpits, intelligent car machine systems have brought consumers a lot of unprecedented experiences. But there are a lot of problems and "complaints" that follow, the central control screen suddenly goes black when driving, the navigation version is too low to upgrade, the system freezes and even crashes directly...... Vehicle machine failure has become the "hardest hit area" of complaints in the automotive field in recent years, and many well-known car companies have made mistakes in software and vehicle machine systems. For those new car makers who are crumbling, it is even more difficult to maintain the continuous operation of their vehicle systems and OTA upgrades.
"The in-vehicle system is the link between people and vehicles, and it is also one of the implementation paths of software-defined vehicles. Zeng Wenxiang, a researcher at the Northern Institute of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence, told the China Automotive News that for electric vehicles, the core of the interconnection of the vehicle-machine system is its software operating system, and the vehicle-machine system is also an important part of the software-defined vehicle. A good operating system can provide smoother and more reliable connections and services for the in-vehicle system.
In recent years, the vehicle machine system of new energy vehicles at home and abroad is showing a development trend based on self-development, and has changed from the dominance of Apple car machine system CarPlay to a new pattern of self-developed car machine system of automobile brands. Among them, Tesla has been using its self-developed car machine system. In addition, including Ford's SYNC in-vehicle system, BMW's iD-rive in-vehicle system, Mercedes-Benz MBUX in-vehicle system, Audi's MMI in-vehicle system, Volkswagen's ID.OS in-vehicle system, Toyota's new Arenal in-vehicle system, etc., are basically self-developed or jointly developed by them and technology companies.
"The reason why car companies tend to develop their own car machine systems is also due to the consideration of 'soul' and cost. Lin Sen said that on the one hand, in the era of software-defined vehicles, data has become the core asset of car companies and an important support for the evolution of automotive products to intelligence, and it is also the "soul" of an intelligent car. Taking the Apple car machine system CarPlay as an example, now CarPlay can not only control the large screen of the car, but also control nearly 90% of the intelligent functions on the smart car. If the CarPlay system is used, it means that the car company has to hand over the core data to Apple, which is unacceptable to many car companies. On the other hand, if car companies want to use CarPlay, they must pay Apple a lot of system licensing fees, special chip fees, value-added tax, and special module certification fees.
As the transformation of the automotive industry accelerates, so does the nature of the automotive product itself. "From the perspective of the general trend, the transition from traditional fuel vehicles to the era of electric vehicles is actually a process of convergence of automobiles from mechanical products to electronic products and digital products. Hu Fenglin believes that the vehicle machine system, as a significant symbol of this transformation, clearly reflects the characteristics of the convergence of automobiles to intelligent electronic products. Therefore, domestic and foreign car companies have invested heavily in the vehicle machine system to develop a car machine system that is more compatible with their own models and functional settings, so as to present the brand characteristics, personalized settings and new functions that can realize the intelligent expansion of software-defined vehicles, so that the car machine system has become an important medium for automotive intelligence. At the same time, with the wide application of vehicle machine systems, a large number of physical buttons on smart electric vehicles have also been canceled, and the system has become the main channel for controlling smart cars.
"Under the rapid evolution of automotive intelligence, the vehicle-machine system has become a major fulcrum for the evolution of intelligent vehicles and differentiated competition. Liang Xiaolei said that the vehicle machine system has also become a symbol of the technological content of intelligent vehicles. From the perspective of use, in the context of software-defined vehicles, the intelligent cockpit is the center of automotive intelligence, and it is also the "command center" of software-defined and driven vehicles. The on-board operating system is an important intersection of intelligent resources, functions and control, and it is also a bridge that reflects the role of the vehicle-machine system.
Well-functioning, feature-rich, safe and reliable in-vehicle systems are becoming increasingly important to consumers. Once the car machine system is down or deactivated, it is tantamount to a bolt from the blue for the car owner.
The car "becomes bricked" and the intelligent function is not "sealed"
As some new car-making brands have become or gradually become "disappearing", the risk of downtime of their car machine systems has greatly increased. So the question is, once the smart car's in-vehicle system goes down, can the car still drive?
"At present, most smart cars still use distributed electrical and electronic architectures. Some intelligent functions of the car are mainly responsible for the cockpit domain and will not affect the driving function of the car. Zeng Wenxiang explained that although smart cars are increasingly trending towards electronic products, they still have the attributes of mechanical products. Smartphone downtime means that it cannot be turned on and used, which is a veritable "brick". However, unlike automobiles, the distributed electronic and electrical architecture of the whole vehicle is generally divided into power domain, chassis domain, cockpit domain/intelligent information domain, autonomous driving domain and body domain. The cockpit domain related to the in-vehicle system is mainly responsible for the vehicle's entertainment information system, so even if the in-vehicle system is down or deactivated, more infotainment functions may be affected, and the basic function of the car as a means of transportation will not be too problematic.
"Weimar has become a 'dangerous horse', and the car machine system has become a furnishing ......" Wang Dong, the owner of Weimar Motor, told reporters that in October last year, Weimar car machine system "Weimar Zhixing", mobile phone App, mobile phone Bluetooth key "Xiao Wei Travel" was completely paralyzed, although it returned to normal soon after the media exposure, but after that, there was no longer customer service. In December last year, Wang Dong's WM EX5 car machine system went down again, and since then, even the Bluetooth key of his mobile phone has been good and bad, and he has to carry the key with him. Wang Dong has tried to call the official after-sales service and customer service number many times, but he has not been able to get in touch. Later, he found in the car owner group that many WM owners have encountered the trouble of car machine downtime and Bluetooth key difficulty in use. Many car owners' car central control screens have "struck" and can only be navigated through their mobile phones.
Some new power brands that have been eliminated or are on the verge of elimination, after the car machine system goes down, the car changes from "intelligent" to "mentally retarded" in seconds. Yang Song, the owner of Aiways, said that not only is the car machine system stuck, but the intelligent driving system is sometimes outrageous. Once, Yang Song started the auxiliary driving function of the car on the highway without a separation zone in the county, and the vehicle actually drove on the wrong road, fortunately there were no other vehicles on the road at that time, so he immediately stopped the assisted driving and returned to the normal lane with manual driving, and never dared to use the auxiliary driving function again.
Song Yong, the owner of Hengchi, "complained", his new car has frequent failures, not only the official App often does not respond, but also the text displayed on the large screen of the car machine often overlaps, which is jokingly called "stacked in a stack" by many car owners. At the same time, there are also problems such as abnormal brake noise, and the inability to use Level 2 driver assistance functions such as adaptive cruise control, traffic sign recognition, and lane assist. Song Yong has only made one OTA upgrade since he picked up the new car in September last year, but it has not solved any problems. He said that some safety-related intelligent functions cannot be used, which directly leads to the overall safety performance of the vehicle.
When it comes to the suspension of the intelligent function of this kind of "left behind" new power brand car, car owners have "a handful of bitter tears". Chu Ziyang, the owner of Tianji Auto, said that shortly after he picked up the car in September 2022, Tianji Auto thundered, at first the car machine App went down, and then the intelligent and infotainment functions could not be connected, and the AI voice assistant claimed by the car company became "no one answered".
OTAs have become "wishful thinking"
How to sell the car in the hand
Among the many "complaints" of car owners, OTA upgrade services are also more concentrated. "For smart cars, normalized OTA is an important part of the after-sales system. Hu Fenglin said that OTA upgrades can not only update the entertainment system, navigation, comfort configuration and other software application settings in the vehicle's intelligent cockpit domain, but also upgrade the underlying firmware such as the power domain, chassis domain, and auxiliary driving domain.
For smart cars, OTA has become commonplace and indispensable after-sales service. With the OTA function, the car can iterate at any time like a mobile phone product, update relevant functions, and make the car "common and always new". OTA turns the car into a full-lifecycle smart product that can continuously evolve itself. Nowadays, OTA has become a service that smart cars must equip and a right that car owners should enjoy. Once the new EV manufacturers fall and can no longer provide OTA services, it will be a heavy blow to consumers. This means that they will not be able to enjoy the benefits and services that are rightfully theirs like other car owners.
Jin Peng, the owner of Weimar, said that when he bought Weimar, he saw how advanced Weimar claimed its OTA and intelligence, but the experience was not significantly improved after the upgrade. After the crash of WM Motor, OTA disappeared without a trace...... According to public data, WM Motor's total sales from 2019 to 2023 will be about 113,000 units, Aiways' total sales will also reach about 16,000 units, and Hengchi Automobile's total sales will be 1,389 units. With more and more new forces thundering, the number of car owners whose rights and interests are not protected is also increasing. These car owners who can't find after-sales customer service are really troublesome when they look at the cars that are "smashed" in their hands, and they can't sell them or repair them.
Mr. Ling, a second-hand car dealer, said that the second-hand car of Weimar that can still be used by the car machine system is currently quoted at about 40,000 yuan, but there is a backlog of such cars, and none of them have been sold since October last year, because they dare not buy it because they know the situation of Weimar. And if the vehicle machine system can no longer be used, there is almost no circulation value.
Repairs are even more difficult. Master Luo, a maintenance technician at a self-employed repair shop, told reporters that in the case of the collapse of car companies, some repairable and replaceable parts can be repaired for the after-sales of automobile hardware. However, in recent years, there are more and more special-shaped parts of smart electric vehicles, and the difficulty of maintenance is also increasing. There are also some irreplaceable parts that can only be painstakingly found, perhaps disassembled from some accident cars and scrapped cars, but this depends largely on luck. After the discontinuation of many electric vehicle brands, after-sales service and official designated maintenance points are closed, original parts are basically not available, and it is difficult to find alternative parts.
For these "abandoned" car owners, it is relatively more difficult to repair intelligence and related software. "OTA updates don't work at all, and the software can't fix them. Master Luo confirmed that the car machine system can not be replaced in a third-party repair shop, because in addition to the different interfaces and functional control instructions set by the manufacturer, the specific connection path and related parameters of the car machine system and the internal system of the vehicle belong to the confidentiality of the car company, which will not be clearly marked, and there is also a lack of professional equipment for testing. Moreover, there may be a risk of illegal cracking of software, and the regulatory authorities are very strict in their investigation. Therefore, third-party unofficial brand repair shops are generally reluctant to take over this "hot potato".
"In accordance with the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China and other relevant regulations, it is indeed suspected of violating the law to crack the car machine system without permission. Ren Chuanzhi, a lawyer at Beijing Yingke Law Firm, told the China Automotive News that the Criminal Law stipulates that it is illegal to hack and destroy computer information systems, GPS systems, automatic control equipment, communication equipment, etc. without permission. This applies not only to third parties, but also to car owners who hack the system on their own private cars. Therefore, whether it is a third-party repair shop or an individual, it is unlikely to crack the car system and related software, otherwise the gains outweigh the losses.
"Generally speaking, when facing delisting, traditional car companies will introduce a relatively mature mechanism to cover the after-sales service after delisting, but such a back-up mechanism has not yet appeared among new EV manufacturers. Lin Sen said that according to Article 21 of the "Measures for the Administration of Automobile Sales" implemented in July 2017, automotive product suppliers should promptly announce to the public the models that have been discontinued or stopped for sale, and ensure the supply of spare parts and corresponding after-sales service for at least 10 years thereafter. Japanese auto brands such as Mitsubishi and Acura, which had previously withdrawn from the Chinese market, have made it clear that the former Chinese joint venture partners will provide after-sales service for their brand owners. However, among the new car-making forces, almost no car companies have the ability to implement this regulation, because many of them are already heavily indebted, the capital chain is broken, and the management is chaotic, where can they still afford to pay for the after-sales service in the next 10 years.
In Liang Xiaolei's view, the technical content of smart electric vehicles is relatively high, and professional technical support and parts supply are required for maintenance and after-sales. If car companies go out of business, it will be difficult to find replacements for some core components, and consumers will often be in a vulnerable position. Therefore, there has been a heated discussion in the industry, hoping to improve relevant regulations and policies while strengthening supervision, and clarify the technical security responsibilities of relevant enterprises.
Liang Xiaolei believes that on the one hand, the relevant departments can consider issuing relevant regulations to stipulate that if new energy vehicle companies go bankrupt or delist, they must perform within a certain period of time to provide protection for consumer product maintenance and OTA upgrades and other software services. On the other hand, in the process of bankruptcy liquidation, in addition to fulfilling the repayment obligations to creditors, the enterprise may consider withdrawing a part of the funds to perform the after-sales obligations. In addition, consideration should also be given to establishing a cooperation mechanism between NEV vehicle companies, or setting up an industry-wide after-sales service fund to continue to provide after-sales service for car owners who have withdrawn from car companies. In short, we hope that through various efforts, we will establish a corresponding mechanism to relieve consumers' worries as much as possible. Liang Xiaolei said.
Text: Zhao Jianguo Editor: Wan Ying Layout: Zhao Fangting
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