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author: wang yajun

cover source: jiyue official

new car, competing with model 5

jiyue, which has always wanted to compete with tesla, has built a car that "tesla has not yet made". the company's ceo xia yiping compared it to the model 5.

on the evening of september 10, the second model of jiyue, jiyue 07, was officially launched on the market. the prices of the three versions are: standard version 209,900 yuan, long-range version 229,900 yuan, performance version 299,900 yuan.

the internal code name of the jiyue 07 is venus, which is the goddess of love and beauty in ancient greek mythology. "if i have to compare it to a benchmark, i think it is more like the model 5 that tesla has not made, because we have made a car that tesla has not made yet."

the reason why xia yiping compares the jiyue 07 to the model 5 is that he believes it is better than the tesla model 3 in terms of battery life and vehicle space size. "if musk builds another car that is bigger than the model 3, i believe it will definitely have the shadow of the jiyue 07."

intelligent driving is one of the core selling points of the jiyue 07. xia yiping described it as "the most intelligent driving car on the planet." when talking about product performance and vehicle cost, he used a series of vivid metaphors: the body rigidity of the jiyue 07 can withstand a pressure of 10.6 tons, which is equivalent to three adult elephants standing on it and the roof will not be deformed; the whole car is equipped with 7 airbags with a total volume of 350 liters, which is equivalent to the size of a simmons mattress; the vehicle cost is 3.7 yuan per 100 kilometers, which is a fraction of the bmw 5 series.

as early as a month before the launch, xia yiping began to promote the new car. "the jiyue 07 will usher in the iphone 4 era of car design. the design of smart cars in the next 20 years will have the shadow of jiyue."

even if his remarks may cause controversy, he believes that they will also help boost jiyue's sales. "you can do positive marketing or negative marketing. when you scold me, i am considered successful because you already know jiyue," xia yiping said.

despite the support of geely and baidu, the brand awareness of jiyue has never been prominent, and the overall sales volume is not good. in the first eight months of this year, the company's first model jiyue 01 sold more than 5,000 units, with an average of less than 800 units per month, while the monthly sales of leading new car manufacturers are often tens of thousands of units.

on the night of the press conference, baidu's robin li, nio's li bin, and catl's zeng yuqun also came to the scene to support xia yiping. geely's li shufu expressed his support for jiyue through a video.

image source: jiyue official

xia yiping's tears

"we sold more than 200 units in january and more than 100 units in february. i feel very uncomfortable." during a group interview at the jiyue launch conference in august, xia yiping choked up and cried when he mentioned the company's low sales.

this slow-selling car is jiyue’s first model launched last year, jiyue 01, a pure electric suv priced at 219,900 to 309,900 yuan.

in order to boost sales, jiyue has taken many measures this year.

in january, jiyue began to reshuffle the entire marketing and sales team, and xia yiping personally led the team to start the transformation of marketing and sales. in april, according to the first financial report, yang zhen, the head of the user development department of the company's marketing, and several directors and other executives were dismissed, and xia yiping himself was appointed as the head of the department; the head of the user operation department responsible for sales was replaced by andy gao from tesla instead of luo gang, the former head of operations.

xia yiping also became more active on social media. on march 15, he opened a personal douyin account, and by september 10, before the new car launch, he had posted 140 videos.

in addition to shooting short videos, xia yiping also started live streaming. on april 15, xia yiping drove the gac 01 and interacted with robin li in the car live. robin li praised the gac 01 for its "great parking ability", and xia yiping replied: "it is no exaggeration to say that it is the best in the world."

the last time robin li publicly supported jiyue was at the baidu world conference in october 2023. at that time, robin li stated at the conference: jiyue 01 will become the smartest and most understanding car robot at present.

during the live broadcast with robin li, xia yiping also took the opportunity to start a promotion: if you purchase jiyue 01 before may 2024, you will receive free lifetime smart driving.

these measures have boosted sales to a certain extent. in august, jiyue delivered 2,117 vehicles, setting a new monthly delivery record this year. however, compared with the leading new car brands, jiyue still has a big gap.

in xia yiping's plan, the jiyue 07 will, together with the jiyue 01, help the company achieve sales of more than 10,000 units per month next year.

the price range of jiyue 07 is highly competitive. in the 200,000-300,000 yuan pure electric sedan market, there are many models that have been tested by the market, such as tesla model 3, xiaomi su7, nio et5 and byd han ev.

according to estimates by wugang securities, in 2024, the market space for pure electric sedans in the price range of 200,000 to 300,000 yuan will be approximately 600,000 to 700,000 vehicles, of which tesla model 3 and byd han ev will account for a total of 43% of the market share.

the present comes first, then the future

in 2014, xia yiping, together with du jiangling, the director of gm china science research institute, and zhou hang, the former chairman of caocao travel, operated an open source car project called "opencarlab". it is also for this reason that xia yiping regards himself as "the first person in china to announce that he will make electric cars."

li yanhong's evaluation of xia yiping is that "he understands cars and the internet, has entrepreneurial experience, a technical background, passion and a sense of mission. he is a very suitable and rare candidate." before jidu was officially established, li yanhong selected him as the company's ceo.

in march 2021, baidu and geely established a joint venture company, jidu, with controlling stakes of 55% and 45% respectively. at that time, baidu had accumulated nearly 8 years of autonomous driving technology, and geely, which had been established for nearly 20 years, had rich production experience and a mature supply chain system.

photo of robin li and li shufu source: baidu official account

in the same month that jidu was founded, lei jun also announced his entry into the automotive industry. facing this rival that started almost at the same time as himself, xia yiping said at the time that he was "not worried about xiaomi." and his opponent has always been tesla. since the project of the first model was launched in 2021, "we have always wanted to fight with tesla." (for details, see snow leopard finance's "dialogue with jiyue ceo: from the beginning to the end, we all wanted to fight with tesla")

more than a year after jidu was founded, robin li frequently spoke for jidu in earnings calls and other public events. in august 2022, robin li said at jidu's first automotive robot ecosystem partner conference that in terms of autonomous driving technology, "jidu will be one generation ahead of tesla."

just one year after this high-profile statement, baidu took a step back.

in august 2023, baidu's car-making project jidu was renamed jiyue, and baidu changed from a major shareholder leading the car-making to a technology provider participating in the car-making. baidu and geely's shareholding ratio changed to 35% and 65%, and the original jidu auto's first model "jidu robo-01" was renamed "jiyue 01", and xia yiping continued to serve as the company's ceo.

during this period, jiyue missed the 2023 shanghai auto show. at the end of last year, xia yiping said bluntly: "from april 2023 to september 2023, we had no external publicity for nearly half a year."

advanced intelligent driving capability is the core selling point of the jiyue model, but this capability is still difficult to impress users in the fierce price war.

according to the "car purchase attention insight report (2024 edition)" recently released by yiche research institute, price is the most important consideration for domestic consumers when buying a car, followed by brand, quality, safety and reputation. among the 15 factors affecting car purchases counted by yiche research institute, the importance of intelligence ranks 14th.

jiyue’s offline sales channel construction is also slightly inferior.

xia yiping plans to open more than 250 sales outlets by 2024. according to statistics from china post securities, in august 2023, the number of stores of weili, xiaoli and li auto will exceed 370.

can the jiyue 07 help the company advance into the first camp? at the jiyue end-to-end ai smart driving launch conference held last month, xia yiping admitted that in today's competitive environment, it is difficult for a new brand to break through.

xiaomi may be an exception. on september 1, lei jun announced on weibo that the delivery volume of xiaomi su7 exceeded 10,000 units in august, and has achieved the delivery target of over 10,000 units for three consecutive months. it is expected that the annual delivery target of 100,000 units will be completed ahead of schedule in november. if this goal is achieved, xiaomi will become the fastest new car brand in china to achieve annual delivery of over 100,000 units.

autumn has arrived, and xia yiping needs to harvest as much food and grass as possible through jiyue 07 to survive the winter.