60-year-old Wei Jianjun "set the tone" of Great Wall Motors: give full play to the advantages of longboard and adhere to long-termism

Our reporters Yin Limei and Tong Haihua report from Beijing

Unlike the practice of car companies in the industry being involved in "price wars", Great Wall Motor's approach in 2024 is to adhere to long-termism.

"The automotive industry is very competitive right now. In 2023, the losses of the electric vehicle industry will intensify. In the fierce competition, Great Wall Motors adheres to the bottom line, adheres to long-termism, and pursues high-quality market share. Recently, the Great Wall Motors held a general meeting of shareholders, in the past two years rarely appeared in front of the public of the Great Wall Motors Chairman Wei Jianjun said that the Great Wall Motors "do something and do nothing", for those businesses with particularly serious losses, will take appropriate measures to reduce sales, concentrate on giving full play to the advantages of the long board, and vigorously promote those who do not lose money, slightly lose money or have relatively high profits in business.

In other words, compared with grabbing market share at a lower price, Wei Jianjun's view is that the price war is unsustainable, and an enterprise must have hematopoietic ability and adhere to the bottom line of compliance management.

At present, the "price war" in the auto market has not yet shown signs of stalling. According to the research report released by Everbright Securities, since April, nearly 40 auto brands and a total of 128 car series have announced discounts, subsidies or price reductions.

The market is fierce, and the automotive industry has once again started a "life and death battle". Wei Jianjun believes that at present, Great Wall Motors should maintain its concentration, give full play to the advantages of longboards, and do a good job in the operation and export business of pickup trucks and tank brands.

The pragmatic "personality" on the "body" of traditional car companies

The shareholders' meeting held in Baoding, Hebei Province, the headquarters of Great Wall Motors, was the first shareholders' meeting broadcast live on the whole network of Great Wall Motors, and it was also a unique shareholders' meeting.

Judging from the lineup of senior executives attending the shareholders' meeting, Great Wall Motors can be described as full of sincerity, including Wei Jianjun, Mu Feng, President of Great Wall Motors, Li Ruifeng, Chief Growth Officer, Wang Yuanli, Chief Technology Officer, Shi Qingke, Vice President and Head of Overseas Business, Wu Huixiao, Vice President of Product Intelligence, and Liu Bao, Deputy General Manager of the Technology Center.

From the two-hour Q&A session at the shareholders' meeting, we can feel Great Wall Motor's frank and pragmatic corporate culture. The senior management team attending the shareholders' meeting was open and frank to shareholders, investors and analysts about Great Wall Motor's strategic deployment, operation and technical layout, as well as some sharp questions, instead of "playing Tai Chi" and perfunctory avoidance.

At the beginning of the shareholders' meeting, an investor raised the following questions: In the past two years, Great Wall Motors has not felt particularly positive to the market in terms of product layout in the pure electric vehicle market, and there are even views in the market that Great Wall Motors has missed the window period for the development of pure electric vehicles. How will measures be taken? The positioning of the ORA brand as a women's car is relatively niche and seems to lack barriers, what is Great Wall Motor's consideration for this?

This is a question that goes straight to the core. Li Ruifeng responded that Great Wall Motors adheres to the strategy of parallel development of BEV (pure electric vehicle), PHEV (plug-in hybrid electric vehicle), HEV (hybrid electric vehicle) and hydrogen energy on the technical route. Among them, the WEY brand is positioned as a high-end intelligent new energy brand, the PHEV technology route of Great Wall Motors is developed in parallel by the three lines of tank, WEY brand and Haval, and the ORA brand takes the BEV technology route. Although the ORA brand is a niche brand, in such a competitive environment of BEV market, it is a success for the ORA brand to make the public remember its women's brand line, even if it is a niche brand.

"We will adhere to the brand route of Ola, continue to promote the comprehensive upgrade of the four value dimensions of brand, technology, product and service in the entire product system, and deepen the needs of users in the market segment through differentiated tracks and characteristic products." Li Ruifeng said that for the BEV route, the ORA brand has a rich product lineup and related planning, and will grasp the rhythm of product launch.

Wei Jianjun also responded to the problem of Ora's positioning: "Although the number of niche brands is small, they often do not lose money or lose less. ”

"Although the number of Blue Mountain models sold is not large, the Wei brand is not losing money now, and it can be 'tied'." When it comes to the intensification of the "involution" of the automobile market and how Great Wall Motors adjusts its strategy, Wei Jianjun took the initiative to reveal the sales and profitability of the Wei brand to the outside world.

There is a view in the industry that compared with other brands, the brand positioning of the Wei brand is not very clear, and the sales volume has not improved significantly. At the same time, Great Wall Motors does not have the absolute leading technical support in the industry in terms of electrification and intelligent technology.

In response to such doubts, Wei Jianjun said: "Regarding the positioning of the Wei brand, in fact, our brand of cars has never been bad at the product level. The problem is to return to the original point, Great Wall Motors is not very good at selling cars, and we are not very good at channel quality and channel competitiveness, so Great Wall Motors began to implement the construction of direct channels, which is also no way. ”

Wei Jianjun believes that the construction of direct sales channels can first help Great Wall Motors connect C-end users; Secondly, in the past two years, the phenomenon of dealer closures has increased, in this tide, everyone is unwilling to invest, unwilling to take risks, and dealers still lack confidence. However, Great Wall Motor's products need to be promoted, and WEY brand Gaoshan, Blue Mountain and other mid-to-high-end models need to face a more high-end user base and need better service. Moreover, if you want the brand to go up to the high-end, an unavoidable problem is the need to build direct sales channels. "The performance of the [WEY] Alpine model is very good, but it doesn't sell very well, and we have to learn how to deal with this group of consumers, and we have to build that ability."

Recently, the car circle has set off a traffic feast, and many car company executives have personally participated in the live broadcast. Wei Jianjun, who has always been low-key and cautious, has also gained the attention of many netizens through the "2024 Beijing International Auto Show" or online live broadcast in the past two or three months, and has been called "Baoding Car God" by netizens. For the "volume" flow, Wei Jianjun has his own understanding.

"Now we are not Internet celebrities, our traffic is still very small, we strive to be a quality Internet celebrity, without quality traffic, we will not do it. We hope to have more exchanges with you, Great Wall Motors is a very transparent and very simple company, we are willing to say anything we can say. Because every online user can become our user, we are very willing to communicate with them honestly. Wei Jianjun said that no matter what method is used to disseminate, the purpose and core of Great Wall Motors is to maintain truth and sincerity.

Longboard thinking under "involution".

In July 2020, on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the establishment of Great Wall Motors, an open letter published by Wei Jianjun - "How Great Wall Motors Will Survive Next Year" caused a ripple inside and outside the industry.

In the open letter, Wei Jianjun made an in-depth analysis of the environment and crisis faced by Great Wall Motors at that time, and believed that Great Wall Motors should carry out breakthrough changes in the next ten years. Behind this open letter is Wei Jianjun's determination to break the old and establish the new when the crisis came, and the courage to fight against the odds.

Since 2023, the intensity of the "involution" of the automobile market has exceeded many people's psychological expectations. In the face of the treacherous market, Wei Jianjun needs to find a new development "anchor" for Great Wall Motors again.

"In the face of general industry losses, in the fierce competition, Great Wall Motors must adhere to the bottom line of compliance and play a long board at the same time." Wei Jianjun believes that from 2024 to 2026, the competition intensity of the industry will not decrease, and Great Wall Motors needs to use long-termism to face market competition in the next three years.

In the longboard strategy planned by Great Wall Motors, going overseas is one of the most important pieces of the puzzle. According to Wei Jianjun's plan, in 2024, Great Wall Motors will challenge the overseas sales target of "500,000 units", and conservatively speaking, it will also "guarantee 400,000 units and strive for 500,000 units". Among them, Haval is still the market, with a target of selling 300,000 units, a target of 60,000 pickup trucks, and a target of 50,000~60,000 tank brands.

The competition in the domestic auto market is fierce, and mainstream car companies are focusing on overseas markets. The accompanying question is that when the major car companies "roll" from the domestic market to the foreign market, the intensification of market competition, will the export market profits of the car companies that have been deployed in overseas markets earlier be impacted?

Regarding this problem, Shi Qingke said that Great Wall Motors went to sea relatively early, from pickup trucks to SUVs, the brands faced by Great Wall Motors in overseas markets are basically Japanese and Korean brands. At present, more and more OEMs are going overseas and may face each other in the market segment, but such competition is inevitable and cannot be avoided. Great Wall Motor will guarantee profits through the following initiatives. First, focus on the ONE GWM strategy to improve efficiency and save costs. Second, it is necessary to open source, seek increments, and quickly enter new markets. In addition to introducing new models to major markets such as Latin America, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, the company is also actively studying policies and product strategies in Europe, North America, Japan, and South Korea. Finally, in the process of overseas operation, it is necessary to realize that the layout value is greater than the short-term business value.

"Great Wall Motor's product matrix is the most complete among car companies. We want to have off-road, we want pickup trucks, we want new energy, ICE (internal combustion engine vehicles), HEVs, PHEVs, gasoline, diesel vehicles. Therefore, it is very advantageous for our products to go out, and we are also very confident. Wei Jianjun said, "From organizational construction to the entire strategic planning, our products are almost ready-made, and only need to be adapted for export." ”

Wei Jianjun believes that Chinese products are basically the top level in the global market in terms of emission standards, safety and other aspects, and almost form a dimensionality reduction blow in the target market of Chinese car companies going overseas.

Shi Qingke said that in the overseas market, Great Wall Motors will also implement the long-term strategic policy, continue to promote the brand, form a certain sales scale in the overseas market, and achieve a high market share. In addition, in overseas markets, Great Wall Motors aims to "make money".

The tank brand is also an important direction for Great Wall Motors to build longboard thinking. Li Ruifeng said that the tank brand is the leader in the subdivision field, and with the popularity of the tank, there are followers. In the market segment, the tank has a huge customer base, forming a good product layout in the price range of 200,000 yuan to 500,000 yuan, and the exclusive intelligent off-road platform Hi4-T of the tank brand has also established a high technical barrier.

In Wei Jianjun's view, the tank brand focuses on the market segment of pure off-road routes, and it is not something that other brands can simply follow. At the end of the year, the flagship model Tank 800 will be unveiled. At the same time, tank brands are accelerating the pace of introduction into overseas markets.

Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors, -1.JPG