The fate of "Wei Xiaoli" is written in 2024 · H1 new energy vehicle sales data

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2024-08-08 19:17Posted on the official account of Hebei Titanium Media APP

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In the first half of 012024, the situation of China's new energy vehicle market has changed, with traditional car companies such as BYD, Chery, Geely, etc. cutting prices to grab the market by virtue of their scale advantages, and new car-making forces such as "Wei Xiaoli" are under pressure.

02 However, younger car companies such as Wenjie, Xiaomi, Nezha, etc., have found another way in terms of intelligent driving and marketing, diverting the market influence of "Wei Xiaoli".

03 To this end, new car-making forces have sought changes, such as NIO launched a second brand "Ledao" with a lower positioning, and Xpeng announced a new brand MONA.

04On the other hand, Li Auto is committed to making up for the shortcomings of intelligent driving technology, and is expected to launch an end-to-end large-scale model solution within the year.

05 Overall, the second half of 2024 will be a critical period for the differentiation of new EV manufacturers, who can find an exclusive commercial moat, and who will stand out in the market competition.

The above content is generated by Tencent's hybrid model and is for reference only

Text | See TrueView, by | Lan Yu, ed TV  

After BMW, Audi, Mercedes-Benz and other car companies have announced that they will "withdraw from the price war", Volkswagen, Toyota and other joint venture car brands have also decided to adjust the terminal policy from July, reduce the terminal discount or no longer reduce the price, which made the Chinese auto market, which was originally in the middle of street fighting, the situation change again.

BBA and the joint venture car choose to "lie flat", on the one hand, it is indeed because of the lack of competitiveness of its own new energy vehicle products, and on the other hand, it is also because of the continuous involution of China's local traditional car companies.

In the first half of the year, BYD, Geely and other car companies relied on the advantages of supply chain, price war, marketing and other advantages to launch new energy vehicle products either directly reduced prices, or reduced prices and increased allocation, which greatly seized the market dividend.

In this context, not only joint venture car companies are under pressure, but also the new car-making forces represented by "Wei Xiaoli" are also difficult to grow fiercely. Considering that the dividends of China's new energy vehicle market are gradually narrowing and the "knockout competition" is about to begin, if the new energy vehicle brand cannot build its core competitiveness as soon as possible and leverage as many consumers as possible, some new car-making forces may become "outcasts" in the consumer market.

With the help of scale advantages, traditional car companies reduce dimensionality and crack down on "Wei Xiaoli"

Because of getting rid of the trap of traditional cars, once upon a time, the outside world had high hopes for the new car-making forces, believing that these car companies would be like Apple beating Nokia, destroying the traditional car companies.

However, automobiles are a typical asset-heavy industry, and traditional car companies have accumulated strong manufacturing resources and strong brand effect, which is difficult to be easily defeated. At present, the leading traditional car companies are better than the new car manufacturers in terms of sales volume and target completion rate.

Taking BYD as an example, in the first half of 2024, passenger car sales will reach 1.613 million units, a year-on-year increase of 28.46%. Among them, the sales of pure electric vehicles were 726,200, an increase of 17.73%; The sales volume of plug-in hybrid models was 881,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 39.54%.

At the beginning of 2024, BYD revealed that its sales target for 2024 is to increase by more than 20% on the basis of 3.02 million units, or 3.624 million units. A simple calculation shows that BYD completed 44.51% of the annual sales target in the first half of this year.

The reason why BYD can achieve such a brilliant performance is mainly because it relies on vertical integration and scale effect, fights price wars, and launches many cost-effective new energy vehicle products.

For example, in February 2024, BYD launched the Qin PLUS Glory Edition, with a price reduction of 20,000 yuan, and the starting price is only 79,800 yuan, shouting the slogan "electricity is lower than oil". Since then, BYD has successively lowered the starting price of Han and Tang models to 169,800.

Considering that in the second half of the year, BYD will also launch many products equipped with fifth-generation DM technology, and its new energy vehicle sales may continue to climb.

In fact, in the first half of 2024, not only BYD's sales have achieved remarkable results, but the sales of new energy vehicles of traditional car companies such as Chery and Geely are not inferior.

For example, Geely Automobile's cumulative sales were 955,700 units, a year-on-year increase of 41%. Among them, the sales volume of new energy vehicles was 320,200, a year-on-year increase of 117%. Geely raised its annual sales target by about 5% from 1.9 million units to 2 million units due to the strong sales growth rate. According to this calculation, Geely also achieved 47.79% of the annual sales target in the first half of the year.

Geely's new energy vehicle sales have exploded, and its brands such as Zeekr, Lynk & Co, and Galaxy have opened "involution" competition, which is directly related to the exchange of price for volume.

Taking ZEEKR as an example, in the past few years, its product sales have not improved significantly. In February 2024, ZEEKR launched the new ZEEKR 001, which not only reduced the price by 31,000 yuan, but also came standard with flagship configurations such as lidar, 8295 chip, 800V high voltage, and silicon carbide motor.

Source: Zeekr

Due to its high cost performance, since its launch, the monthly sales of the new ZEEKR 001 have continued to exceed 10,000, driving the sales of the ZEEKR brand in the first half of the year to increase by 106% year-on-year to 87,800 units.

Compared with traditional car companies, although the sales volume of new automakers is also steadily rising, the absolute sales volume and target completion rate are significantly lower by one level.

Taking "Wei Xiaoli" as an example, in the first half of 2024, the sales of these three will be 87,400, 52,000, and 189,000 respectively, a year-on-year increase of 60.2%, 26%, and 35.87%, respectively, and 38%, 18.6%, and 33.75% of the annual sales target will be completed, respectively.

On the whole, in the first half of 2024, the sales figures of leading traditional car companies are generally better than those of new automakers, as it is easier for traditional car companies to achieve scale effects, make concessions to the market by virtue of cost advantages, and capture price-sensitive consumers. This also means that it is difficult for the new car-making forces to be similar to Apple in the mobile phone industry, and easily defeat the traditional forces by relying on intelligence.

Wenjie and Xiaomi have risen strongly, and "Wei Xiaoli" has been attacked on all sides

In recent years, not only the sales of new energy vehicles of traditional car companies have taken a significant lead, but also the new forces of car manufacturing have begun to reshuffle, and "Wei Xiaoli" is no longer a well-deserved top three car manufacturers.

In the first half of 2020, the top five brands in the delivery list of China's new car-making forces were Weilai, Ideal, Weimar, Nezha, and Xiaopeng, with sales of 14,169 units, 9,500 units, 7,686 units, 5,002 units, and 4,202 units, respectively, with "Wei Xiaoli" ranking high.

In the first half of 2024, the top five brands in terms of delivery volume of China's new EV brands have become Ideal, Wenjie, Aion, NIO and Leap. Among them, Ideal surpassed NIO and won the championship, while NIO ranked fourth. In addition, brands with the imprint of traditional car companies such as Wenjie, Aion, and Zeekr have also squeezed into the top of the list.

Unlike Ideal and Weilai, which are still ranked high, Xpeng has fallen behind significantly, ranking 9th, with only 52,028 deliveries, and has even been left behind by Nezha.

In addition to the re-ranking of "Wei Xiaoli", in the first half of 2024, younger brands have also emerged on the list of deliveries of China's new EV brands. For example, on March 28, 2024, Xiaomi released its first new energy vehicle product, the Xiaomi SU7. The product was highly sought after as soon as it was listed, with 88,898 units set within 24 hours of listing, and the delivery volume exceeded 10,000 in June and July.

Wenjie, Xiaomi, Nezha and other relatively younger car companies can emerge in just a few years, to a large extent, it shows that the first-mover advantage of new car-making forces such as "Wei Xiaoli" is not very obvious, and late-mover companies can easily open the market after building a commercial moat at the level of intelligent driving, publicity and distribution, and price.

Taking Wenjie as an example, it was born at the end of 2021, and the product sales were not bright at the beginning of its launch. Until September 2023, the new M7 came out, not only with a significant price reduction, but also equipped with Huawei's ADS 2.0 high-end intelligent driving system, NCA intelligent driving pilot can cover 90% of the urban scenes, with and without pictures, it can be opened, and the AEB maximum braking speed has been increased to 90km/h, and the market has opened.

According to official information, in the two and a half months after its launch, the new M7 has accumulated more than 100,000 units, of which the intelligent driving version accounts for 60%, and the urban NCA option rate reaches 75%.

Unlike Wenjie, which relies on industry-leading intelligent driving technology to win the market, Xiaomi Auto mainly relies on its outstanding marketing capabilities to win. Immersed in the field of consumer electronics for more than ten years, Xiaomi has planned many "out of the circle" marketing events and accumulated unique marketing experience.

In the early stage of the listing of Xiaomi Auto, Xiaomi replicated its previous marketing strategy, not only the official blog of Xiaomi Auto and Lei Jun's personal Weibo frequently forwarded relevant content, but also invited digital bloggers to experience Xiaomi Auto. After the product was launched, the communication potential energy accumulated before was quickly released, driving the sales of Xiaomi cars to rise.

From this point of view, "Wei Xiaoli" is currently in the dilemma of being attacked by the enemy. On the one hand, traditional car companies rely on scale advantages to reduce prices to seize the market; On the other hand, younger car companies have found another way to break the situation in terms of intelligent driving and marketing, diverting the market influence of "Wei Xiaoli".

The knockout round opened, and "Wei Xiaoli" ran to different directions

Although new energy vehicles are an important sales role in the future automotive industry, as most consumers complete the replacement, the new energy vehicle market dividend has shown signs of narrowing.

According to the data of the Passenger Association, from the first half of 2022 to the first half of 2024, China's new energy vehicle sales will be 2.6 million, 3.747 million, and 4.111 million respectively, a year-on-year increase of 120%, 44.1%, and 33.1%, respectively, and the growth rate will gradually decline.

In this context, traditional car companies and younger car companies are vying to seize the market, which will naturally eliminate some of the outdated new car manufacturers. Comparing the delivery volume list of new car-making forces in 2020 and the first half of 2024, it can be seen that brands such as WM, Guoji Zhijun, Yundu, and Aiways, which were once in the top ten, have disappeared.

In response to this trend, in March 2024, He Xiaopeng, chairman of Xpeng Motors, said in an interview that "China's new energy market has begun to enter the knockout round". Zhu Huarong, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Changan Automobile, swore that in 2024, the top 10 car companies in terms of sales will occupy nearly 85% of the market share, and 80% of the brands will be shut down in the next few years.

In order to avoid being eliminated, since 2024, new car-making forces have sought change, either incubating new products or increasing intelligent driving technology.

For example, in May 2024, NIO launched the second brand "Ledao" with lower positioning, and the first product, Ledao L60, is positioned as an intelligent pure electric family SUV, using a 900V high-voltage architecture, and the entry-level model uses a single motor, cutting lidar, Orin X chips and other configurations, with a pre-sale price of 219,900 yuan.

Coincidentally, Xpeng also announced a new brand MONA, which is committed to becoming a popularizer of AI intelligent driving cars. MONA's first product is positioned as a compact electric sedan, which is expected to be launched in the third quarter of 2024 at a price of about 150,000 yuan.

Considering that NIO and Xpeng are still in the red, the launch of lower-positioned brands by these two is obviously hoping to follow the example of traditional car companies, so that sub-brands with higher sales volume can share the high cost of upstream battery swapping and intelligent driving technologies, broaden their market influence and open up profit margins.

Unlike companies such as NIO and Xiaopeng that incubate new products, Ideal is committed to making up for the shortcomings of intelligent driving technology. Due to the "late investment of half a year", the ideal will not promote the intelligent driving plan in urban areas without high-precision maps until the second half of 2023.

On July 3, 2024, 36Kr Automobile reported that Lang Xianpeng, the head of Li Auto's intelligent driving, is leading a team of more than 300 people to develop an end-to-end large model solution, "which has been developed for more than 2 months and is expected to produce results within the year." On July 5, Ideal disclosed the end-to-end autonomous driving technology architecture and launched an early bird test plan for the new architecture solution. Obviously, Li Auto's intelligent driving technology is accelerating its implementation.

It's no coincidence that the ideal choice is to add intelligent driving technology at this time, and after the MEGA suffered a waterloo, its pure electric product will not be launched until next year. In the second half of 2024, Li Auto has a long product window period.

On the other hand, relying on extended range products, Ideal has returned to positive cash flow, and there is no need to launch products with lower prices, which will lower the company's profit margins. In this context, Li Li has obviously decided to follow Huawei's example and build differentiated intelligent driving technology to enhance the competitiveness and attractiveness of existing products.

On the whole, although the new energy vehicle market is still growing since 2024, the growth rate has declined sharply, and market competition has intensified. On the contrary, under the encirclement and suppression of traditional car companies and the new generation of car companies, "Wei Xiaoli" and others even feel pressure.

Considering that in the past two years, China's new energy vehicle market will usher in the final development window period, if the new car-making forces represented by "Wei Xiaoli" want to become an oligarch, they need to find an exclusive commercial moat.

This also determines that the second half of 2024 will become a critical period for the differentiation of new EV manufacturers. 

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