In just three weeks since 2024, the competition for the ranking of car market sales has become extremely fierce.
Looking back at the changes in the sales ranking of new power brands in the first three weeks, Wenjie and Ideal fiercely competed for the top spot, Deep Blue stabilized the third spot, and brands such as NIO, Lingpao, and Jike competed for the remaining seven rankings, but their weekly sales did not exceed 3000 vehicles.
As the ideal of a victorious general last year, its competition with its "old rival" gradually intensified.
"Struggle" lasts for over a year
After the release of the sales ranking in the third week, Ideal regained the top spot and surpassed Wenjie, who had dominated the charts for two consecutive weeks, with a slight advantage of 300 vehicles. However, based on the cumulative sales in the first three weeks, Wenjie ranked first with 20000 vehicles sold, while Ideal ranked second with 18700 vehicles sold.
In fact, after the release of the first week's list, Wenjie won the first place, which was unexpected in the market. In the last week of December 2023, Ideal's weekly sales exceeded 10000 units. At that time, the industry believed that Ideal would maintain its momentum and firmly hold the top spot in the new year. However, the fact was that Wenjie surpassed Ideal with an advantage of 16000 units, breaking Ideal's weekly sales record of over 40 consecutive weeks.
The "battle" between the two sides can be traced back to the initial launch of the WENJIE M7 in 2022, when the WENJIE M7, also positioned as a mid size SUV and priced between 300000 and 400000 yuan, began a market share battle with the Ideal ONE and L series.
At the beginning of last year, Wenjie took the lead in a "price war", with a maximum reduction of 30000 yuan. The adjusted selling price of the Wenjie M5 EV started at 259800 yuan, and the adjusted selling price of the Wenjie M7 started at 289800 yuan. As a direct competitor of the Wenjie M7, Ideal did not make any price adjustments and even launched a 90 day warranty agreement, which attracted a large number of consumers to recognize and helped Ideal's sales grow against the trend in the price war.
On the other hand, when the M7 did not launch a new model, its sales in the first half of the year could be described as "dismal", with an average monthly sales of only 3117 units. At that time, the market believed that the advantage of the WENJIE in 2022 was gradually declining, and Huawei's intelligent driving aperture was being matched by its peers. At the same time, the old WENJIE M7 was questioned for being "oil to electric", not meeting the standard for range, and safety hazards such as A-pillar bending during collision testing were also criticized by consumers. The company was no longer able to achieve the glorious results of 2022 with the old WENJIE M7.
At that time, Li Xiang, the CEO of Ideal Automobile, who was once a rival, did not forget to post a Weibo post to "praise" him. He said, "In the third quarter of 2022, the release and operation of the Wenjie M7 directly disabled Ideal ONE. We have never encountered such a strong opponent before, and for a long time, we had no way to fight back." He even said that the company is fully learning from Huawei.
However, Ideal was not able to be complacent for too long. After last year's National Day, Yu Chengdong, the Chairman of Huawei's Intelligent Automotive Solutions BU, came back with the new Wenjie M7. With a starting price of 250000 yuan, a more sturdy body, and an upgraded intelligent driving system, Li Xiang sold more than 50000 vehicles, which made him panic.
In order to avoid the disastrous defeat of the former Ideal ONE, there have been many rumors circulating in the market that Ideal sales are urging customers to give up asking for help and switch to Ideal. For example, they are helping to pay 5000 yuan for asking for help in order to "grab an order", while informing Ideal that they can withdraw the car in cash, and the new Wenjie M7 still needs to wait for a few days. In communication with sales, the reporter learned that Ideal has changed its marketing strategy, implemented decentralization of management rights, and local policies and subsidies are also relatively flexible. However, these are usually limited time and quantity promotional activities, and will not continue to be the case.
The initial effect of price reduction is evident
Entering 2024, Wenjie has snatched the ideal weekly sales champion position for two consecutive weeks, which has also put a lot of pressure on the latter.
Contrary to last year, this year's Ideal actively joined the "price war". On January 11th, it announced a price reduction of 33000-35000 yuan for its L-series models, with the starting price of the Ideal L7 dropping for the first time to within 300000 yuan, to 286800 yuan; The starting price for Ideal L9 after discounts is less than 400000 yuan.
The International Financial News reporter visited several Ideal stores in Shanghai and learned that with the support of all subsidies, the Ideal L7 can be reduced by up to 43000 yuan, the Ideal L8 can be reduced by 44000 yuan, and the Ideal L9 can be reduced by 45000 yuan. According to calculations, the Ideal L7 Air version, which originally had an official guide price of 319800 yuan, has a minimum landing transaction price of 276800 yuan.
The store salesperson told reporters that this is actually an ideal price reduction measure before the model iteration. Currently, the L series models participating in the price reduction are all from 2023, and it is expected that the latest model from 2024 will be launched in the first quarter. Compared with the old model, the in car intelligent chip and intelligence have been upgraded, and the price may also be adjusted; At the same time, the all-new Ideal L6 series is about to be launched, which can be seen as Ideal clearing out its' inventory cars' for 2023.
To put it bluntly, in addition to the impact of market competition, Ideal's price reduction is mainly due to the company's desire to surpass BBA in sales this year. The price reduction is in response to BBA's significant price reduction, making it easier for Ideal to achieve its annual sales target of 800000 vehicles.
In terms of weekly sales, Ideal's price reduction was successful. On the weekly sales chart from January 15th to 21st, Ideal surpassed Wenjie and regained the top spot, with an increase of 3300 units compared to the 4300 units in the first week.
According to a reporter's investigation, the price reduction of "BBA" began last year, but this year's magnitude is even more "exaggerated". Currently, Mercedes Benz's models are generally reduced by more than 100000 yuan, and the Mercedes Benz EQS with a price exceeding one million yuan has dropped to the lowest level of 636800 yuan for pickup. The new car is almost sold at a 50% discount; BMW i7 offers discounts of over 400000 yuan, while iX3 and other models can be picked up for only about 150000 yuan; The Audi Q4 e-tron has a cash discount of 90000 yuan, and the new Audi e-tron battery swapping model can be picked up for only about 136000 yuan.
Netizens joked that in the future, only "poor people" will buy "BBA".
Asking about the world also brings troubles
The ideal price reduction is said to be in response to BBA, but industry insiders are more willing to believe that Huawei cars are putting greater pressure on them.
During the weekend visit, the reporter found that the number of people entering Huawei stores in the same location was significantly higher than the ideal store. Several consumers from Huawei stores told reporters that they have come specifically for buying cars, as well as those who come for their phones but are attracted by cars. According to the reporter's understanding, consumers are more interested in the consultation of the new WENJIE M7 and WENJIE M9.
Compared to Huawei stores, the ideal number of customers entering the store is not high, and the models consulted are mostly L7 and L8. In store consumers told reporters that although the current subsidy discounts are significant, they still want to wait until after the 2024 model to make a choice.
In terms of price, in response to the fierce price reduction trend since the beginning of the year, Wenjie has also launched a series of subsidy policies. Huawei Sales told reporters that in January, the four models currently on sale by Wenjie and Zhijie all received varying degrees of subsidies. Among them, the highest discount for the new Wenjie M7 was 40000 yuan, the highest discount for the Wenjie M5 was 52000 yuan, the highest subsidy for the Zhijie S7 was 55000 yuan, and the highest subsidy for the Wenjie M9 was 30000 yuan.
However, Huawei sales roast that although there were a lot of orders after the launch of InterWorld M9, which exceeded 30000 on January 1, all stores in Shanghai did not have test drive cars for the time being. The sales representative emphasized that this led to the loss of some orders for the M9, and some users who wanted to experience the M9 and ordered a car chose the test drive M7 or purchased other brands.
Last year, Wenjie delivered a total of 94400 vehicles, of which the new Wenjie M7 delivered 20600 vehicles in December. Since its launch, it has delivered a total of 48600 vehicles, with a total of over 120000 vehicles.
The huge difference between order quantity and delivery quantity is another pressure currently faced by Wenjie.
At the end of last year, Yu Chengdong launched a care plan for the new Wenjie M7, which starts from the date when the order status on the AITO APP shows "delivery plan confirmed" and ends at the date when the vehicle has arrived at the store. During this time period, if the corresponding waiting period is exceeded, compensation will be charged at 200 yuan per day for the number of days exceeded, with a maximum compensation of 10000 yuan.
In the AITO APP, many car owners took screenshots to "show off" the compensation they received. The highest car owner has accumulated more than 10000 yuan. The high compensation received by car owners also reflects that the capacity of the Celis factory can not match the hot order of the new model M7, which means that the two parties did not expect the hot issue before and failed to adjust the capacity in advance.
At the press conference of the WENJIE M9, He Liyang, President of Celes Automotive Co., Ltd., said, "The cumulative order of the WENJIE new M7 has exceeded 120000 vehicles, of which the intelligent driving version accounts for 60%. Celes is continuously improving its production capacity, and currently the production capacity has reached 30000 vehicles."
In addition to accelerating the production and delivery of the new WENJIE M7, WENJIE has also released a "Pioneer Plan" for the WENJIE M9. On January 26th, according to official reports from AITO Wenjie Automobile and Hongmeng Zhixing, Wenjie M9 Pioneer plans to launch delivery first on January 26th, with a limited edition of 2000 seats, targeting early booking users.
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