Bitauto original "Wait for everyone to roll first, and then we will lift the table after finishing the roll." Li Bin, founder, chairman and CEO of NIO, said at a media communication meeting on December 14.
Looking back on 2023, Weilai is still an active member of the automotive industry. New cars, mobile phones, overseas travel, battery replacement and other businesses have not fallen behind, but sales and profits have never been as high as desired. Everyone has been waiting for Weilai to change the table for a long time. Coming to the more complicated year of 2024, can Weilai really live up to everyone’s expectations?
The year of failure in 2023
Rumors of "Nio's bankruptcy" have been circulating this year, and even NIO's co-founder and president Qin Lihong had to come forward to clarify.
Data shows that in the first three quarters of this year, Weilai has accumulated a net loss of 15.352 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 77.46%. Although the performance in the third quarter has improved somewhat, with both sales and revenue increasing, the net loss is still growing (a year-on-year increase of 10.8%) to 4.557 billion yuan, making it the largest loss-making enterprise among "Wei Xiaoli".
You must know that the direct operation model, battery replacement and energy replenishment, mobile phones, etc. that Weilai is betting on are all heavy investment and money-burning businesses. The key point is that Weilai also insists on full-stack self-research, and needs to use recent R&D investment to exchange for the long-term development of the company. The gross profit means that it needs to burn crazy money in the early stage.
At the communication meeting, Li Bin reflected that NIO has always been a company that likes to talk about long-term thinking, but now he is not sure whether this is a derogatory term or a complimentary term.
In the previous internal meeting, Li Bin mentioned that "long-termism is not an excuse for not doing a good job in short-term execution. Every step of the marathon needs to be run well." Therefore, in order to reduce costs and increase efficiency, we must take every step of the present. Weilai chose to "survive with a broken arm": lay off at least 10% of its staff, open up the battery swap business, and apply for independent car manufacturing qualifications...
However, these are obviously enough for NIO to deliver a beautiful annual report card.
At the beginning of the year, Weilai set the 2023 annual sales target of doubling year-on-year sales and monthly sales exceeding 30,000. Based on NIO's annual sales of 122,500 vehicles in 2022, its annual sales target in 2023 is approximately 245,000 vehicles. From January to November, NIO delivered a total of 142,000 new cars, with a gap of more than 100,000.
Regarding the issue of sales, Li Bin, the upright BOY, said: "The biggest lesson this year is that the sales increase was too late. It should have been launched in February. As a result, new cars were not accepted in June and July. Otherwise, we could sell 10,000-20,000 more. Trolley."
In fact, Weilai had a good start at the beginning of the year and has a large number of intended orders. However, a price war initiated by Tesla caught Nio by surprise. At first, due to positioning issues, NIO stuck to its bottom line on price and refused to engage in a "price war."
Until the order was lost, Weilai finally began to realize the problem in June and July, so it came up with a profit-sharing policy that later adjusted user rights and lowered the price of the entire series by 30,000.
Price reduction has always been the most advantageous weapon. NIO successfully crossed the monthly delivery mark of 20,000 vehicles in July, delivering a total of 20,500 new cars, a surge of 103.6% year-on-year;
However, in the following August and September, NIO"s delivery volume declined, reaching 19,329 and 15,641 vehicles respectively. In October and November thereafter, monthly sales maintained around 15,000. Now it seems that Weilai’s annual sales are 2The target of 45,000 vehicles is basically out of reach.
How will Weilai save itself in 2024? Li Bin gave two answers: consolidation (Nio) and sinking (Alps).
How to play two trump cards?
NIO’s second brand, Alps, is NIO’s highlight in 2024. (PS: Alps is just an internal code name. Weilai came up with a very down-to-earth name for this and completed the registration)
As a sub-brand of NIO, Alps shares NIO’s autonomous driving, battery and other technologies, further reducing technology costs and price thresholds, and absorbing market segments below 300,000 yuan. Its sales volume determines whether Weilai can turn around and achieve both fame and fortune.
Suspected road test spy photos of Alpine's first model
Alpine's first model has recently completed the trial production of the VB car and rolled off the production line. It is revealed that it is equipped with the popular "refrigerator, color TV, and large sofa", and will also be equipped with a long-lasting single motor.
Alps is not quick to launch its brand. Li Bin believes that "the competition in the 200,000 to 300,000 yuan market will become increasingly fierce, and we will wait until everyone is exhausted before launching." And unlike Weilai, the main brand has gathered With a variety of products, Alpine focuses on fewer but more refined routes, and currently only plans three vehicles.
As for the Weilai brand, it will be responsible for focusing on the high-end market and continue to "fight" BBA. At the meeting, Weilai also shared the fruits of his tough BBA:
For example, in Shanghai, starting from July, NIO has surpassed all brands in the local market of over 300,000 yuan (including fuel vehicles). In November, NIO’s sales reached 3,300 units, more than 1,000 units sold than BMW. , sold almost twice as much as Audi.
Enlarge In the national market, NIO occupies 45% of the pure electric market of more than 300,000 yuan, strongly dominating the high-end pure electric market.
In order to consolidate its position in the world, NIO will further enrich its product matrix, including launching an MPV and a new flagship car ET9.
The first to come out is the new flagship car ET9, which targets the imaginary rivals of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, BMW 7 Series, Porsche Panamera, etc. Although these executive flagship cars sell about 100,000 units globally a year, the profits are enough to lure them. People can also support the facade of a high-end brand.
When talking about ET9, Li Bin was like praising his own child, and he did not hesitate to praise it: Not to mention that it is far ahead, but this will definitely be the most advanced car in the world in terms of comprehensive technology. How far ahead is it? Please wait and see on the upcoming NIO DAY on December 23.
As for MPVs, Lideal and Xpeng have launched MEGA and X9 respectively. Let’s not talk about sales for the time being. Their own Internet celebrity traffic alone is enough to win half of the market share. NIO does not dare to show weakness. Its MPV project has been completed. The node is late, but at least it can preemptively strike.
With the release of Alpine, NIO’s strategy will also become clearer. The former focuses on families, while the latter focuses on high-end and business.
In terms of price, the overall average price of the NIO brand will go up in the future. Without exchanging price for volume, the ET5 will be its most entry-level model. The empty area below 300,000 will be left to the Alps to capture.
2024: Sell cars, sell cars, sell cars
When asked about the upcoming year 2024, Li Bin said frankly that he has only one expectation, which is to "sell cars well."
In the final stage of the competition, the golden indicator to judge whether you can survive is sales volume. Although the start of 2023 was not successful, Weilai is still full of expectations for 2024.
Previously in the third quarter, Li Bin revealed that Weilai currently has about 5,700 sales consultants, of which more than 3,000 have recently joined. According to the industry's average training cycle of 6 months, Li Bin believes that after half a year, when most sales become experienced, it will be helpful to increase sales after the second quarter of 2024.
Regarding next year’s sales forecast, Li Bin predicts that after the first quarter, NIO will be able to stably maintain above the baseline of 20,000 monthly sales.
Alps, which is regarded as "The hope of the whole village", Li Bin also has high hopes, saying that "the household market has the opportunity to produce a single model With monthly sales of 50,000 to 60,000 vehicles, Model Y has confirmed this."
Write at the end:
As Li Bin said, from 2024 to 2025, the high-end smart electric vehicle market will enter a stage of explosive growth. This means that in a situation where there are too many people and too few people, the wave of market elimination is accelerating.
Looking back at the high-end market in 2023, the battle is as fierce as a fight between gods. The traditional car-making faction headed by BYD breaks through, and new forces such as Huawei and Intellectual World are approaching step by step. Sales are chasing each other, okay? lively.
Nio, which has always been stable and focuses on long-termism,However, we must move faster than ever, learn the lessons of 2023, improve market acumen, and accelerate the pace of new brands, so that we can quickly, ruthlessly and accurately set off other people's tables.
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