The advent of car brand knockout: car companies should balance the relationship between traditional cars and new energy vehicles

According to the data of the Federation of Travelers and Delegates, a total of 10.57 million narrow-sale passenger vehicles were sold in the first half of this year, an increase of only 0.8%. Benefiting from a slight rebound in auto sales in July, sales of narrow passenger cars reached 12.6 million in the first seven months, an increase of 2.8%. It should be noted that for auto operators who have become accustomed to double-digit growth in the sales of passenger vehicles, the performance of the auto market in the first half of the year is enough to make it felt.

In particular, the new car brands that have sprung up this year will have to be eaten on a slightly-growing plate, which will undoubtedly accelerate the industry's reshuffle and the elimination of car brands. Of the 10 mainstream self-owned brands, sales in the first half of the year, such as Jianghuai and Zhongtai, all fell sharply. Although BYD's overall sales in the first half of the year were unchanged from the same period of last year, sales of “profitable dairy cows” new energy vehicles fell by nearly 20% from last year, and traditional fuel vehicles did not return to traditional status.

The worse-than-average market still has its own brands with “anti-day” growth, such as Geely, SAIC Passenger Cars, and Guangzhou Automobile, which increased by 89%, 112%, and 57% respectively in the first half of the year. In particular, SAIC passenger vehicles are running like crazy, and most of the main sales models are more than 100,000 yuan, and they seize the inherent market of joint venture brands.

Just like the positive and negative sides of the coin, SAIC Passenger Vehicle and BYD have been the same in the past few years. Five years ago, BYD had sold more than 450,000 vehicles. By then, it could compete with Chery, Geely, and the Great Wall. Since then, its sales volume has hovered between 450,000 and 500,000 vehicles, making it difficult to break through. SAIC Passenger Cars After surpassing 200,000 sales in 2012, the sales target has not been completed for three consecutive years. However, the long-lasting SAIC passenger vehicle has driven the overall sales volume in 2016 with the explosive model Roewe RX5 and achieved an 89% increase.

Looking at the sales volume of traditional auto vehicles and new energy vehicles of two independent brand auto companies, SAIC Passenger Vehicles have shown that BYD is struggling.

In terms of traditional fuel vehicles, SAIC's passenger cars dominate the concept of Internet vehicles in the area of ​​cars and SUVs. The Roewe brand's flagship models, the Roewe RX5 and Roewe i6, have grown rapidly. The Mage’s brand claims to be the first Internet SUV standardized by young people. "The MG ZS won't be listed on the market for more than 10,000 units a month. In contrast, BYD has excessively incapacitated its resources in new energy vehicles in recent years. The development of traditional fuel vehicles has been almost stagnant. In the first seven months of this year, traditional fuel vehicles have been in a downward trend. From the monthly sales of about 30,000 vehicles to monthly sales, only 17,129 vehicles, not even a sales volume of Roewe RX5.

In terms of new energy vehicles, BYD has invested a lot in recent years and has also learned a lot. Last year, BYD new energy vehicle income has reached about 40% of the group's revenue, and new energy vehicles account for 60.73% of BYD's total business revenue, which means BYD. Became the first domestic car company focusing on new energy vehicles. BYD, the forerunner of new energy vehicles, did not realize that the crisis was coming.

According to publicly available data, in the first half of 2015, sales of BYD new energy vehicles were 19,789 units, an increase of 193.3% year-on-year; in the first half of 2016, sales of BYD new energy vehicles were 43,000 units, an increase of 117% year-on-year; in the first half of the year, BYD new energy vehicles Sales were only 34,634 units, down nearly 20% year-on-year. Why does BYD's sales suddenly drop so much?

The author believes that the most important reason for the decline of BYD's new energy vehicles is the high requirement of national policies. The "Circular on Adjusting the Financial Subsidy Policy for the Promotion and Application of New Energy Vehicles" issued by several ministries and commissions at the end of last year has imposed higher requirements on the battery energy density of new energy vehicles. But BYD, which started as a battery, failed to obtain more national subsidies because of technology failures. Instead, it was a rising star such as SAIC Motor, which satisfies the requirements of the New Deal technically and received more subsidies from the state. This undoubtedly makes people boast of battery technology. The strong BYD is very embarrassing.

On the contrary, SAIC Passenger Vehicles that used to be quiet in the field of new energy vehicles in the past have been accumulating. Last year, SAIC New Energy won the first prize of the China Automotive Industry Science and Technology Award. SAIC Motor has become the only car company in this field of plug-in hybrids this year thanks to its innovations in EDU drive, HCU electronic control and ESS batteries. But what about BYD? Its hybrid system technology is relatively old, the work mode is only electric and parallel two, and many other car products can already be switched in series, parallel, electric three modes.

The attitude of SAIC Passenger Vehicle and BYD in plug-in hybrid technology is very different and it is directly reflected in sales. In the first seven months of the year, BYD's plug-in hybrids represented the model Tang, which sold only 8,479 vehicles, a year-on-year drop of 62%. In contrast, Roewe's eRX5 performance steadily improved with cumulative sales of 10811 units.

In BYD's inherently pure electric vehicle field, BYD faced severe challenges in the face of competition from BAIC and Jianghuai and other pure electric products, as well as SAIC's pure electric vehicle Roewe ERX5.

In the face of this situation, BYD tried to change the technical line of sticking to lithium iron phosphate batteries in the past. In February of this year, Tang 100 and Qin 100 switched to three-cell lithium batteries with higher energy density and better battery consistency and stability. However, the author believes that once the road is deviated, the time for changing the strings is an opportunity for latecomers, and BYD must speed up.