Image source @ Visual China
Text | The headline, author | Sink the boat
There is no hotter track than the new energy automobile industry.
On April 22, it was reported that Li Yinan, former executive vice president of Huawei and former founder and CEO of Xiaoniu Electric, has joined the new energy vehicle entrepreneurship camp. In addition, since the beginning of 2021, Huawei, Didi, and Xiaomi have successively announced that they have entered the game of "car manufacturing"; not long ago, iFLYTEK, an established artificial intelligence company, also said that "iFLYTEK has an absolute market share in the entire automotive industry."
Li Yinan Source: Internet
In the market, in addition to the leading figures Tesla, BYD, etc., the development and capital news of early "new car-making forces" companies such as Ideal, Xiaopeng, Nezha and Weima are also fermenting, and the competition of a car-making competition is becoming more and more intense.
"Various industries have come to 'pick peaches', indicating that the potential of the new energy automobile industry is unlimited." In the 5G era, new energy vehicles and smart cars may be as popular as computers to thousands of households. From the perspective of long-term planning, the industry has a relatively complete ecosystem and a relatively clear business model. Zhang Xiaorong, president of the DeepInn Science and Technology Research Institute, also explained to the headlines.
Although the progress of the new energy automobile industry is hot, the actual sales volume and production capacity landing are relatively calm.
According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China in 2020 reached 1.366 million and 1.367 million units, respectively, a record high, but the share of the overall passenger car market is still low. Previously, the workplace user data report surveyed by a platform showed that the market share of new energy vehicles was only 7.4%; at the same time, more than half of the respondents said that they had greater concerns when considering buying new energy vehicles.
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500 shuffles to more than a dozen, what has happened?
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The "first year of car building" began in 2015.
Chuangtoutiao understands that at that time, the state began to promote new energy vehicle projects at the policy level. It is reported that at that time, all companies that applied for the establishment of new energy vehicles could get a lot of government subsidies to help the production and operation of enterprises; users who purchased new energy vehicles could also receive government subsidies of varying value without participating in the lottery.
According to incomplete statistics, there were more than 500 new car-making forces at the peak, including Weilai, Weima, Xiaopeng, Hezhong, Xinte, Yundu, Qiancheng, electric coffee, zero running and so on. At the other end, foreign-funded enterprises represented by Tesla and traditional housing enterprises represented by Evergrande have also entered the field of new energy vehicles.
"However, after experiencing a wave of subsidies, the government found that there was no substantial technical progress in the new energy vehicle project." Since then, the pace of subsidies has begun to gradually slow down. Solid-state battery developer Shin Rhenium Energy CEO Ye Shihong told Headlines.
With the continuous decline of policy support, coupled with the high requirements for car investment, small brands are gradually facing financial problems. Finally, the time has come to 2019-2020, and the "new forces of car manufacturing" have ushered in a violent reshuffle.
At the end of June 2020, Byton Automobile declared bankruptcy, and in 4 years, Byton still did not mass-produce a new energy vehicle, and burned out 8 billion yuan.
At the end of 2020, Changjiang Automobile declared bankruptcy. As early as 2014, Changjiang Automobile, as one of the first new energy vehicle companies to receive approval from the National Development and Reform Commission, has successively received an investment of up to 5.1 billion yuan. Seven years later, the company became insolvent.
"After a major reshuffle, the market competition can be described as very 'magnificent', and there are about a dozen car manufacturers left on the market." Some insiders told The Headlines.
However, after experiencing industry reshuffle and major withdrawal, the national level further emphasized the market share of new energy vehicles at the end of 2020, and introduced substantial incentive policies in November 2020. At that time, the Ministry of Industry issued the "New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (2021-2035)" clearly mentioned that by 2025, the sales volume of new energy vehicles will reach about 20% of the total sales of new cars.
Ye Shihong told reporters, "The main reason behind the cycle is that there are many technologies in our country facing the situation of global card necks, and the government may hope to achieve technical 'curve overtaking' through new energy vehicles." ”
Ye Shihong also said that behind it is also the confidence of China to build a new energy automobile industry. "China has natural accumulation and advantages in battery production and research and development. China is the global concentration of lithium battery production, and about 80% of the world's lithium batteries are produced in China. ”
"Moreover, from the perspective of the industry, since the timetable and roadmap of 'carbon peaking' and 'carbon neutrality' have been clarified, all walks of life are accelerating implementation." Automobiles are one of the main starting points for carbon neutrality, and the industrial chain is long, which can drive more related enterprises such as energy and intelligent manufacturing, so the government will have a tendency in policy. Chanson Capital Shen Meng told Chuangtoutiao.
The above reasons not only directly touched the recovery of the new energy automobile industry, but also brought a new spring breeze to the industry - shortly after the beginning of 2021, all walks of life began to lift the "car-making plan".
<h2>Internet companies build cars, is it reliable? </h2>
Chuangtoutiao observed that the new forces of car-making that entered the game at this time can be clearly seen that the company's industry itself involves a very wide range, which is far from the automotive industry chain, and the industry comes from the Internet and technology.
"In fact, we can see that there are many Internet companies participating in the car-making plan, the essential reason is that their own business needs to be transformed and achieve performance breakthroughs." Taking Xiaomi as an example, its mobile phone business is a bottleneck, and some businesses are even declining; taking Baidu as an example, Baidu has been working in the field of automatic driving, and we can also see that Baidu's own search advertising business revenue has also declined in recent years. Therefore, some Internet manufacturers are doing car-building plans at this time, and many are seeking industry development and another growth point. Zhang Xiang, a senior automotive industry researcher, told Chuangtoutiao.
"Now there is also a feeling that the country's car-making threshold is lower and easier to enter." Some people in the industry sighed.
Zhang Xiang explained, "The current market has changed from the first wave of blue ocean to the red ocean. In the early days, a large percentage of companies or startups lived on financing, but many were out. Now the second wave of players has come in, they are large, the investment is also large, so that the current competitive format from the 'blue ocean' to the 'red ocean', the industry's competition has also begun to enter the last place elimination system. ”
Chuangtoutiao learned that the low threshold is also reflected in the car-making technology.
Ye Shihong said, "'Battery technology' and the car's 'power unit' control system are the two major constraints that dominate the real landing of new energy vehicles, but neither of these two problems has a substantial breakthrough." We groped in the industry for 3 years and found that most of the mature electric vehicle brand battery technology comes from Japan, and the energy storage capacity reaches 500km a day, which means that it is difficult to 'run out of a city' a day. That is to say, no matter how big the company enters the market now, the technical threshold is still not high. ”
<h2>Lack of technology, Internet services to make up for? </h2>
The problem with energy storage lies in the configuration of the battery itself.
Zhang Xiang explained that the current new energy vehicle battery realization technology is still lithium battery technology. "Lithium batteries are mainly divided into two types, one is a ternary lithium battery, and the other is a lithium iron phosphate battery. Nowadays, with the advancement of technology, the energy density of lithium batteries has become very high. But in general, the scale of lithium batteries used in new energy vehicles is still very small, not commercialized, and many are still produced by state subsidies. ”
Some insiders told Chuangtou that the ideal battery for new energy vehicles should be a solid-state battery. Because solid-state batteries generally have low power density and higher energy density, they are ideal batteries for electric vehicles.
But today, solid-state batteries have not achieved an essential breakthrough in technology. Zhang Xiaorong explained, "From a global point of view, solid-state batteries are still in the laboratory stage, and there is no all-weather product suitable for smart cars. The industry also expected that "in 2020, the research and development of solid-state battery technology is expected to make breakthroughs." In 2030, lithium-ion batteries will no longer be the mainstream of electric vehicle batteries. ”
From the perspective of the control device inside the body, some experts told Chuangtoutiao that most of the control systems used in new energy vehicles are based on the traditional car controller, and then make some adaptive changes to form a control software that is adapted to the work of new energy vehicles. "In other words, the power control system still needs to be continuously adapted and updated."
"Overall, in essence, new energy vehicles are the same as traditional cars, it is not difficult to build a car, but it is not easy to build a good car." Shen Meng said.
If it is still necessary to make a breakthrough in technology, then what is the cost and profitability of new energy vehicles under high investment? Is this another game for businesses that can only be challenged by the brave?
Zhang Xiaorong said, "The profit margin of different car manufacturer brand models is not the same. Judging from the general data of vehicles delivered now, profits are roughly within 10%, and estimates are often around 5%. ”
The data shows that the profit range of the new energy vehicle transaction amount is not too high, and most of the head companies are still in a state of loss. However, some analysts believe that the profitability of new energy vehicles has been transformed into the logic of "software service payment".
Taking Tesla as an example, its subsequent forms of payment include one-time purchase of fully autonomous driving and fully autonomous driving software packages; visual real-time road conditions display, satellite maps, streaming media videos, streaming media music, Internet browsers and other monthly subscription services, as well as OTA updates and upgrades to purchase value-added services.
"Compared with traditional auto retail, superimposed software payment and follow-up services have left room for new energy vehicle companies to create revenue in the later stage." However, the premise still depends on whether new energy vehicles can be widely popularized. Industry insiders said.