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tencent news "high beam"

author: aodun

editor｜liu peng

the "golden september and silver october" consumption peak season has just begun, and two star joint venture b-class cars have successively reduced their prices to survive.

on september 10, bypassatthe new passat 380tsi family consisting of two models, pro and 2025 outstanding models, is officially launched.saic volkswagena limited-time price of 159,900 yuan to 223,900 yuan was given; three days later, the japanese b-class car benchmarktianlaia new entry-level model, the teana true heart edition, was launched, with a limited-time price of 127,800 yuan. a year ago, the entry-level models of passat and teana were priced at around 180,000 yuan.

"whoever controls the b-class car controls the world" has been a rule in the automotive industry for many years. especially for joint venture brands, the b-class car is not only a concentrated embodiment of technology and brand, but also the core of their profits. today, the reason behind the german and japanese brands' "action" on the b-class car is the increasing pressure of shrinking market share.

data from the china association of automobile manufacturers show that from january to august, a total of 10.213 million chinese-branded passenger cars were sold, up 20.4% year-on-year, with a market share of 63.2%. the market share of joint venture brands has been shrinking, with german brands having a retail share of 16.6% and japanese brands having a share of 12.6%.

this year marks the 40th anniversary of the establishment of saic volkswagen, and also the 40th year that the volkswagen brand entered the chinese market. but saic volkswagen is not having an easy time. at the 40th anniversary, saic volkswagen is not only facing external pressure, but also internal reasons such as the change of senior management in the saic system and the opening of the third joint venture vehicle enterprise of the volkswagen brand in china. the transformation strategy of this old joint venture has become the focus of special attention in the industry.

how can joint ventures break through? tao hailong, party secretary and general manager of saic volkswagen automotive co., ltd., who has just taken office for more than 50 days, described to tencent news "high beam" that given the current market situation, saic volkswagen is under great pressure. the entire team must tread on thin ice and race against time to win the market. "the strategy is very clear. to adapt to the chinese market, we must follow the three technical routes of gasoline vehicles, electric vehicles, and hybrid vehicles."

new official investigates saic volkswagen, denies cost reduction of 2 billion yuan

in july, saic group welcomed a new management team - wang xiaoqiu served as chairman, jia jianxu, former general manager of saic volkswagen, served as president, and tao hailong, former general manager of huayu automotive systems co., ltd., took over as general manager of saic volkswagen; in august, saic officially announced again that fu qiang replaced yu jingmin as executive vice president of sales and marketing of saic volkswagen and general manager of saic volkswagen automotive sales co., ltd.

from jia jianxu to tao hailong, saic has gradually allowed talents with supply chain and manufacturing experience to move to the management of vehicle manufacturers in recent high-level adjustments. in fact, the essence of price wars is cost wars and technology wars, and the supply chain is an important link in cost control. therefore, reusing technical management has gradually become a common consensus among auto companies.

soon after tao hailong took office, news of his "cost reduction of 2 billion" spread. "less than a week after i took office, reports appeared on the internet that i cut costs by 2 billion. as a logical science and engineering man, it is not tao hailong to come up with this number without investigation and research." in response to the rumors, tao hailong, who came from a quality assurance background, responded at the passat pro launch conference that cost is very important for any company and is also the core competitiveness of a company. especially in the current extremely competitive situation, cost is even more important.

in tao hailong's opinion, there are many ways to control costs, and the prerequisite is efficiency. another very important prerequisite for reducing costs is that there must be no loss of quality. he said that it is necessary to investigate and study which directions can be optimized before setting corresponding indicators.

there are opportunities in the market, but the sales of joint venture brands are under pressure year by year, and the entire industry chain is facing uncertainty and huge challenges. as the earliest established joint venture company for complete vehicles in china, saic volkswagen has tried to explore a new post-joint venture model in the past few years to allow independent technology to feed back to the joint venture.

in may this year, saic motor andaudithe two sides signed a cooperation agreement to jointly develop a new platform focused on the chinese market, and the first pure electric vehicle will be launched on the market in 2025. in june, saic group and volkswagen signed a number of technical cooperation agreements on saic volkswagen's new product projects, including a technical cooperation agreement to develop three plug-in hybrid models and two pure electric models in china. it is expected that from 2026 and across 2030, a number of jointly developed plug-in hybrid models and pure electric models will be launched on the market one after another.

in order to seek a more pragmatic way out, tao hailong conducted a survey of saic volkswagen's product portfolio and dealer system within 50 days of taking office.

"the starting point for breaking the deadlock is the product portfolio. from a strategic point of view, saic volkswagen's entire product portfolio is very sound, including hybrid models that are now highly recognized by everyone in the chinese market. they have been fully deployed in different price segments. from a-class cars to b-class cars, and they are not a single model but a series." at the market level, although electric cars and hybrid models have a high market share, tao hailong said that saic volkswagen is still the number one in the gasoline car market. the volkswagen brand gene is there, and customer acceptance is also there. "we must stick to gasoline cars, but we cannot be conservative. we must continue to develop hybrid and electric cars, and we must continue to develop intelligent cars."

in terms of strategy, tao hailong repeatedly stressed that saic volkswagen will never do anything that is quick to achieve success and will not lose its composure when making moves, "because there is no need for saic volkswagen to do so, this is my understanding." he further explained that saic volkswagen has a large base, and the dealer system must be well supported. it must adhere to the strategy of the regular army and the systematic strategy, and at the same time, it must firmly stabilize the gasoline vehicle market.

regarding the current competition, tao hailong believes that the competition in the chinese market is far from over, and it is difficult to say who will have the upper hand in the current situation. "it is far from game over. there are really a lot of people eating together at the table, which is a good thing. more people means there are opportunities."

the market share of gasoline vehicles will inevitably decline, but are smart gasoline vehicles a blue ocean?

with the strong counterattack of new energy vehicles, fuel vehicles have gradually become a minority. in april this year, the market penetration rate of new energy vehicles exceeded that of fuel vehicles for the first time by more than 50%. according to the data of the china passenger car association, from january to august, the cumulative sales of new energy vehicles reached 6.016 million, a year-on-year increase of 35.3%, which is much higher than the overall level of passenger cars. the penetration rate has reached 44.6%.

according to the saic group's production and sales report, from january to august, saic volkswagen sold about 678,000 vehicles, a year-on-year decline of 4.81%. in august, the monthly sales were 85,000 vehicles, a year-on-year decline of 22.75% and a month-on-month increase of 9.5%. fu qiang revealed after the press conference on september 10 that as of that day, saic volkswagen's cumulative sales this year were about 750,000 vehicles, a slight year-on-year increase, and new energy vehicles and fuel vehicles have reached a 50% to 50% situation. in july and august, saic volkswagen's market share in the fuel vehicle market was 7% and 8% respectively. fu qiang revealed that september will also move in this direction.

with the dual-line investment strategy of volkswagen brand fuel vehicles and new energy vehicles, saic volkswagen will usher in a quasi-big year for products in 2024. so far, in the pro trilogy,tiguan l pro and passat pro have been released.touronthe pro is expected to be launched early next year. judging from the product configuration, saic volkswagen hopes to make up for the shortcomings of intelligence through the pro series of three flagship products, thereby achieving a counterattack.

in terms of intelligence, passat pro and tiguan l pro are also equipped with l2++ level iq. pilot intelligent assisted driving system in deep cooperation with dji. fu qiang revealed that the monthly sales of tiguan family are about 14,000 units, of which tiguan l pro sells more than 3,000 units per month. "almost every 3-4 tiguan family cars sold are tiguan l pro. this smartest gasoline car has been accepted by consumers."

under the "oil-electric intelligence" strategy, saic volkswagen's fuel vehicle market share has remained relatively stable, but the new top management still gave a more severe market prediction: the market share of fuel vehicles will inevitably decline.

"of course we hope that there will be no decline, which will be better for us, but we must be strategically prepared for the decline in oil vehicles." tao hailong said that saic volkswagen will promote various forms of energy, focusing on hybrid and new energy, "and the market share of these two will definitely increase."

tao hailong said that the connotation of the pro series is to add intelligence and internet to the original products with excellent mechanical performance, so as to promote the overall brand. at the same time, after the launch of pro products, they will be sold on the same line as existing products, strengthening the coverage density of the core price range and consolidating the industry position.

however, there has long been a controversy in the industry: the intelligentization of fuel vehicles is a false proposition, and only new energy vehicles can achieve intelligence. some experts give the reason that due to various technical and structural limitations, the intelligentization process of fuel vehicles is more complicated and slower than that of electric vehicles.

in response to this view, fu qiang refuted that whether a car model is "smart" has nothing to do with the form of energy. to some extent, traditional energy may be smarter because its control is more complex.

"when we were making the pro trilogy, we felt that the market had stopped investing in traditional energy, but we felt that there was still opportunity. if the intelligence of fuel vehicles can be done well, this will be a blue ocean market." fu qiang further explained that saic volkswagen internally believes that tiguan l pro and passat pro are the smartest models among fuel vehicles, "but this intelligence depends on who you compare with. if compared with the smartest new energy products now, i also admit that we still have shortcomings."

passat,accord、camry、magotanjoint venture brand b-class cars such as the passat and teana have long occupied a mainstream position in domestic families. now, not only has the passat reduced its price and increased its configuration, but similar competitors are also catching up to varying degrees. when talking about saic volkswagen's annual sales target for 2024, fu qiang revealed that he hopes to achieve 1.2 million vehicles, of which the passat model alone hopes to achieve monthly sales of 25,000 to 30,000 vehicles.

joint ventures are undergoing a critical transformation and difficult period. in the view of bao jiacheng, deputy director of the information and industrial development department of the national information center and senior economist, the market share of joint venture automakers will continue to decline in the next 3-5 years, but the rate of decline will slow down.

"in the past few years, the competitiveness of joint venture car products has been insufficient compared with domestic brands. with the development of new generation platforms by joint venture car companies, especially those based on chinese technology (such as volkswagen anhuixiaopeng"the competitiveness of the products launched will be improved by the introduction of new technologies," bao jiacheng predicted. the market share of joint venture automakers is still facing downward pressure. the overall development trend in the next few years is that the share of electric vehicles will increase and the share of gasoline vehicles will decrease. joint venture brands account for 70% of the total sales of gasoline vehicles and will continue to face the compression of the overall market capacity. in the electric vehicle track, joint ventures will expand their market share (currently 14%) through new technology platforms.