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Source: Times Finance Author: He Qing

After NIO co-founder and president Qin Lihong explicitly asked, "Can we remove our brand from the weekly sales list?", on July 30, Ideal Auto announced the sales list of new power brands in the Chinese market from July 22 to 28. Ideal Auto ranked first on the list with 12,800 vehicles, and said it had won the first place in sales of new power brands in the Chinese market for 14 consecutive weeks. NIO ranked third.

On the first day of August, many domestic new forces and new energy vehicle companies released their delivery data. In July, Ideal Auto rose from the weekly champion to the monthly champion, with 51,000 vehicles delivered, setting a new monthly delivery record. Following closely behind was Hongmeng Zhixing, which delivered a total of 44,090 new cars. Aion's global sales in July were 35,238 vehicles, and Leapmotor and NIO delivered more than 20,000 vehicles, 22,093 and 20,498 respectively.

The China Passenger Car Association believes that July showed a trend of "off-season is not off-season". Plug-in hybrids grew rapidly, providing favorable support to the new energy market. New energy retail sales in July are expected to reach 860,000, basically the same as in June, and the penetration rate is expected to further increase to 49.7%.

Image source: Ideal Auto

Ideal Auto's monthly delivery volume hits a new high

In July, Ideal Auto delivered 51,000 vehicles, a record high for monthly deliveries, up 49.4% year-on-year. From January to July 2024, a total of 239,981 vehicles were delivered.

"The Ideal L6 continues its strong performance, with monthly deliveries exceeding 20,000 units for consecutive months, becoming a best-selling product in the price range of 200,000 to 300,000 yuan," said Li Xiang, Chairman and CEO of Ideal Auto.

Hongmeng Intelligent Driving followed closely behind, delivering 44,090 new vehicles in July. Among them, the M9 delivered 18,047 vehicles and the M7 delivered more than 16,562 vehicles. From January to July, Hongmeng Intelligent Driving delivered a total of 238,287 vehicles.

Aion ranked third with sales of 35,238 vehicles, up 0.6% month-on-month and down 21.7% year-on-year. In July, Aion released the second-generation Aion Tyrannosaurus.

Leapmotor delivered more than 20,000 vehicles for two consecutive months, reaching 22,093 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 54.12%. Leapmotor said that after the launch of Leapmotor C16, the first month's orders exceeded 10,000, and deliveries started across the country, which helped boost Leapmotor's sales.

NIO's deliveries exceeded 20,000 vehicles for three consecutive months, with 20,498 new vehicles delivered. Sales were almost the same as the same period last year, but fell by 3.35% month-on-month.

Zeekr, which delivered more than 20,000 vehicles in June, saw a month-on-month decline in sales, with 15,655 new vehicles delivered in July. In July, the all-new Zeekr 009 was launched, and Zeekr revealed that the orders for the all-new Zeekr 009 exceeded 6,000 within 10 days of its launch.

Xpeng Motors' delivery volume has been hovering around 10,000 vehicles in recent months. In July, it delivered a total of 11,145 new vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 1% and a month-on-month increase of 4%.

Nezha Auto delivered 11,015 vehicles in July. The Nezha S Shooting Brake will be unveiled this month.

Xiaomi Auto did not release specific delivery figures, only revealing that deliveries continued to exceed 10,000 in August and that it expects to complete the annual delivery target of 100,000 vehicles ahead of schedule in November.

In addition, traditional automakers, BYD, Chery Group, and Geely Automobile also disclosed sales data on August 1. BYD leads by a large margin, with sales of 342,383 vehicles in July, setting a new record. Among them, 30,014 passenger cars were exported. According to BYD's production and sales report, the production in July was 320,852 vehicles. Regarding whether BYD's current production capacity is in short supply and how to continue to increase sales in the next step, Times Finance sent interview questions to BYD, but no response was received as of press time.

SAIC Motor sold more than 71,000 new energy vehicles in July. Chery Group sold 45,370 new energy vehicles in July, up 254.5% year-on-year. Geely Auto sold 59,051 new energy vehicles in July, accounting for about 40% of new energy sales, up about 58% year-on-year. Great Wall Motor sold 24,145 new energy vehicles in July.

Weekly sales chart is controversial

Before various new energy vehicle companies released their monthly reports in full swing, the topic of some companies opposing the weekly sales rankings attracted attention.

On July 27, Qin Lihong said, "NIO has never authorized any other organization to publish a weekly chart with our name on it. This number has never been approved by us. No more than ten people in our company know our company's weekly sales data. If you are another company, why do you use my brand to publish a weekly chart? Can you please exclude our brand?"

However, on the 30th, Ideal Auto released the sales list of new power brands in the Chinese market from July 22 to July 28, 2024. According to the list, Ideal Auto, Wenjie and Weilai ranked the top three respectively.

Whether the weekly sales chart has any value is debatable.

On the 30th, Ma Lin, assistant vice president of brand and communication at NIO, posted a series of posts on social media platforms, saying that the weekly rankings can be regarded as low-level involution. Ma Lin said: "Every month, each company will announce its audited delivery volume. This monthly figure can basically reflect the operating conditions of the car company at that time. It is more effective for users to understand the market situation and help consumer decisions. Everyone has a curiosity mentality, which is particularly understandable. But the weekly rankings will interfere with the normal operation of the company."

"Huawei and Ideal are currently selling well in the extended-range field, which is great. NIO and Tesla are selling well in the pure electric field. However, putting products of different prices and different categories with or without fuel tanks on the same list cannot reflect the objective situation of the market. When making a list, it must be reasonable and comparable with each other." Ma Lin said.

Later, Yang Xueliang, senior vice president of Geely Holding Group, also wrote an article to express his opposition to the weekly ranking. He Xiaopeng, CEO of Xpeng Motors, said at the AI ​​Intelligent Driving Technology Conference at the end of July: "Everyone is working on the weekly sales ranking, but what are our technology companies doing?"

Previously, the weekly report released by Ideal Auto was controversial because it did not include Aion and the credibility of the data. At present, Ideal Auto’s weekly list includes three items, namely the sales of new power brands in the Chinese market, the sales of new energy brands in the Chinese market (including BYD, Aion and other brands), and the sales of luxury brands in the Chinese market. It also marked in the weekly sales list that "the sales referred to in this article are different from the statistical caliber of the delivery data released on the 1st of each month."

Times Finance sent interview questions to Ideal Auto about the reasons why it continues to update its weekly reports, the value of the weekly rankings, and the sources of relevant data, but no response was received as of press time.

In fact, under the background of intensified competition in the current auto market, some automakers have begun to use various methods to compile rankings. In addition to increasing the release frequency from monthly to weekly, the comparison dimensions also involve aspects such as sales volume, battery life, and the number of charging piles built. In terms of the positioning and segmentation of the rankings, increasingly longer adjectives such as "market above 300,000 yuan", "pure electric market above 300,000 yuan", and "medium and large six-seater pure electric SUV" have limited the comparison scope to a smaller one, making their own rankings more eye-catching.

On August 1, Gu Huinan, general manager of GAC Aion, told Times Finance: "The volatility of the Chinese auto market is well known. In this context, the volatility list is nothing but pediatrics. There are too many dimensions worth competing for, such as volatility value."

At present, some car companies have explicitly rejected the "involutionary" vicious competition. How to become stronger and stronger in the competition and drive the industry forward is a common issue faced by new energy vehicle companies.