Reporter | Yan Yao
Trainee reporter | Zhang Zhuoran
Photography | Zhang Peixin
At this shareholders' meeting, Chen Hong, chairman of SAIC Motor, answered dozens of questions raised by shareholders in almost one hour. "The company's stock price, this topic can not be left untreated." Chen Hong was straightforward and answered very frankly: "Since we held a capital market communication meeting on June 11, the stock price has risen by nearly 10%. Of course, at this price, investors are certainly not satisfied. As our share of business on the new track increases, I believe the stock price will definitely rise. ”
At the same time, Chen Hong said that SAIC will continue to promote the equity incentive plan after that. "We are improving the relevant plan, and we will officially disclose it to the outside world after the relevant procedures are fulfilled."
Today, the 2020 annual general meeting of saic motor was held, and all the proposals such as the work report of the board of directors, the profit distribution plan and the financial final account report were passed by a high vote, and the eighth board of supervisors was elected. According to the profit distribution plan, the company will pay a cash dividend of 6.2 yuan (including tax) for every 10 shares, based on the total share capital of 11.683 billion yuan excluding the repurchased shares, for a total dividend of 7.177 billion yuan, ranking the forefront of A-share listed companies. In the past five years, SAIC Motor has accumulated dividends of 75 billion yuan.
Previously, some shareholders left a message to SAIC: Last year, affected by the new crown pneumonia epidemic, this year encountered chip supply cuts, SAIC is indeed very difficult, but seeing that you have been making moves, you are also working hard, hoping that SAIC can rush out of the predicament. We are all shareholders of SAIC for more than ten years, can withstand the wind and rain, and must support SAIC!
Chen Hong said at the meeting, "Seeing these words, I am deeply touched as the chairman of the company and more confident. In the face of market storms, your encouragement is the greatest support for the company! We will strive to create greater value to return the love of shareholders! ”
Shareholders dare to ask, Chen Hong dares to speak, SAIC is "very frank"
Shareholders: How to deal with the company's stock price breaking?
Chen Hong: The company's stock price is in a relatively low state, which is the problem we have to face. On June 11th, our communication meeting with institutional investors worked well. From June 11 to June 29, the stock price rose nearly 10%, which is slightly better than the about 6% increase in the vehicle sector index.
From the perspective of the entire industry, not only our SAIC Group, but also the stock prices of large groups such as Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, and BMW, there is a certain gap compared with the new forces of car manufacturing. Now, in the eyes of investors, SAIC seems to be a traditional manufacturing enterprise, but in fact, we are already changing, such as Zhiji, R standard and other major projects are mutations; some other brands are also gradually changing in the marketing system and "new four modernizations".
As our share of business in the new track rises, I'm sure our share price will come back, but the process does take time.
At the same time, SAIC's layout on the new track is difficult for the general new car-making forces to do. We have comprehensively laid out five major centers, including data center, cloud platform center, software center, artificial intelligence algorithm center and network security center, and the investment in the entire basic system is also relatively large. This is a thick and thin process, and the next thing to study is how to continue to speed up the pace.
"He is the soul, I am the body", this is unacceptable
Shareholders: How is the cooperation with third-party autonomous driving such as Huawei and Baidu?
Chen Hong: It is difficult for SAIC to accept a single supplier to provide us with a holistic solution. This becomes "He is the soul, I am the body", which we cannot accept. Our soul must be in our own hands, so we do not accept the overall solution of any supplier, at most it is cooperation. We have a lot of cooperation with Huawei in 5G, and there will be a lot of cooperation in the future in the Internet ecology; Baidu is also, and Baidu attaches great importance to baidu at this software developer conference, and there are many cooperations.
Shareholders: Compared with Huawei's Hongmeng platform, what is the competitive advantage of SAIC's SOA platform?
Chen Hong: Last week, Autohome had an autopilot video about Zhiji Cars, starting from Weihai Road in downtown Shanghai, going up the Yan'an Road Elevated Highway, taking the Inner Ring Road, the North-South Elevated Highway, and the whole journey took 40 minutes without taking over. In addition, there is the L4-level Robotaxi project, which we will cooperate with Momenta to launch in Shanghai and Suzhou in the fourth quarter of this year. Robotaxi set a contract challenge goal of taking over more than 100,000 kilometers by 2025. A large accident will occur when humans drive about 70,000 kilometers, and robotaxi safety will definitely be higher than the level of human driving.
The lack of cores is bad news, but it creates an opportunity
Shareholders: How much impact will the chip shortage have on SAIC?
Chen Hong: According to the forecasts of some US institutions, in the first half of this year, the global production may be lost due to chip shortages of 3 million vehicles, and the annual loss of about 4.5 million vehicles. At present, by the end of July, the chip supply shortage problem can be alleviated, and from the third quarter to the fourth quarter, it can basically gradually return to normal.
Chip shortages are the first problems the global automotive industry has encountered. Originally, we did not have direct contact with chip factories, and the two major types of chips used in automobiles, MCU (microcontroller chips) and SVs (system-on-chips), were provided by Bosch, Continental, Denso and other enterprises.
After the outbreak of this core shortage crisis, we have directly established contact with chip factories and accelerated the layout on chips. From the perspective of future development, the car to take the road of intelligence, must be the automaker and chip factory directly deal with. Instead, this turns bad things into good things.
Shareholders: Does SAIC have independent research and development and manufacture of electric vehicle batteries?
Chen Hong: Now, whether it is lithium iron phosphate or ternary batteries, we and the Ningde era are deeply cooperating. Three weeks ago, our joint venture with CATL continued to expand, and the production capacity was quadrupled. In the new generation of battery technology, SAIC invested in QuantumScape in the United States, which is the head company of solid-state batteries in the United States, and its market value has increased by 5 times shortly after its listing. We are discussing with QuantumScape that by 2025 at the latest, the production line will be built in China in a 50% to 50% joint venture, and no later than 2025, it will start large-scale and commercial operations. In terms of solid-state batteries, SAIC has also invested in SolidEnergy, another company in the United States, which is also about to go public, and it also has a very close cooperative relationship with the domestic solid-state battery head company Qingtao, which has begun to lay out.
On the new track, it is not only necessary to change oneself, but also to deepen cooperation
Shareholders: What is SAIC's plan and specific arrangements for mechanism reform?
Chen Hong: In terms of institutional mechanisms, we are actively communicating with government departments to promote mixed reform. At the same time, we are also promoting spin-offs and listings. SAIC has 14 innovative companies, such as Jet Hydrogen Technology. We are also exploring the diversification of capital structure to promote spin-offs and listings, and promote the market-oriented development of innovative businesses. These innovative businesses will have a very important impact on SAIC's new track.
SAIC is very large, whether it is a new track or an old track, the business can basically be fully covered. In the next step, for the group's major projects, especially the independent brand Zhiji, R standard, etc., corresponding to the enterprises that provide supporting services for it, these major projects all implement the betting mechanism, do well to continue, do not do well to give way.
Shareholders: In 2022, the share ratio should be liberalized, what are the foreign parties' ideas?
Chen Hong: Foreign parties believe that Chinese auto companies are at a relatively leading level in the world on the new track of electric intelligent networking. Now, it is far from enough to talk about electric, and it must be connected by electric intelligent networks. Intelligence on the traditional automotive industry subversion is higher, joint ventures to the new track to be able to have an advantage, SAIC has done in the past 3 years, they all have to do, must have a data center, software center, must have an intelligent algorithm center, cloud platform, network security center, etc., otherwise can not go on. In this regard, traditional automobile companies do not have ready-made experience, because we are also discussing with foreign parties. Therefore, on the new track, the cooperation between foreign parties and us will be further deepened.