If you want to select the Chinese brand "a brother", I believe that a considerable number of people will vote for Geely in their hands, mainly Geely has indeed surprised the majority of consumers in recent years, and the models launched have made great progress with the domestic models in our impression, whether in terms of design or performance, and even many models can directly compete with the joint venture brand. So, how does Geely, a brand that is thriving in the Chinese market, perform in overseas markets? This issue of "The Overseas Road of Chinese Brands" will talk about Geely's overseas development road.
Geely's overseas journey begins with an acquisition
Geely and the previous issues of the brand different, Geely Automobile's own export volume is not particularly amazing, in November 2021 released Geely Automobile 1-10 months of total sales data, Geely Automobile sales of more than one million vehicles for five consecutive years, 1-10 months cumulative export volume of 84818 vehicles, although an increase of about 73% year-on-year, but compared to the Great Wall and Chery, the export volume is still much lower.
However, although the export volume is not outstanding, this does not mean that Geely's influence in overseas markets is not high, mainly because the current development route of Geely overseas is not the same as that of great wall and Chery. Compared with the Great Wall's overseas investment and factory construction, Chery's long-term overseas market operation, although the Geely brand has maintained a certain number of exports in the early days, the overall volume is not large. It was not until the acquisition was carried out that the Geely brand was really introduced to the world.
In 2010, Geely formally acquired Volvo Cars, the specific acquisition process here is not too much to repeat, anyway, the entire acquisition process is very difficult, after all, geely at that time in the international is still only a small factory with no name. But the good news is that Geely acquired a 100% stake in Volvo, and Volvo officially became a wholly-owned sub-brand of Geely. And what did Volvo bring to Geely?
The first is to improve Geely's popularity and influence, a small Chinese factory that was still unknown in the world at that time, acquired a world-class luxury brand, such news almost occupied the headline position of the world's major media at that time, and also let the world know the Chinese Geely brand. The second is the technical level, in addition to volvo's world-class technology in terms of safety, it has the technical heritage of luxury brands in terms of engine, chassis and vehicle tuning, which Volvo will feed back to Geely. Finally, the sales network, with the help of Volvo's international sales network, further expand the sales of other brands of Geely Automobile, and reduce the risk and difficulty of market expansion and the cost.
Berry is the first model launched after Geely's acquisition of Volvo, this car is also the first model under Geely to introduce Volvo's safety technology concept, designed by the international design team led by Peter Hobley, former design director of Volvo, using a large number of Chinese design elements, once known as "the most beautiful Chinese car".
As for Volvo, after Geely took over, it was clearly stated that Volvo would maintain independent operation, Geely would not interfere too much in Volvo's development decisions, and it was this decision that made Volvo develop more and more outstanding after being acquired by Geely 11 years later, so that a marginal brand that was once under Ford's umbrella grew into a successful luxury brand with annual sales of nearly 700,000 vehicles worldwide. And in November 2021, Volvo was officially listed on the Starks Stock Exchange, which became the largest IPO project in Europe that year, with a market value of $22 billion on the day of listing. Today Volvo Cars has 10 production and assembly plants, 3 R&D centers and 3 design centers worldwide, and more than 2,300 dealers in more than 100 countries.
Geely and Volvo also co-founded the joint venture brand Lynk & Co, released in October 2016 in Berlin, Germany, since its birth, Lynk & Co has positioned itself as a global car brand, and Lynk & Co's R&D team comes from Geely Automobile's European R&D center in Gothenburg, Sweden. In September 2020, Lynk & Co's "European Plan" was released, and on October 21, Lynk & Co 01 Plug-in Hybrid, as the first global strategic product of Lynk & Co's entry into Europe, opened pre-sale in China and Europe.
Since its birth, Lynk & Co has been positioned as a global brand, designed in Europe, produced domestically and exported to the world. Under the concept of global integration, it has truly achieved the development concept of "born global, open and interconnected".
In addition to the "European Plan", Lynk & Co also released the "Asia Pacific Plan" to officially land in Kuwait, and built the first official Lynk & Co owners club in the Asia-Pacific market in Kuwait. At present, the cumulative overseas exports of Lynk & Co have exceeded 10,752 vehicles, and the development concept of "born global, open and interconnected" allows us to see the figure of Lynk & Co in the Asia-Pacific and European markets. At present, seven Lynk & Co experience stores have landed in Europe, and three more will be added in 2022.
In addition to Volvo and Lynk & Co, Geely has a brand in Europe, The London Electric Vehicle Company (LEVC), and its predecessor was the London Taxi Company. Geely acquired the London Taxi Company wholly owned in February 2013, and in July 2017, the London Taxi Company announced that it had officially changed its name to London Electric Vehicle Company, and its TX model was the star model of LEVC, which had been launched in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany and other places, becoming an iconic taxi.
Since the acquisition of Volvo, Geely has truly opened its own overseas road, and Geely's acquisition of Volvo has become the most successful overseas acquisition in history, Geely not only helped Volvo achieve brand rejuvenation and sustainable development, but also with Volvo's technology feeding, so that Geely's own development has a long way to promote.
Gilly's ambitions don't stop there
In addition to exploring the European market, Geely also has a lot of moves in Southeast Asia, in June 2017, Geely beat PSA Group and Malaysia Diversified Heavy Industry Group, signed an agreement with The Malaysian DRB-HICOM Group to acquire 49.9% of the shares of its Proton Automobile and 51% of the shares of sports car brand Lotus. The addition of Geely has brought assets such as the Boyue manufacturing platform to Proton Automobile, which has also gradually put Proton Automobile on the right track from the brink of bankruptcy. In November 2021, Proton's total sales in November were 14,187 units, up 24.3% year-on-year and 6.2% month-on-month, and the cumulative sales volume from January to November 2021 was 100566 units, an increase of 4.3% year-on-year. This is also the third consecutive year that Proton Automobile has exceeded 100,000 sales.
To know that the total population of Malaysia is only 32 million people, and Proton's monthly sales have reached tens of thousands, which is already very remarkable. Among them, the Proton X50 (corresponding to the domestic Binyue) is the best-selling model in the Malaysian small SUV segment, while the Proton X70 (the domestic counterpart Boyue) is also shining in the compact SUV market, and the overall sales volume is far ahead of competitors. In addition to the Malaysian market, Proton also radiates to neighboring countries, and the current Proton X50 and X70 models have entered the Thai and Philippine markets.
Nowadays, looking at the rise of Proton' mixing, in fact, before being acquired by Geely, Proton was already a mess. At its peak, Proton's market share reached 73%, but in 2016, the market share was only 17%, with a loss of 1.8 billion yuan. To this end, in 2016, the Malaysian government subsidized Proton with 1.5 billion Giringit to repay the debt of suppliers. Before Geely acquired Proton, the Malaysian government again provided 1.1 billion Gillingt to Proton to repay part of its debt before it was acquired.
Now the results have also been seen, after Geely joined Proton, in just a few years to achieve double growth in sales and revenue, in production, sales, service, brand building and other aspects have achieved good results. This also shows that Geely's cross-brand international operation capabilities are indeed very strong.
In addition to the European and Southeast Asian markets, Russia is also a very competitive market for Chinese brands, where the Great Wall and Chery have achieved very satisfactory results, and Geely's performance here is also more eye-catching, geely Russian dealers sold 22,479 Geely cars in the first 11 months of 2021, an increase of 63% year-on-year. The main models currently sold in Russia are the Tugella, Coolray, Atlas and Atlas Pro. This year, Geely also plans to introduce The Star-Etsu L to the Russian market.
Geely Atlas (Boyue) at the Scene of the Russian Launch Conference
In addition to passenger cars, Geely also has a layout in commercial vehicles, on January 18, 2021, Geely Commercial Vehicles and Israel UTI announced that the two sides will reach a strategic cooperative relationship and will develop remote E200 8T pure electric light trucks for the Israeli market. Israel's logistics and transportation is dominated by traditional energy, and the new energy truck market is still in a blank stage, and Geely has seized the opportunity to use differentiation to win the market.
In addition to excellent product strength, Geely also put in full efforts in auto racing, its Lynk & Co team shined in the WTCR arena, in 2021, after 6 months of fierce competition, Lynk & Co team finally won the 2021 season championship with 392 points, this championship is also Lynk & Co also completed the first triple crown in the WTCR Caravan World Cup, at the same time, it also created a new history of Chinese car brands in the world arena.
Don't think that the WTCR is a small race with no name, the WTCR World Touring Car Championship is a race that was born after the merger of the WTCC and the TCR. it is an annual series of venue motorhome competitions organized by the International Automobile Federation (FIA). At the same time, it is also one of the four major events under the FIA, in addition to the WTCR, the other three major events are F1, WRC and FIA-GT, it can be said that the WTCR is the highest standard touring car championship today.
At present, Geely Automobile Group has built modeling design and engineering R&D centers in Shanghai, Ningbo, Sweden, Gothenburg, Barcelona, California, Frankfurt, Germany, And Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with more than 20,000 design and R&D personnel and a large number of invention and innovation patents. It has built world-class modern vehicle and powertrain manufacturing plants in China, Belarus and Malaysia, and has more than 1,400 sales outlets of various types.
Geely Holding Group has developed into a global group integrating the design, development, production, sales and service of complete vehicles, powertrains and key components, and covering passenger cars, commercial vehicles, technology, motor sports and culture, travel, finance, digital technology and education.
Geely Group's overall sales in 2021 have not yet been officially released, let's take the overall sales volume in 2020 as an example for the time being. In 2020, Geely Holding Group's three major automotive subsidiaries – Geely Automobile Group, Volvo Car Group and Geely New Energy Commercial Vehicle Group – sold more than 2.1 million units. This is still the result of several months of factory shutdowns during the epidemic, and the overall situation in 2021 is better than in 2020, so it can also be concluded that Geely Group should achieve better results in 2021.
Geely is clearly not satisfied with the status quo, and we can all see that the domestic market can no longer meet Geely's ambitions. Just in November 2021, Geely released the "Dragon Bay Operation". It said that it will comprehensively promote the process of globalization and realize the overseas sales of 600,000 vehicles in 2025. Geely brand will focus on the layout of Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Africa, South America and other "Belt and Road" countries, build more than 600 overseas sales outlets around the world, and enter the European and Asia-Pacific new energy markets. The Lynk & Co brand will deepen the "European Strategy" and "Asia-Pacific Strategy" and deploy in Russia, Malaysia, Australia and New Zealand and other countries, from being born global to moving global. Geely will also create a systematic output of the "Proton model", making PROTON the first automobile brand in Malaysia and the top three in ASEAN.
Written in the end: Geely's current positioning of itself is no longer a car manufacturer, but a global enterprise. Its overseas path is also completely different from other domestic brands, through overseas acquisitions, to achieve the landing of the globalization strategy, and this has also made Geely the most well-known Overseas Chinese automobile company. I believe that in the future, geely automobile and Volvo cars, Proton automobiles, Lotus automobiles between the continuous integration of talent and technology, Geely automobile will also give us greater surprises.