Despite the liquidity problems faced by the network, Baoneng does not seem to have reduced its investment in the automotive business.
Recently, Baoneng Automobile held a new car tasting meeting in Guangzhou, officially releasing two new models, including the GX5 (internal code GX16) under the new high-end new energy vehicle brand "BAO" unveiled in June last year, and the QOROS 6 under the Qoros brand.
Yao Zhenhua, chairman of Baoneng Group, and executives of Baoqi Group are the new station platform.
In his speech, Yao Zhenhua mentioned that in the past year, the Guangzhou Development Zone Management Committee and the Huangpu District Government have given guidance and support, and Baoneng Automobile has "achieved rapid development".
Baoneng has a lot of intersection with Huangpu District, especially in 2021, Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group announced that it will land its headquarters in Guangzhou Development Zone and obtained a strategic investment of 12 billion yuan from state-owned enterprises in Guangzhou Development Zone; since the second half of last year, state-owned enterprises in the development zone have begun to take over a number of real estate projects in Baoneng in Guangzhou.
In January this year, Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile, another important platform, also introduced the Science City Group and the Knowledge City Group as war investments. Local state-owned enterprises have successively rushed to the aid to solve the urgent need of Baoneng Automobile.
At present, Baoneng said that it is promoting the research and development of new energy models, base construction, equipment introduction and other work at full speed.
It should be noted that in the latest cooperation, the board seat of Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile occupies 4 seats in the state-owned enterprises of the development zone, and Baoneng occupies 3 seats.
Seeing automobiles as its core business and betting on Baoneng in Guangzhou attracts new capital to enter the market, it also carries more.
Baoneng Guangzhou made cars
In the five years since Baoneng transformed its car manufacturing business, Guangzhou has always occupied an important position.
In March 2017, "Baoneng Automobile Co., Ltd." was established in Shenzhen, and a month later, Baoneng Group signed a cooperation agreement on major industrial projects with Guangzhou Huangpu District and Guangzhou Development Zone, involving the headquarters of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, new energy and innovation value park projects.
In September of the same year, "Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile Co., Ltd." was registered in Sino-Singapore Knowledge City, and in October, the new company acquired 275,000 square meters of "Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park" project land. By the end of the year, the project started rapidly, claiming a total investment of 30 billion yuan, the first phase of the planned production capacity of 500,000 new energy vehicles, vehicle and parts manufacturing output value of more than 100 billion yuan.
During that time, Baoneng began to acquire 25% of the equity of Qoros Automobile from Chery Automobile, and other cities also had reserves for new energy automobile industrial park projects. Yao Zhenhua said with great ambition that the new energy automobile industrial park is an important measure for Baoneng to transform and develop the real economy, and strives to build a new automobile group with international influence in 10-15 years.
According to the new media, in April 2020, guangzhou development zone also signed an agreement with Baoneng, according to which Baoneng stated that on the basis of building a new energy vehicle manufacturing base, automotive power batteries, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area headquarters and other projects, Baoneng International New Trade Innovation Center, Baoneng International Medical Center, Baoneng International Intelligent Manufacturing Innovation Center, Baoneng International Science and Technology Innovation Center and other projects will be laid out.
At the concentrated construction of major projects in Huangpu District in the second quarter of 2020, the Guangzhou Baoneng Intelligent Manufacturing Center project was announced, with a total investment of 21 billion yuan, involving an annual production capacity of 300,000 new energy vehicle bases.
However, even the Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park, which was the first to land, has been in operation for three years, but the progress is still slow.
In November 2020, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) required local development and reform commissions to report on the investment in new energy vehicles in various places, which clearly required detailed reports on the complete vehicle and parts projects invested and proposed to be invested and built by Evergrande, Baoneng and other enterprises since 2017.
The Administrative Examination and Approval Bureau of Guangzhou Development Zone disclosed that in late July 2020, four months before the issuance of the document by the National Development and Reform Commission, the Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park project is still planning to make program adjustments, including some janitor rooms, B1 parts assembly workshops, office buildings, production management centers, new planning supporting offices, plants, parts assembly plants, etc.
The slow schedule is also reflected in the most important link of new energy vehicle research and development and mass production.
At the Beijing Auto Show in September 2020 and the Guangzhou Auto Show in November, Baoneng Automobile successively unveiled only Qoros 7 and Qoros 5S, which is the first batch of works launched by Baoneng three years after the acquisition of Qoros, but it is still questioned by the outside world that the overall configuration is low and the competitiveness is not strong enough. Also unveiled at the same time was the Qoros Milestone (i.e., milestone) concept car, which has received little news since then.
After entering 2021, Baoneng Group has been affected by liquidity shortages, and only in the automobile business, including relevant subsidiaries in Xi'an, Shenzhen, Guangzhou and other cities, there are wage arrears and social security provident funds. Projects, including the Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park, also have the pressure to stop work.
However, there are indications that Baoneng's layout for new energy vehicles has not been interrupted.
Taking the core platform of new energy vehicles "Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group" as an example, the company has established three new companies since the second half of 2021, of which the automotive software company named "Qianhai Seven Swords" is committed to mastering the core technologies and development methods and processes for intelligent vehicles.
At this stage, chi aid from Guangzhou state-owned assets largely "saved" Baoneng Automobile.
On June 15 last year, Baoneng Group signed a strategic cooperation agreement with the Guangzhou Development Zone, agreeing to settle the headquarters of "Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group" in the Guangzhou Development Zone, and the state-owned enterprises in the Guangzhou Development Zone will strategically invest 12 billion yuan in the platform.
According to industrial and commercial information, Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group, through Hangzhou Chengmao Investment Co., Ltd., holds 63% of the equity of Qoros Automobile Co., Ltd. This means that Qoros Will officially enter the arms of Guangzhou Huangpu.
According to the new media of the viewpoint, two days before the signing of the above-mentioned signing, Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group has completed the change of industrial and commercial information, and the business premises have been changed from Baoneng Science and Technology Park in Longhua District, Shenzhen to No. 1 Yichuang Street, Sino-Singapore Knowledge City, Guangzhou.
However, Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group is still 50% owned by Baoneng Automobile and Baoneng Holdings respectively, reflecting that the funds of state-owned enterprises in the Guangzhou Development Zone may be more reflected in debt investment.
At present, the equity of this platform is basically in a state of waiting to be frozen.
Two platforms are tilted
Following the introduction of the 12 billion war investment, Baoneng Automobile released the luxury intelligent new energy vehicle brand "BAO" on June 24, 2021, and announced that it will release the first pure electric SUV within the year, and there will be at least 16 new models in the next five years.
For Baoneng Automobile's addition of a new brand on the basis of Qoros, market commentators believe that this mainly isolates the positioning of new cars from Qoros, because Qoros once positioned the high-end market, and after being acquired by Baoneng, it has taken a people-friendly route, and sales are difficult to say ideal. Without pricing power, it is difficult to maximize profits.
According to media reports, Qoros's sales in 2019-2020 and the first half of 2021 were about 22,700 units, 13,100 units and 4,380 units, showing a downward trend.
The "BAO" brand's first car, codenamed "GX16", is said to have completed the power system test and the winter calibration of the vehicle parameters in March last year, and it is reported that it was originally planned to be released in mid-last year, but has since been postponed due to financing problems. The model was developed by Baoneng Automobile Guangzhou Research Institute, which is now 100% owned by Baoneng Automobile Technology Co., Ltd.
Baoneng Automotive Technology is one of the newly established companies of Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group in the second half of 2020, and from it, it can also find the slush claws adjusted by Baoneng Automobile.
Baoneng Automotive Technology was established on September 14, 2020, with a registered capital of 1 billion yuan; on September 27, Baoneng Automobile Co., Ltd., the original major shareholder of Guangzhou Research Institute, was upgraded to "Baoneng Automobile Group", and its headquarters is still in Shenzhen, which means that Baoneng's car manufacturing business has begun to develop towards collectivization.
In mid-December, Baoneng Automobile Group officially transferred the three research institutes in Guangzhou, Kunshan and Xi'an and Hainan Research Company to the name of Baoneng Automobile Technology.
Source: Opinion Index Collation
After the internal adjustment in the second half of 2020 and the signing of a contract with Guangzhou Huangpu in the first half of 2021, Baoneng Automobile has basically realized the convergence of R&D and manufacturing functions and direct control of new energy vehicles in "Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group", which belongs to Guangzhou enterprises.
In addition to the development work, the "GX16" equipped with Baoneng Automobile's hope to turn over is also planned to land in Guangzhou. Among them, Baoneng Automobile's Guangzhou base resumed work in September last year; at the end of November, the contractor China Construction Third Bureau disclosed that Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park completed the first large-scale integration of the grid frame of the new energy industrial park in the Greater Bay Area.
Behind the Guangzhou base that undertakes the task of mass production, another important platform is pulled out: Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile Co., Ltd.
Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile, as the leading party of Guangzhou Baoneng New Energy Automobile Industrial Park, began to adjust its structure in November last year.
At that time, the controlling interest of Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile was transferred from Baoneng Automobile Group to Guangzhou Baoyao Enterprise Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Guangzhou Baoyao), whose registered capital was only 10 million yuan, equivalent to the existence of a shell platform, which was held by Baoneng Automobile Group, Guangzhou Zhuolang Enterprise Management Group Co., Ltd. (referred to as Guangzhou Zhuolang) and Guangzhou Lewei Enterprise Management Co., Ltd. (referred to as Guangzhou Lewei) held 81%, 9% and 10% of the shares respectively.
Guangzhou Zhuolang and Guangzhou Lewei were both established on September 18 last year, and their registered addresses are located in Room 607 and Room 608, Room 601, No. 280 West Xiangxue Avenue, Huangpu District, respectively. Among them, the actual controller of Guangzhou Lewei is Tang Xiangfeng, and a blog in 2016 on the Internet shows that the person with the same name "Tang Xiangfeng" was engaged in financial software development and management work in Baoneng Group at that time.
In January 2022, Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile was invested in science city (Guangzhou) Investment Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Science City Group) and Knowledge City (Guangzhou) Investment Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as SSGKC Group), each holding 41% and 10%, and Guangzhou Baoyao's shareholding was reduced to 49%; the total share capital of the company was still 2.141 billion yuan.
Different from the potential debt investment in Baoneng New Energy Automobile Group, the state-owned enterprises in Guangzhou Development Zone have now involved cooperation at the equity level, and the equity structure is also the difference between the two platforms.
After the adjustment, Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile has been equited by the state-owned enterprises in the Guangzhou Development Zone, and in the board seats, the directors with Baoneng's background are Song Weiyang, Lu Xingze and Sun Li, and the local state-owned enterprises have 4 directors.
This is interpreted as state-owned enterprises bringing more endorsement effects while also taking measures to ensure the smooth operation of enterprises.
At the cost of control, Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile won more support. At the Baoneng Automobile New Car Tasting Meeting on January 22, Yao Zhenhua said that Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile introduced the strategic shareholding of state-owned enterprises in the development zone, and is currently promoting the research and development of new energy models, base construction, equipment introduction and other work at full speed.
According to Baoneng's plan in September last year, Baoneng Automobile's Guangzhou base strives to complete the construction of the project plant by the end of last year, and will mass-produce new models such as GX16 in 2022.
By the January new car tasting meeting, the disclosed timetable was changed to the completion of the plant construction target by the end of March this year, and the GX16 "strives to roll off the production line in July this year".
Bets under debt
At the Baoneng Young Cadres Symposium in August last year, Yao Zhenhua publicly stated that car manufacturing is a specific action of Baoneng's major strategy for transformation and development, and Baoneng resolutely builds a "leading domestic and international first-class integrated automobile group"; in September, Yao Zhenhua once again stressed that automobiles are the first core business of Baoneng Group and resolutely carry out the car-making business to the end.
The above intensive statement occurred under the reality of signing a contract with Baoneng Automobile Guangzhou Development Zone and the company falling into liquidity difficulties.
Baoneng explained the reason that the company invested more than 50 billion yuan in its own funds in the entire automotive industry chain, superimposed on the impact of the epidemic and the impact of macro-control, and the problems such as the centralized maturity of debts, the redemption of wealth management products, supplier payment, and employee wage payment appeared, which it described as a time that had never been seen in 29 years.
According to the disclosure of Zhongju Gaoxin, as of the end of September 2021, Baoneng Group has interest-bearing liabilities totaling 192.7 billion yuan and a balance of 30.8 billion yuan in external guarantees; of which the liquidity gap funds with a tight time are about 20 billion yuan, including a total of 8.349 billion yuan for the redemption of wealth management products, 2.6 billion yuan for project funds, and about 8.5 billion yuan for some operating funds and principal and interest due.
The above liabilities also involve the car-making business, and a product document obtained by Zhongrong Trust obtained by Viewpoint New Media shows that it initiated the establishment of a trust plan in May 2020, and the relevant funds were used for the development and construction loan of the new energy automobile industrial park under the name of Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile, and the debtor defaulted in the second half of last year.
However, Yao Zhenhua believes that this is a "temporary liquidity difficulty", and Baoneng's cumulative revenue as of the third quarter of last year was 110 billion yuan, and the fundamentals continued to improve. It continued that at present, it is necessary to promote vehicle manufacturing, power battery factory construction, and actively promote the introduction of war.
According to the plan to withdraw funds, Baoneng intends to use prices below the market valuation to accelerate the disposal of some high-quality assets, on the one hand, to sell equity in many old renovations, office buildings and other projects in the Greater Bay Area, and on the other hand, to actively promote the sale of real estate inventory.
Zhongju Gaoxin disclosed that Baoneng expects to recover nearly 4.8 billion yuan in the fourth quarter of last year, and launched the sale of 8 major projects in Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, with an appraisal value of more than 100 billion yuan, and is expected to return about 20 billion yuan.
Guangzhou, as a city where Baoneng has made significant investments in the past few years, has made initial progress in asset disposal. Including the Baoneng Financial Center project in Science City in Huangpu District, which has been taken over by local state-owned enterprises, the main interests of the SSGKC Maple Renovation Project have also been transferred to the Science City Group.
And the projects signed in 2020 have also begun to fade.
At the end of September last year, Science City Group, Together with Guangzhou High-tech Zone Group and Knowledge City Group, established a joint venture company with a registered capital of 9.2 billion yuan; on January 17 this year, the joint venture company announced that it would bid for the HP-WC-01 plot in Huangpu District for 8.84 billion yuan, which was renamed from "Baoneng International New Trade Innovation Center" to "Bay Area International Innovation Center Project", with a total investment of 36.214 billion yuan.
After the disposal of the above projects, Baoneng mainly includes assets such as new energy vehicle bases, power battery bases, and Qoros Cultural Centers in Guangzhou, most of which are related to the car-making business. At the same time, the new energy vehicle base successfully resumed work, and Guangzhou Baoneng Automobile also introduced science city group and knowledge city group as war investment.
Coincidentally, in October last year, Xu Jiayin, chairman of the board of directors of Evergrande Group, also proposed to complete the industrial transformation from real estate to new energy vehicles in 10 years.
Baoneng and Evergrande, in the face of liquidity problems in the strategic decision-making is surprisingly similar, both choose to transform into a new energy vehicle track. This is often easier to get new capital and capital than traditional real estate.
The two companies also maintained a similar rhythm in the research and development of new cars: on January 12 this year, Evergrande Automobile's first model "Hengchi 5" rolled off the production line in advance, and 10 days later, GX16 was officially unveiled as the first model of Baoneng's "BAO" brand; both cars released information to the outside world, saying that mass production has entered the countdown.
For new players of new energy vehicles, "mass production" has a milestone significance from 0 to 1, which means that from parts to orders have become large-scale development, and enterprises have entered the "harvest period". But this is also a thrilling leap, including Faraday Future, the mass production has been delayed.
What's more, mass production of a good model is more challenging. Under the outlet of new energy vehicles, everyone wants to become Tesla, but selectively ignores the fact that Tesla once hovered on the line of life and death, and launched the explosive Model S for 9 years.
Yao Zhenhua also mentioned that Baoneng automobiles, power batteries, linkage cloud, and financial sectors have not been listed on the IPO, and the "huge potential" in the capital market has not yet been released. Referring to the industry leader, the data shows that Tesla's current total market value is about $941.4 billion, with a price-to-earnings ratio (TTM) of more than 170 times.
This may be the reason why he firmly believes that Baoneng's assets are high-quality and the risks are completely controllable.
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