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auto-first｜zhou guangjun

as the global ceo of lotus group, feng qingfeng's eyes are not limited to the chinese market. the maps of major countries and regions in the world are all lotus' territory. the biggest constant in the world is change. from brand to product, lotus must keep up with the pulse of the world. at the 2024 chengdu auto show, feng qingfeng's worldview of lotus is cautiously optimistic, not pessimistic.

in this ever-changing world, feng qingfeng's worldview sees both challenges and opportunities.

feng qingfeng said that the challenge comes from the overall decline of 40% in the luxury car market this year, including luxury brands such as porsche. what is more challenging than the macroeconomic challenge is the intensification of geopolitics. the imposition of tariffs is a personal experience of lotus, and it is also a painful experience. after the united states imposed a 100% tariff, canada followed suit. feng qingfeng said that lotus will not give up the us market, the world's largest luxury market. in september, eletre will be released in the united states. "lotus adjusted its positioning, fighting and moving forward, taking into account both the present and the long-term." feng qingfeng also said that the bad news is that the eu imposed tariffs, and the good news is that the uk did not follow up.

lotus also has "plenty" of opportunities. this year's growth comes from the relatively stable economy in the asia-pacific region. lotus' development in the middle east and asia-pacific is also accelerating. it has entered the korean market, which it had not entered before, and is also increasing its investment in the japanese market. lotus' global channels are still expanding, from more than 100 in the past to more than 200 worldwide, and will increase to more than 300 next year.

on the world map in feng qingfeng's office, all the outlets that have been developed are clearly marked with red pen.

lotus delivered 4,873 vehicles in the first half of the year, a year-on-year increase of 239%. among them, 2,389 pure electric suv models were delivered, a year-on-year increase of 174%. 2,484 supercar models were delivered, a year-on-year increase of 337%. the delivery volume in the european market was 1,459 vehicles, 1,208 vehicles in the chinese market, 1,278 vehicles in the north american market, and 928 vehicles in other global markets. feng qingfeng said that lotus has formed a pattern of balanced development in the three major markets of "china, the united states, and europe", and has achieved a more balanced delivery distribution in all major markets around the world.

feng qingfeng said that the global layout is crucial to lotus. lotus is studying the possibility of finding a more suitable manufacturing base overseas due to geopolitical influences in the future. as the international situation and market change, lotus must not only look at a longer-term dynamic strategy, but also balance the present. it is unpredictable and impossible to judge how long geopolitics will affect lotus, so lotus must be prepared for the long term. just like the dual circulation proposed by china, we must be prepared for the dual circulation, the internal circulation plus the external circulation.

in addition to its main business of selling cars, lotus is also looking for a second growth curve to climb upward.

the growth comes from two lines, one is the "outsourcing" of lotus engineering services, and the other is intelligent driving.

lotus engineering, known as the "road of lotus engineering" in the industry, provides engineering services to the entire industry. in the past, many cars, whether complete or partially tuned, have been served by lotus engineering. this includes tesla's first car, the roadster, which uses the lotus elise platform. in traditional fields, lotus still serves the entire industry, and many car manufacturers are still using lotus engineering tuning.

intelligent driving is also a feature of lotus. lotus' intelligent driving is a set of solutions that adapt to the world. many car manufacturers will have two sets of solutions, such as one for china and one for overseas, but lotus has one solution that applies to the world. the practice of the two cars, eletre and emeya, also proves that lotus has a considerable advantage.

now, lynk & co z10 is the first to be equipped with lotus's autonomous driving and is now on the market. geely's commercial vehicles also use lotus's intelligent driving. in particular, lotus has a clear advantage in commercial end-to-end intelligent driving. in the future, lotus will not only serve the geely group internally, but will also begin to provide engineering output to the outside world.

in feng qingfeng's view, luxury brands like lotus benefited from the empowerment of geely group during their development. a brand can only survive in the future if it shares resources with a large group. now the development cycle of a new car is shortening, but the r&d cost is increasing. taking the software of the electronic and electrical architecture as an example, if lotus alone were to share the tens of billions of dollars of investment, the burden would be too heavy to bear. the survival and development of porsche and bentley have benefited from the protection of groups like volkswagen. on the contrary, aston martin, for example, uses mercedes-benz's electronic and electrical architecture because it does not have the ability to develop a new generation of electronic and electrical architecture.

as a global automobile brand, feng qingfeng has seen a change that cannot be ignored after working in lotus for several years: "i think the term 'made in china' has begun to change. in the past, the term 'made in china' was synonymous with cheap and poor quality, but now it has become synonymous with low price and good quality."

for lotus, it is necessary to adapt to changes in the market environment and stick to long-termism. no one can change or reverse the economic trend, but there are still new points to explore under the consumption downgrade. for luxury brands, of course, some users will be lost, such as those who used to buy cars worth millions but now buy cars worth 400,000 or 500,000. but there are still many users who will stick to their consumption methods and behaviors. for lotus, it is more and more focused on offline, giving users a higher experience offline, rather than a kind of excitement online. this is what lotus will insist on doing.

feng qingfeng said that lotus is now very focused. it mainly focuses on two aspects: technology and r&d, and brand and sales. lotus' funds are also focused on these two aspects. for example, in marketing, lotus pays more attention to brand building and sales growth. it does not use such a large-scale manpower, but creates a small and beautiful marketing format.

channels expand in an orderly manner and products expand in a precise manner.

lotus' future products and prices will go down a bit. the price bandwidth focuses on the positioning of 500,000 to 1 million yuan; the value bandwidth focuses on the status of a luxury brand. feng qingfeng took the luxury brand arc'teryx as an example. arc'teryx is cheaper than hermes, but its brand tone is not inferior to hermes. logically, low pricing does not mean a low brand.

feng qingfeng believes that "electrification is not pure electrification". at present, the proportion of gasoline vehicles and electrification is half and half. basically, two major routes have been formed in the world, one is the european route of phev energy-saving products mainly based on gasoline, and the other is the chinese route of phev mainly based on electricity.

this makes the outside world full of expectations for the future of lotus.