Wang Ziyang/text
From the micro electric vehicle market, to the mid-to-high-end range extender market, to the hybrid compact car market, the new energy wave has given birth to a batch of hot-selling models, but most of them are like meteors, and the sales boom has flashed.
Those who want to flow far will dredge their springs. Although the factors that affect the market performance of an automobile product are complex, throughout the history of the automobile industry, classic national cars that can survive for a long time are often good at self-positioning and self-analysis.
As a 250,000-level large-scale luxury smart new energy SUV launched in September 2023, the cumulative number of Wenjie new M7 has exceeded 180,000 units so far, which is not only second to none in the new energy market, but also a national SUV in the new era even from the perspective of the entire automobile market.
On May 30, the half-year car report (hereinafter referred to as the "report") of the owners of the new M7 was officially released, and the new M7 conducted a surgical and accurate analysis of itself, allowing the outside world to see the inevitability and experience of the success of this national SUV in the intelligent electric era.
While completing the phased self-analysis, the new M7 has also begun to take a new step to a higher level. On May 31, the new M7 Ultra was launched.
From all aspects such as technology, products, and manufacturing, the new M7 Ultra has shown more mature and in-depth thinking in the dimension of value competition, and this thinking is making the domestic auto market, which is now mired in vicious price involution, see the hope and direction of getting out of the quagmire.
It can also be a luxury new energy product that can be a national SUV
In China's new energy vehicle market, competition is fiercer this year than last year. But no matter how fierce the competition is, the market will eventually use real data to distinguish the highs and lows. According to the data of the car vertical platform owner's home, in the national TOP10 sales list from January to April, there are two luxury models, one of which is a foreign brand model, and the other is a Chinese brand model - Wenjie new M7.
From the brand level, in March, Wenjie delivered 31,700 new cars, occupying a leading position among new brands. Behind this sales achievement, the contribution of the new M7 is extremely crucial, with 24,500 units delivered in a single month, which has a clear advantage among China's new power brand models. According to the report, the new M7 ranked second among all brands in the sales of high-end models in the Chinese market in the first quarter of 2024, second only to a non-new car company.
From the perspective of the entire automotive industry, a revolutionary change has also emerged this year: the new energy market has become the mainstream track, China's new energy vehicle penetration rate exceeded 50% in early April, and the sales of new energy vehicles exceeded that of fuel vehicles for the first time. This means that the head player in the new energy market will automatically become the head player in the entire automobile market.
Today, one of the most iconic models that reflects this trend is the new M7. However, there has never been a shortage of national cars in China's auto market, and most of the national cars that appeared before were entry-level scooters, which were linked to low prices, such as some entry-level sedans and SUVs of about 100,000 yuan in the era of fuel vehicles, and micro electric vehicles of tens of thousands of yuan in the new energy era.
As the main model of the Wenjie brand, the new M7 has been selling well in the past six months, marking that the national car is no longer synonymous with the entry car, and the luxury new energy SUV can also become a phenomenal national SUV if it is done well.
For the new M7 Ultra that was newly listed on May 31, Pacific Securities' research report on May 26 has given relevant predictions. According to the research report, the new version of the M7 chassis suspension, lidar, seats, audio, front face and other interior and exterior decorations have been upgraded in an all-round way, and the new version is expected to once again create a national SUV to hit the sales list of new power models.
User thinking in the era of intelligence is creative thinking
Nowadays, electrification and intelligent technology have not only brought about changes in the form of automobiles, but also reshaped the needs of users. Traditional fuel vehicle technology has been extremely mature, enterprises only need to ensure that the user's existing experience dimension is high enough, but in the era of intelligent electric vehicles, technology is changing with each passing day, and it is far from enough to meet the user's existing experience dimension.
As far as intelligence is concerned, whether in the past, present or future, the pursuit of a more convenient driving experience is one of the core pursuits of automotive products, and intelligence has brought new opportunities to the driving experience.
For a long time before, intelligent driving was mainly used to enhance a new car and even the entire brand image positioning, due to various factors such as immature technology and too high price, the contribution of intelligent driving to the sales of a smart car was very small, or even negative. In a word, intelligent driving is more of a vase function with symbolic meaning than actual value.
However, the new M7 has begun to make intelligent driving a key force to stimulate the growth of new car sales, and a large number of users choose the new M7 because of intelligent driving. According to the report, by April this year, the total mileage of the new M7 intelligent driving exceeded 99.46 million kilometers, which is equivalent to 2,617 self-driving tours around China, of which the total mileage of intelligent driving in urban areas exceeded 9.32 million kilometers.
The reason why the intelligent driving of the new M7 can be universally recognized by users is that it can bring higher efficiency and comfort. According to the report, the APA+RPA automatic parking system of the new M7 has successfully parked more than 3.51 million times, with an average time of only 45 seconds each time, saving users a total of 44,000 hours of time.
Great Wall Securities' research report in April said: "Domestic high-end intelligent driving welcomes multiple benefits from the policy side + industry side + cost side, and the industrial progress is expected to accelerate. ”
Of course, the two systems of intelligent driving and intelligent cabin are not independent of each other, but highly related. When a large amount of the user's energy originally used for driving is liberated by intelligent driving, the intelligent cabin will bring users a more convenient life experience.
According to the report, the smart cabin of the new M7 has become a part of the car life closely related to users - users have awakened the smart travel butler "Xiaoyi" 65 million times, the dialogue duration is 510,000 hours, Xiaoyi helps users operate the model setting 30.95 million times, and the intimate reminders of various types of cars exceed 38.03 million times......
As far as electrification is concerned, electric vehicles have entered the mass stage with a penetration rate of more than 30%, and unlike the early users who are mostly technology enthusiasts, the mass users who come to the chrysalis are more rational and picky, they will not simply pay for some novel gimmicks, but will pay attention to whether the car is worry-free, such as the cost of the car.
According to the report, long-distance users pay attention to low fuel consumption, and the average fuel consumption of the new M7 under CLTC is 5.6L for rear-wheel drive and 5.8L for four-wheel drive, which is 30% less than the industry average; Urban pure electric users pay attention to low power consumption, and the average cost of the new M7 is 6.6 cents per kilometer, and the large 5-seater, 6-seater new M7 is a multi-person self-driving tour, and the cost per person per kilometer is as low as 5 cents.
From electrification to intelligence, there are many players, and the new M7 can be widely recognized by users, which stems from Huawei's multiple "moats" at the technical level.
According to a research report by Zheshang Securities in April, Huawei has developed sensors (lidar, millimeter-wave radar, ultrasonic radar), chips (intelligent cockpit chips, intelligent driving chips), as well as intelligent components such as electric drive systems and AR-HUD.
The correct concept of competition that has been hidden in the snow has been re-lifted by Huawei
The continuous spread of the price war has made a strange phenomenon in the automobile market, some car companies have been unable to fight their opponents at the level of hard power, but after achieving sales growth through bottomless price reductions, they have begun to look back and be complacent, and even output their own "successful experience" in a high-profile manner, completely ignoring the fact that this is at the expense of the long-term development of the enterprise itself and the healthy development of the industry.
The vicious price war will hurt the smart car and electric vehicle market much more than the traditional fuel vehicle market. The traditional fuel vehicle technology system has been quite mature, while smart cars and electric vehicles are still in the stage of technological breakthroughs.
However, what the auto market needs is not simply an empty slogan called "We should compete for value", but a concrete example of how to truly practice this correct view of competition.
Whether it is the existing model of the new M7 that has been sold for more than half a year, or the new M7 Ultra that was relaunched on May 31, it is the core driving force for its own sales growth to build high value. Today, the new M7 can be regarded as a successful forerunner in the value competition.
Why do you add the word "success"? In today's automotive industry, confidence is worth more than gold. In fact, the price of the volume has no future, the value of the volume has a future, most car companies know this truth, but many car companies in the actual practice is contrary to this concept. Because of the lack of confidence in the industry as a whole, all kinds of sales data have been transmitting such a signal that the value of the volume is "not filling", and the volume price can be "filled", and whoever does not desperately roll the price will be marginalized by the market.
If the new M7 has achieved the word "first" in the issue of value competition, then Huawei Smart Car has achieved the word "success" in the issue of value competition, and this success will boost the confidence of the entire industry to turn to value competition.
At the 2024 China Electric Vehicle 100 Forum, Yu Chengdong, Executive Director of Huawei, Chairman of the Device BG, and Chairman of the Intelligent Vehicle Solution BU, revealed that in the first three months of this year, Huawei's smart car business has turned a profit. While most of the new car companies are continuing to lose money, Huawei Smart Car is the first to take the lead in realizing the closed loop of business.
"With the further expansion of the model matrix and the further improvement of delivery, the profitability of the smart car model and the car BU itself is expected to improve rapidly, and Huawei is becoming one of the important choices for car companies to move towards high-end intelligence." Cinda Securities' research report in May said.
After more than half a year of exploration, the "Question Boundary Model" has matured
As a successful case, the road of value competition can be divided into two stages, and the dividing line in time is the new launch of the new M7 Ultra on May 31.
Prior to this, it was the stage of exploration and growth, and in the absence of a successful case of Shuangzhi in the industry, the new M7 must be used as a pioneer to explore and test the user's reaction; After that, it is the mature and leading stage, and the "Wenjie model" of the new M7 Ultra that allows the value of the volume rather than the price of the volume has begun to be fully demonstrated to the industry.
First, whether it is technology, function or experience innovation, it must be based on a deep understanding of users, which is a matter of attitude. For example, Yu Chengdong once launched a poll before the pre-sale of the new M7 Ultra to investigate the upgrade points that users are most looking forward to for the new version of the M7.
Second, after market verification, car companies need to focus on the intelligent experience that is highly recognized by users. At present, the Huawei intelligent driving equipped with the new M7 is already the ceiling level of the industry, and the new M7 Ultra still chooses to continue to upgrade and improve in the absence of a real threatening opponent.
Third, in recent years, many new energy brands have launched pre-sales or even announced the launch of new vehicles before the mass production problem has been completely resolved, resulting in a gap of several months or even longer between the launch and delivery of new vehicles. Although this operation can help brands launch marketing offensives earlier and attract users and even investors in the first place, once the follow-up delivery is delayed, it will easily cause user dissatisfaction and hurt the brand image.
Starting from the new M7 Ultra, HarmonyOS Zhixing bid farewell to the "production capacity ramp-up" and ushered in the "rocket launch" delivery, which reflects Huawei's strong system strength. In order to build system capabilities around manufacturing, Huawei not only invested a lot of money in new production lines, but also coordinated resources along the entire industry chain through cooperative development and on-site coordination to maximize efficiency.
epilogue
In fact, if you zoom in on the time horizon to the last two or three years, you can see that the new M7 is not a dream fairy tale of eternal happiness.
However, unlike many other models that have gradually been marginalized by the market under pressure, from the Wenjie M7 to the new Wenjie M7, and then to the new Wenjie M7 Ultra that has just been launched, it is the car backed by Huawei and even the Wenjie brand that it is through self-innovation and respect for users that it has been able to grow from a "student" who was initially crawling in the luxury new energy SUV market to a "teacher" who can provide an excellent development template for the smart electric vehicle market.