Author: Bells
Editor: Mark
Producer: Red Interstellar
Header image: Web image
High-end intelligent driving ushered in the moment of big water and big fish.
As we all know, in the past 25 years, the main engine factory has begun to enter the stage of rolling electric to intelligent driving.
A friend of the main engine factory said that regardless of the old and new forces, models with a price of more than 20W basically have to be high-end intelligent driving, even if they are not standard, at least they must be selected. If the car above 20W does not have high-end intelligent driving, it will be like an "elderly mobile phone" in the market, and it is not even easy to brag at the new car press conference.
Even foreigners (overseas OEMs) have taken action, and foreigners have also aimed at the 25-year-old Shanghai Auto Show, wanting to "Tao" good goods, bind domestic high-end intelligent driving suppliers, and give in-depth cooperation to popular models + strategic investment.
In such a window period of market demand blowout, the head players have also begun to intensively take orders to get fixed points. In the face of this wave of market opportunities, different players have adopted very different strategies. Some players have built themselves into light luxury, some players eat both sizes, and some players play the role of technological pioneers.
1. The key to high-end intelligent driving: popular models
The volume of high-end intelligent driving by OEMs is undoubtedly a huge benefit to high-end intelligent driving suppliers.
As the two most important high-end players in Nvidia's computing power chips in China, Yuanrong and Momenta have shown different market strategies.
The Magic Gate Tower belongs to the rapid style in the market strategy, and pursues the scale of the fixed-point project, so it is a typical size to eat, and the high-sales models are also fixed-pointed, and the low-sales models are also fixed-pointed.
Yuanrong is relatively restrained in terms of market strategy, and does not blindly pursue the scale and quantity of the fixed project. Yuanrong chose to do in-depth cooperation with some alpha customers, aiming for the popular models of alpha customers. Since the successful mass production and delivery of the Great Wall Blue Mountain, Yuanrong has become hot, and many OEMs have taken the initiative to come to the door to talk.
It is reported that under the relative restraint approach, Yuanrong has obtained the cooperation intention of high-end intelligent driving from several OEMs, and the cooperation method has also changed from the scattered model fixed-point in the past to a popular model or a model platform.
Yuan Rong's restraint is related to the fact that the high-level intelligent driving has reached a new stage.
First, in the end-to-end era, the cooperation mode between OEMs and high-end intelligent driving suppliers has changed.
As we all know, end-to-end needs data, and data is in the hands of OEMs, which requires suppliers and OEMs to upgrade their cooperation to an "all-in" model for both parties, rather than simply taking some models for mass production. In addition, the end-to-end requirements for data scale are gradually escalating, from 1 million clips to 10 million clips. This requires high-end intelligent driving suppliers to make popular models, and large-scale data can be collected for popular models with large sales.
Second, OEMs' strategies on development fees and licenses have also changed. At present, OEMs are more inclined to the strategy of "paying less for development fees and more for licenses" when negotiating prices with suppliers.
In the past, the main engine factory paid a large amount of development fees, and as a result, hundreds of models equipped with high-end intelligent driving were sold every month, and the development fees were evenly spread to the cost of a single vehicle as high as tens of thousands of yuan, which was higher than the cost of sensor + domain control, so there was a "big injustice" mentality. The strategy of "paying less for development fees and more for licenses" can reduce fixed costs and make it more flexible.
Therefore, whether it is from the perspective of obtaining data or bargaining strategies, it makes it more valuable for high-end players to make popular models.
Yuan Rong tasted the sweetness of the popular model of the Great Wall Blue Mountain, so he did not blindly expand, but continued to aim at the popular model.
In the end-to-end era, popular models are becoming one of the core keys to the competition between high-end intelligent driving suppliers. In the 24 years of mass production and delivery data of Momen Tower, the majority of customers are still SAIC Zhiji, and other customers such as Denza, Lotus, GAC Haobo and other customers cannot sell high-end intelligent driving models in mass production.
For companies that do high-end intelligent driving, technical capabilities are a part of building a competitive moat, and another important part is market strategy. When the market demand blows out, what kind of OEM customers to target and what kind of models to make are the key to winning in the future.
2. to B to C商业闭环的关键：技术爆点
As we all know, there are relatively few high-end intelligent driving players in China, and only the top players are mass-produced at this stage. Although there are not many players, their strategic positioning is different, and they are very differentiated in terms of product technology.
Huawei is positioned as a light luxury product, with leading performance and expensive price; The positioning of the Momen Tower pursues the fixed-point scale, as long as it can take the fixed-point whether it is high-end or intermediate-end, as well as Nvidia or Qualcomm chips; DJI Zhuoyu is positioned to be popular, and it is stumbling towards cost performance; Yuanrong is positioned as a pioneer in intelligent driving technology, and continues to do technical explosions from no map to VLA.
A friend of the head OEM said that Yuanrong's positioning is relatively unique, different from several other players, and its positioning can cater to the needs of traditional OEM technology marketing, and it is easy to get the fixed point of the flagship model.
In the product definition of flagship models, traditional OEMs need to shape the technical performance representatives of similar competing models, so they need high-end intelligent driving with technical explosion points, with cutting-edge and good performance characteristics, in order to compete in technical marketing. In addition to Huawei, Yuanrong just plays this role, which is an important reason why some traditional OEMs choose Yuanrong.
A friend in the industry said that the demand for high-end intelligent driving for 25 years is blowing out, and this is when the water is big and the fish is big, and everyone can eat fish. But the key to competition is not whether you eat fish or not, but what kind of fish you eat. The best fish is, of course, the flagship model of the hit, and whether you can eat it or not is determined by strategic positioning.
In the new stage of high-end intelligent driving competition, the top players are on the table, and the number of players available to traditional OEMs has increased, and it is no longer a stage where one or two high-end players can eat it all by virtue of their scarcity. At such a stage, the advantage of doing "early" will weaken, and the advantage of doing "skillful" will be magnified.
In addition, strategic positioning not only determines what kind of fish can be eaten at this stage, but also determines whether the business closed loop to B to C can be opened up in the future.
With the gradual mass production of parking spaces to parking spaces, high-end intelligent driving basically covers all user scenarios. However, although the full scenario for to C has been completed, the business closed loop of to C has not yet been fully completed, which is also the last and most important step of to C.
The current user's very typical attitude towards high-end intelligent driving is: want but don't want to pay more. Especially for users with a price of more than 20W, in the context of the oversupply of blood rolls by domestic OEMs, the taste of such users is very strong, and they are very willing to want high-end intelligent driving, but they are not willing to pay for software algorithms.
This makes the commercial closed loop of high-end intelligent driving to B to C not work.
The reason why the last step has not been taken is that the "ease of use" of high-end intelligent driving has achieved the level that users want, and has not yet reached the level that users are willing to pay for it.
A capital source said that now the intelligent driving industry lacks a technological explosion point that changes the speed of technological progress, and opens up the commercial closed loop to B to C, and VLA may have this possibility. Once such a technological explosion is officially implemented, the business value of a company like Yuan Rong will undergo subversive changes.
If it goes through, the logic of high-end intelligent driving will change, and it will no longer be a high-end player doing business with a B-end OEM and earning the development fee and license of the OEM, but working with the OEM to earn money from C-end users, and jointly launching a TO-C product similar to the "Smart Driving Gift Package", so that C-end users can pay for it, and then share the account together.
Only in this way will intelligent driving be the real to B to C, and it will officially usher in the era of long slopes and thick snow.
At that stage, the logic of OEMs selecting high-end intelligent driving suppliers will change fundamentally. Suppliers who are good at making technical explosions will be favored by OEMs, because OEMs need helpers who can help sell smart driving to C-end users.
Conclusion
In this round of blowout cycle, several leading players of domestic high-end intelligent driving have different resources, endowments and strategies, just like the eight immortals across the sea to show their magical powers.
At present, the market pattern of high-end intelligent driving is far from being determined, and intelligent driving is a round of wheel warfare, and it is too early to talk about market share, scale, and moat barriers. For the top high-end players, if they want to become the big winners in the future, they must have two capabilities: in terms of market strategy, whether they can get the popular models of the main engine factory; In terms of technical strategy, can we continue to make technical explosions?
These two points are far more important than the current scale of mass production, and are the real cornerstones of building a moat barrier.
In the competition between high-end players in the future, who can have the ability of explosive models + technology explosions, and stand out, we will wait and see!
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