In the Chinese market, joint ventures are becoming more and more passive.
According to the data released by the Passenger Association, in March this year, the retail sales of the national passenger car market were 1.687 million units, a year-on-year increase of 6.0% and a month-on-month increase of 52.8%; Among them, the retail sales of self-owned brands were 930,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 19% and a month-on-month increase of 51%; In March, the retail sales of mainstream joint venture brands were 500,000 units, down 8% year-on-year and up 49% month-on-month.
In March, the market share of independent brands increased by 6 percentage points to 54.8%, and the market share of the corresponding joint venture brands was declining rapidly. According to the data, the retail share of German brands in March was 20.4%, down 1.5 percentage points year-on-year, the retail share of Japanese brands was 13.8%, down 2.2 percentage points year-on-year, and the retail share of American brands reached 8.2%, down 1.8 percentage points year-on-year.
"In the next 3~5 years, the share of joint venture brands will drop from 40% to 10%, of which 30% is the future growth space of Chinese brands." Recently, Wang Chuanfu, chairman of BYD, said this in an interview.
In addition to being aggressive in the domestic market, independent brands have also accelerated the process of going overseas. According to the data of the China Passenger Car Association, passenger car exports (including finished vehicles and CKD) in March were 406,000 units, up 39% y/y, setting the highest monthly export record in history, of which self-owned brand exports reached 341,000 units, up 33% y/y and 37% m/m.
"Chinese automakers are the most competitive in the world and pose the toughest competitive challenge to Tesla." In an interview with the media, Musk has also repeatedly mentioned that Chinese car companies are super competitive, and in his opinion, if there are no trade barriers, Chinese car companies can almost beat most car companies in the world.
The successive "touting" has made many netizens happy, as if the independent brand has achieved a leading edge and become a leader in the global automotive industry. However, this is not the case, and we should be cautiously optimistic about the development of the automotive industry before officially dominating the global automotive industry, after all, domestic brands will not be able to shake the leading position of foreign brands in a short period of time.
According to the data released by GlobalData, in the sales list of the world's top ten car companies in 2023, Toyota, Volkswagen and other car companies are still in an absolute leading position, among which Toyota's annual sales once again exceeded 10 million, ranking first for four consecutive years, and BYD, the first brother of new energy, also entered the list for the first time, surpassing Suzuki to rank ninth with a slight advantage of 10,000 units.
Image source: Nissan
Even Japanese brands, which have suffered successive setbacks in the Chinese market, are still in a dominant position in the global market, and accelerating the transformation of the Chinese market to smart and electric has become the main strategy for Japanese brands to seek leading development while ensuring their leading position in overseas markets.
Japanese automakers are accelerating their embrace of intelligence and electrification
The Japanese are accelerating the change of the passive situation in the field of smart electric vehicles.
At the past Beijing Auto Show, Changan Mazda exhibited its first electric sedan - MAZDA EZ-6, although in the eyes of industry insiders MAZDA EZ-6 and dark blue SL03 are inextricably linked, but it cannot be denied that Mazda is using Changan's technical advantages in the field of new energy to strengthen its competitiveness in the Chinese market.
Compared with Mazda, Nissan has changed more rapidly, and at the Beijing Motor Show, Nissan exhibited five new energy concept cars at one time, of which four new energy concept cars were developed based on the Chinese market.
Image source: Nissan
It is worth mentioning that on the opening day of the Beijing Auto Show, Nissan (China) Investment Co., Ltd. and Baidu Online Network Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd. jointly signed a memorandum of understanding to carry out a feasibility study on strategic cooperation in the field of artificial intelligence (hereinafter referred to as AI) and intelligent vehicles. It's a foregone conclusion that Nissan will have Baidu's AI solutions on its models in China.
Compared with Mazda and Nissan, Honda and Toyota have a more far-reaching layout in the field of smart electric vehicles.
On April 16, before the Beijing Auto Show, Honda officially released the new electric brand "Ye" specially launched for the Chinese market, and exhibited three new energy models under the "Ye" brand, among them, "Ye S7" and "Ye P7" are the first batch of models of the brand, which will be put into production by Honda's joint ventures in China - Dongfeng Honda and Guangqi Honda, respectively, and will be launched at the end of 2024; The "Ye GT CONCEPT" will be mass-produced in 2025.
The "Ye" brand is "a symbol of Honda's electrification revolution in China". Masayuki Igarashi, Executive Director of Honda Motor Co., Ltd., General Manager of China Headquarters, General Manager of Honda Motor Industries (China) Investment Co., Ltd., and General Manager of Honda Motor Technology (China) Co., Ltd.
"Next, Honda will face the fierce competition in the Chinese market through the coexistence of two different brands, e:N and Ye." In Igarashi's view, Honda must change its slow layout in the field of new energy in order to gain more development opportunities.
Image source: Honda China
At the Beijing Auto Show, Toyota brought two pure electric models "bZ3C" and "Bozhi 3X", among them, bZ3C was jointly developed by Toyota and BYD Toyota Electric Vehicle Technology Co., Ltd., FAW Toyota, and Toyota China R&D Center, and will be produced and sold by FAW Toyota in the future; The 3X is a practical-oriented SUV model jointly developed by Toyota, GAC Group, GAC Toyota, and Toyota China R&D Center, and is planned to be produced and sold by GAC Toyota.
In addition to strengthening the competitiveness of new energy vehicles with the help of BYD and GAC, Toyota has also launched a strategic cooperation with Tencent to create new value for mobility by leveraging Tencent's advantages in AI large models, cloud, and digital ecology. In addition, Toyota and Pony.ai have also established a joint venture to open up the layout in the field of intelligent driving.
In the field of intelligence and electrification, China has taken the lead, and the collective turn of Japanese brands to embrace Chinese companies can make up for their shortcomings. In addition, the durability of the Japanese brand equity formed in the traditional automobile era can still be continued, which is the key to the MAZDA EZ-6, which bears the name of "human and horse", to win the favor of Mazda fans.
Policy protection and insufficient infrastructure have become a window period for the transformation of foreign investment
In the Chinese market, Japanese brands are accelerating the transition to smart electric vehicles by creating new "joint ventures" and leveraging technology companies. In the global market, Japanese brands are also continuing to lead with their previous accumulation, while it is difficult for domestic brands to change this state in a short period of time.
From the perspective of the development trend of the industry, smart electric vehicles are a generation ahead of traditional fuel vehicles and have a leading advantage in driving experience, but compared with traditional fuel vehicles, smart electric vehicles have a high dependence on infrastructure such as charging piles, and the layout of charging piles in overseas markets is a problem.
According to the data released by the Passenger Association, the number of public charging piles in China increased by 950,000 in March this year compared with the same period last year, but because of the different acceptance of electric vehicles in the local market, there are also large differences in the layout of charging piles in various cities.
"At present, the ratio of public piles in China is much better than that in Europe and the United States, but there is a problem of insufficient utilization, and some public charging piles have serious losses. Due to the relatively small popularity of public charging piles in the offline market of small and medium-sized cities in the central and western regions, consumers who buy new energy vehicles in these areas are still relatively poor in terms of convenience. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the passenger association, said.
Image source: Special call WeChat ID
In addition, according to the financial report of Telide (the parent company of Telide, stock code: 300001), Telide, which has been established for 9 years, will make a profit for the first time in 2023, becoming the first charging pile company in the industry to achieve profitability. As of December 23, 2023, the number of charging piles operated by Telai has exceeded 500,000.
On the one hand, it is necessary to build ahead of time to seize more advantageous positions, facilitate consumers and lock in more potential users at the same time; On the other hand, it is also necessary to bear the risk of high "vacancy rate", which is the fundamental reason why many charging pile companies are difficult to make profits, and the same problem is also restricting the development of overseas charging pile companies.
The lack of infrastructure is an important reason for the decline in the acceptance of new energy vehicles in overseas markets. In other words, the speed at which new energy vehicles in overseas markets will replace fuel vehicles will not be as fast as in the Chinese market, which will win more time for many foreign car companies to transform into the new energy market.
Image source: Toyota China
In the longer term, the quality of the transformation of foreign brands in the Chinese market will directly affect their future. This is because smart electric vehicles are an inevitable trend in the development of the industry, and the Chinese market has achieved a leading advantage, in this context, foreign brands to increase investment in the Chinese market, increase the weight of China's research and development, is the only way to cope with future development.
Secondly, the current market pattern of independent and joint ventures in the Chinese market will gradually extend to overseas markets. According to the data released by the General Administration of Customs, in the first quarter of this year, the export of complete vehicles was 1.322 million, a year-on-year increase of 23.6%, and the export volume of Chinese automobiles is growing rapidly.
Although the export business of independent brands will be affected by a series of unfavorable factors such as imperfect infrastructure, policy restrictions, and local protection, this cannot stop the industry trend of smart electric vehicles sweeping the world, and the globalization of independent brands is only a matter of time.
Foreign car companies are taking advantage of this time lag to make up for their shortcomings in the field of intelligent electrification, in which Chinese companies are playing an increasingly important role, as evidenced by the fact that Chinese companies such as Tencent, Baidu, and Pony.ai have become partners of joint venture car companies.