In Wei Jianjun's view, in order to achieve sustainable development, we must do something and do nothing.
"In the face of competition in the next three years, Great Wall Motor will uphold long-termism, adhere to the bottom-line thinking, and pursue a high-quality market." At the shareholders' meeting of Great Wall Motors on May 10, Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors, said when talking about industry competition.
It is worth noting that the shareholders' meeting of Great Wall Motors, which was originally not open to the public, was held in the form of live webcast, and all core executives attended, which won praise from the industry. The industry believes that the Great Wall's frank attitude to the outside world shows the determination and confidence of enterprise reform.
The conference first summarized the performance of Great Wall Motors in 2023 and the first quarter of 2024, and then elaborated on the development policy, product and market layout, intelligent technology development route and Great Wall Motor's overseas strategy in 2024.
In terms of operating performance, in the first quarter report released by Great Wall Motors, Great Wall Motors achieved operating income of 42.86 billion yuan in the first quarter of this year, a year-on-year increase of 47.60%; The profit attributable to the parent company was 3.228 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of more than 17 times, the highest revenue and profit in the same quarter in history, and in the 2023 fiscal year, Great Wall Motors is still in a state of increasing revenue but not increasing profits, which shows the speed of its "blood".
In this regard, Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors, said, "Great Wall Motors has done something and has not done anything, and the loss is particularly serious, so we will moderately reduce sales and give full play to our long board, and we will vigorously promote it if it does not lose or has a slight loss or a relatively high profit." ”
Among them, "doing something" refers to actively laying out and taking the lead in the new energy market. "Great Wall Motor's product matrix is the best and most complete, with pickup trucks, new energy and new energy, hybrid, plug-in hybrid, gasoline, and diesel," Wei Jianjun said.
But on the other hand, in the face of the unprofitable industry problem of pure electric vehicles, Great Wall must be restrained and cannot blindly take the market share. For example, in 2022, due to the serious loss of bicycles, Great Wall Motors stopped the Ora white cat and black cat, which were popular at that time.
In Wei Jianjun's view, it is necessary to stick to the bottom line in the fierce competition, adhere to long-termism, give full play to the long board, and pursue a high-quality market share, which is also the "inaction" he adheres to.
In addition, Great Wall Motor's "inaction" also includes not blindly participating in the "price war". With the advent of the era of new energy vehicles, the domestic automobile industry is undergoing changes unseen in a century, which brings about the reshaping of the domestic passenger car market pattern and brand pattern. You must know that in the early years, independent brands and joint venture brands maintained a safe price difference of 3-50,000 yuan in order to have the ability to compete with one another.
Nowadays, the "moat" of joint venture brands and even first-line luxury brands has begun to loosen, and the brand premium halo is relatively bleak. In the view of Mu Feng, president of Great Wall Motors, the current price of self-owned brand cars can be fully supported by product strength, which means that Great Wall Motors will not blindly participate in the price war.
This is also the core idea that Great Wall executives have repeatedly emphasized throughout the shareholders' meeting - long-termism and bottom-line thinking. As Wei Jianjun said, "the enterprise is to create social value, if it is a loss, in the long run, it is untenable, must have its own hematopoietic ability, so we must establish long-termism, more long-term view." ”
Of course, in addition to the core issues of Great Wall Motor's strategy, this shareholders' meeting was also asked many sharp questions by investors and netizens. Such as the business performance of Wei brand, Great Wall car and Wei Jianjun's first experience of Internet celebrities.
In response to the problem of WEY brand market performance, Wei Jianjun responded, "WEY brand products have never been bad, but the Great Wall is not very good at selling high-end cars, so direct sales are also a last resort, and the general environment makes dealers lack confidence." ”
Based on this, the Great Wall began to test the "double sales" model, that is, the channel network of "direct sales + dealer sales". It is understood that in May this year, Great Wall Motors began to try a dual sales system, that is, to establish a direct sales model on the basis of the existing dealer system, and released the "Great Wall Smart Selection" direct sales model. Among them, six products of two brands, Tank (Tank 300, Tank 400, Tank 500, Tank 700) and Wei brand (Blue Mountain and Gaoshan), have been stationed in the direct sales system.
Regarding the issue of Great Wall cars, Mu Feng, president of Great Wall Motors, responded that Great Wall Motors does not reject the category of cars, and the Ora Good Cat itself is a car, so cars are natural in the Ora category. In addition, the layout of the sedan category will also be considered in the Wei brand.
It is worth noting that in addition to talking about long-termism and bottom-line thinking many times, Wei Jianjun also mentioned Internet thinking many times, that is, to face to face with users. In fact, since last year, many high-end members of the Great Wall have settled in Weibo and moved to the foreground.
This year, Wei Jianjun, who has lived behind the scenes for a long time, has also moved from behind the scenes to the front of the stage, and is often active in the front line of Great Wall Motor's marketing activities, not only operating his own Weibo and Douyin accounts, but also live broadcasting.
When asked by netizens about how he feels about being an "Internet celebrity", Wei Jianjun said, "This is the Internet era, and our entire team must establish Internet thinking and master the communication laws of the new era." We still have very little traffic, and we strive to be a high-quality Internet celebrity. ”
In addition, Wei Jianjun also said frankly, "I am also setting an example, I must do better than them, I have an advantage, because I am the boss." In fact, including Wei Jianjun, since April this year, many industry bigwigs such as Yin Tongyue of Chery Automobile and Li Shufu of Geely Automobile have moved from behind the scenes to the front of the stage, and it is more attractive for the outside world to have the founder tell the brand story.
In the face of radical change, "we should first focus on efficiency and do the right thing, and then we should try to be more efficient and do things right," Peter Drucker, the father of modern management, wrote in his book Effective Supervisor. Nowadays, when the automobile industry is accelerating change, it is also the time to test the ability of car companies to withstand the cold. What is certain is that the long-termism and bottom-line thinking that Great Wall Motors adheres to, as well as the Internet thinking that keeps pace with the times, will become its weapon against the cold.