Rebirth 99 to become a car giant.

Chapter 766: Review of 2012, surprising loss of the crown

2012 was a good year for China's independent brand car companies.

Seven manufacturers in the TOP10 are self-owned brand companies. This fact alone has been worthy of coverage by various media for quite some time.

As Xingchen Motors broke into the TOP10 for the first time and even directly ranked fourth, it naturally attracted the attention of many people.

Nanshan Automobile Group is making some internal summaries on this matter, and other car companies in the industry are also making summaries on the situation of Xingchen Automobile.

"Ai Moha, although the company's sales in China last year historically exceeded 35 vehicles, which is higher than mainstream joint venture car companies such as Yangcheng Toyota."

"But the gap between us and Xingchen Automobile is widening. This point must be paid attention to."

Phillips called Aimoha and others to his conference room to specifically communicate about the performance of BMW and other luxury car brands in China.

"The situation of Xingchen Automobile is so special. The sales of the big G series were very good last year, which allowed Xingchen Automobile to quickly achieve a sales breakthrough."

"Actually, our main global competitor is Mercedes-Benz. Their sales in China last year were only 25 units, which was a lot less than us."

Aimoha also wants to make some achievements in China, so that he can go further when he returns to Germany.

"But although we at BMW entered the electric vehicle market relatively early, we have never launched any high-selling models."

If China becomes BMW's largest overseas market in the future, and even electric vehicles become BMW's largest market, then Almoha's position within BMW will be even more stable.

"The headquarters should give the Huaxia branch more authorization and support, and try to introduce some configurations suitable for Huaxia."

"Of course, as Mercedes-Benz launches more SUV models this year, I estimate that their sales will quickly exceed the 30 mark."

"The sales volume of Future Auto this year has exceeded 10 units, and the sales volume of Changan Automobile's electric vehicles has exceeded 15 units, and is estimated to exceed 20 units this year."

"Throughout 2012, Jaguar Land Rover's sales in China exceeded that of Mercedes-Benz, which is close to 30 units. It may surpass us at any time."

"However, we also have more and more models on the market. Sales this year exceeded 40. I think there is no problem."

"Under this situation, if we don't launch more electric vehicles as soon as possible, the future situation will be very passive."

After all, what he said were objective facts.

"When the time comes, we may not be able to keep our second position in China's luxury car sales."

What he said was based on objective facts, so Phillips did not refuse.

"This proposal is very good. I think we should develop electric vehicles."

"For example, in terms of wheelbase, I think we can consider further strengthening the wheelbase of our X3 and X5."

Phillips has now completely thought about it.

"At the same time, General Motors' Cadillac is not to be outdone and will continue to launch several SUV models this year."

"After the Chinese New Year, we went to Nanshan Automobile Group to visit Cao Yang and have in-depth exchanges with Nanshan Batteries and Nanshan Auto Parts."

"Consumers here in China often buy cars not for the owner to use alone, but as a family car."

"In this case, they are very concerned about the seating space in the back row."

Ten years ago, few international automobile giants would have thought so.

Even as long as you give enough money, you can dig out any type of person.

"Many people go to see the car as a family, and their family members sit in the back seat. They feel that it is not spacious enough, so they may not consider us."

"But our current electric vehicle sales are a bit embarrassing. I am ready to do some long-term cooperation with the other party to obtain more favorable conditions for our electric vehicle project."

"I naturally agree with the logic you said, but now not only the sales of Xingchen Automobile are very impressive, but Jaguar Land Rover is also not to be outdone."

After all, there were relatively few qualified design talents in the automotive industry in China at that time.

"The sales volume of electric vehicles in Yangcheng Aian also exceeds 10 units, and the electric vehicles of several other car companies are also performing well."

Besides, half of Xingchen Motors' more than 800,000 sales were sold overseas.

"I think it is a more important thing for the headquarters to set up a dedicated electric vehicle research and development center in China."

Aimoha feels that BMW China's performance last year was already very good. There is no need to feel that it is not doing well just because Xingchen Automobile sells well.

Phillips is obviously preparing to hand over all the main components of BMW China's future electric vehicle projects to Nanshan Battery and Nanshan Auto Parts for production, and obtain lower costs and business conditions by providing orders.

"Compared with other markets, the sales volume of electric vehicles in China is very impressive, and it is estimated that it will exceed 100 million units this year."

But now, whether it is Xingchen Automobile, Future Automobile, or various car companies such as BYD and Changan Automobile, the R&D capabilities are rising rapidly. It is no longer particularly difficult to spend money to poach people in the market.

"Xingchen Automobile has done very well in this regard. Their cars of the same level must have longer wheelbases and richer configurations than ours."

When Phillips said this, Amoha couldn't directly refute it.

"We will work hard on this, but in addition to the requirement you mentioned, I think the Huaxia Branch needs to carefully consider the development strategy of electrification."

"If we don't cooperate with them on key parts of electric vehicles such as batteries and motors, I don't think we can find a better partner."

Naturally, Aimoha also wanted to take this opportunity to find Phillips for some resources, otherwise the development speed of the Huaxia branch would definitely be affected in the future.

Phillips proposed a more ambitious goal, hoping that all electric vehicles produced by BMW in China would be designed by the R&D center in China.

If you include BMW's global sales, there are 200 million vehicles.

These R&D centers arrange some people from Germany, and then recruit more people from the local area to achieve localization of R&D.

There is a relatively good cooperation background between the two parties, so it is not impossible at all.

BMW and Nanshan Automobile Group are in a competitive relationship, but they are not in a life-or-death relationship.

Objectively speaking, there are some differences in the positioning of each model. BMW's competitive relationship with Mercedes-Benz and Audi is actually stronger.

Taking advantage of the fact that Mercedes-Benz and Audi have not launched large-scale cooperation with Nanshan Battery and other manufacturers, it is definitely not a bad thing for BMW to seize the opportunity.

Especially in terms of Nanshan batteries, their production capacity already accounts for more than 70% of the entire Chinese battery industry.

Even globally, Nanshan Battery's production capacity accounts for more than half of the world's power batteries.