On January 26th, Zhaoqing held a launch ceremony for the production line renovation of Xiaopeng Automobile's new model project. Xiaopeng Motors plans to upgrade its existing vehicle production line and put new models into production at the Zhaoqing base.
At present, the automotive industry is experiencing unprecedented changes, with the acceleration of electrification and the rapid rise of intelligence to the competitive C-position. The new technological revolution represented by "cleanliness" and "intelligence" has sparked a wave of transformation, and the global automotive industry landscape is constantly being reshaped.
Faced with the fierce competition in the industry, Xiaopeng Motors, which has emerged from its low sales, immediately set its sights on Zhaoqing as a key factor in improving its product structure and increasing sales. Zhaoqing chooses to deeply bind with Xiaopeng Motors, bet on new energy vehicles, and strive to take the initiative in industrial development.
Xiaopeng Motors and Zhaoqing, these old Peng friends, are working together to open up a new future.
In 2023, Xiaopeng Automobile's sales continued to rise, achieving a "reversal against the trend"——
From the delivery of 5218 vehicles in January 2023 to the average monthly delivery of over 20000 units in the fourth quarter, Xiaopeng Automobile's monthly sales have continuously exceeded historical highs, with a cumulative delivery of over 400000 units, returning to the top tier of the industry.
"We are walking out of a pile of fierce competition dead people, and I think it's getting faster and faster now," said He Xiaopeng, Chairman and CEO of Xiaopeng Motors, at the Xiaopeng X9 press conference on January 1st.
The Xiaopeng G6, G9, and P7i contributed to the main sales volume. While the G6 was hot on the market, the G9 ranked first in terms of delivery volume for three consecutive months in the 300000 class of mid to large pure electric SUVs. The Xiaopeng X9 launch event had not yet ended and achieved a major breakthrough of 5000.
At this critical moment, fully releasing the production capacity of the Zhaoqing base can not only consolidate the steady improvement trend of Xiaopeng Automobile, but also have profound significance for the development of the new energy vehicle industry in Zhaoqing.
As early as the second half of 2023, the two sides reached an agreement to plan the implementation of new energy vehicle models and advance the layout.
"Xiaopeng Motors will upgrade its existing vehicle production line, invest new models in the production of the Zhaoqing base, expand the market, increase sales, promote the growth and strength of Xiaopeng Motors' Zhaoqing base, and jointly build an important base for the national new energy vehicle industry with Zhaoqing City," said Lv Yuanmei, General Manager of Xiaopeng Motors' Zhaoqing base.
Both parties recognize that this cooperation is related to the effectiveness of their cooperation, the future of the enterprise and the city, and there is no room for loss. We will accelerate the implementation of the new vehicle production line renovation project as soon as possible
The scope of this renovation involves production lines and logistics equipment and facilities in the four major workshops of stamping, welding, painting, and final assembly. The stamping workshop has newly developed molds, the welding workshop has upgraded conveyor lines, and the painting workshop has improved its electrophoretic cleaning capabilities.
According to the arrangement, the overall renovation of the project will last for about 20 days and the production line debugging work will be completed in February this year. "The introduction of new models will significantly increase the production capacity of the Zhaoqing base and inject new vitality into the development of new energy vehicles in Zhaoqing City," said Lv Yuanmei.
The Zhaoqing Base is the crystallization of the cooperation between Xiaopeng Motors and Zhaoqing, and has witnessed the shining moments of Xiaopeng Motors.
On April 28, 2017, Xiaopeng Motors signed a contract with Zhaoqing City to settle in Zhaoqing High tech Zone. After 15 months, the Zhaoqing base was completed and put into operation.
As the first self built factory of Xiaopeng Motors, the Zhaoqing base produced Xiaopeng Motors' first popular product - Xiaopeng P7. After 695 days of release, it achieved a remarkable result of 100000 units being taken offline, becoming the first pure electric new force model to break through 100000 production, helping Xiaopeng Motors win the sales championship of the new force in 2021.
Achieving 100000 units of production faster represents consumer recognition of the intelligence and quality of the Xiaopeng P7, which cannot be separated from the support of the Zhaoqing base and the Zhaoqing industrial chain.
Xiaopeng Motors, which has won its first battle, launched the second phase of the Zhaoqing base project in 2021, aiming to enhance the annual production capacity of the vehicle design by increasing capital and production, improving quality and efficiency, and expanding market share by catching up with the victory.
Zhaoqing makes every effort to help the company grow and strengthen, even during the darkest moments when Xiaopeng Motors is facing sluggish sales.
In the past two years, Zhaoqing has held a new energy vehicle industry investment promotion conference, built the Xiaopeng Intelligent Automotive Supporting Parts Industry Park, established a joint investment promotion mechanism, promoted the settlement of upstream and downstream projects in the Xiaopeng automotive industry chain, and provided "doorstep" security.
With the intensification of competition in China's intelligent new energy vehicles, exchanging price for quantity and acquiring quantity through intelligence is becoming a choice for many car companies. "Wall supply" can effectively reduce production costs and help car companies provide more cost-effective products.
In July 2023, Xiaopeng Motors successfully established a strategic partnership with Volkswagen in Germany; In August, Xiaopeng Automobile announced a strategic partnership with Didi, launching the MONA project to integrate Didi's automotive technology foundation and accelerate the implementation of "technology inclusiveness and intelligent equity".
With the launch of the production line transformation of the new model project, Xiaopeng Automobile and Zhaoqing accelerated to release the energy accumulated in the past year, and jointly promoted the early arrival of "autonomous vehicle with both gross profit and competitiveness".
Currently, the automotive industry is experiencing another major turning point.
Chinese made cars are on the rise - with production and sales exceeding 30 million units for the first time in 2023. Throughout the year, the total export of automobiles reached 4.91 million units, a year-on-year increase of 57.9%, ranking first in the world for the first time.
The sales of new energy vehicles have achieved a new breakthrough - according to statistics from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, a total of 1.191 million new energy vehicles were sold in December last year, making it the month with the highest sales of electric vehicles in Chinese history, with a penetration rate exceeding 40%.
In the wave of automobile electrification, Zhaoqing took the lead and successfully introduced Xiaopeng Automobile and Ningde Times, becoming one of the few cities in the country that has both new energy vehicle manufacturing and energy storage battery projects.
Nowadays, Zhaoqing has initially formed a relatively complete industrial system covering the entire vehicle, motor, battery, electronic control, and related components.
However, after multiple rounds of upgrades, with a range of 800 kilometers and acceleration exceeding 3 seconds becoming increasingly standard for new car models, the competitive importance around motor, drive, and battery technology is constantly decreasing.
Just as in the era of gasoline vehicles, car companies will not focus on researching gasoline, in the era of electric vehicles, the dominant market should not only be dominated by batteries. Electric drive itself is not advanced, what is advanced is information and intelligence based on electricity.
With the continuous release of Tesla's catfish effect, the strong rise of the industry, and Xiaomi's entry into the market, the Chinese new energy vehicle industry has clearly entered the second half - the standards for evaluating new energy vehicles are no longer limited to motors and batteries, and the level of intelligence has become a hard indicator.
Perhaps, cars are going through an era of transition from "functional machines" to "intelligent machines", and the future will be "those who gain intelligence will gain the world.".
At present, Xiaopeng Motors, which has had years of layout in the field of intelligent technology, has achieved leading intelligent driving functions in China, which is a presence that competitors must attach importance to.
Public data shows that as of January 1st, Xiaopeng XNGP has completed road validation with a measured mileage of over 3 million kilometers (including highways), a total simulated driving mileage of 145 million kilometers, over 16000 core simulation scenarios, and over 40000 professional simulation scenarios.
At the same time, Xiaopeng Automobile's autonomous driving architecture has been continuously upgraded from XNGP to the ultimate XBrain architecture for all scene intelligent driving. "We can adapt to the surrounding environment information in a timely manner and generate the best sports trajectory," He Xiaopeng introduced at the press conference.
In the process of NGP landing in cities, Xiaopeng Motors is also in the first tier. As of January 2nd, Xiaopeng Motors XNGP has opened 243 cities, achieving its goal ahead of schedule.
If the "dual leaders" have enabled Zhaoqing to quickly enter the track of automotive electrification, then Xiaopeng Motors will determine the upper limit of Zhaoqing's new energy vehicle intelligence.
At the recently concluded 7th Plenary Session of the 13th Zhaoqing Municipal Party Committee and the Economic Work Conference of the Municipal Party Committee, Zhaoqing proposed to accelerate the construction of the Xiaopeng Intelligent New Energy Vehicle New Model Project, expand and strengthen the "dual leaders" of Xiaopeng Automobile and Ningde Times, comprehensively promote the "three in one" development of the whole vehicle, parts, and aftermarket, and promote the chain and cluster development of the new energy vehicle industry.
With the opening of the intelligent war for new energy vehicles in China, Zhaoqing has chosen to deeply bind with chain leading enterprises such as Xiaopeng Motors and Ningde Times, bet on new energy vehicles and intelligent vehicles, and strive to seize the initiative in future urban competition.
At present, Zhaoqing is running on the right path.