Chang'an's new energy heart has moved again

It seems that this time, Changan Automobile is finally going to make a real move in the new energy vehicle market. On April 7, Avita, a high-end electric vehicle brand under Changan Automobile, unveiled its new car, Avita 011.

Avita is a brand new attempt by Changan Automobile in the field of new energy. In November 2020, Changan Automobile announced that it will work with Huawei and CATL to jointly build a new high-end car brand and develop a new electric vehicle platform, which will be jointly named after the initials of the three companies, that is, the CHN platform. At that time, it was rumored in the industry that the new high-end automobile brand would borrow The backdoor Changan Automobile and Weilai Automobile's 2018 joint venture Changan Weilai.

In May 2021, Changan Automobile's announcement confirmed the above speculation, saying that Changan Niolai New Energy Automobile Technology Co., Ltd., a holding subsidiary of Changan Automobile, has officially changed its name to Avita Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Avita Technology"). Subsequently, Changan Automobile officially unveiled the Avita brand and completed the capital increase and share expansion of Avita Technology in November. According to the announcement at that time, Avita Technology introduced three major investors, namely the consortium of Ningde Times and Fujian Mindong, the consortium of Chongqing Cheng'an and Liangjiangxi Securities, and the consortium of Southern Assets and Southern Industrial Fund.

Reorganizing the shareholding structure and releasing a new brand, Changan's drama stage aimed at sprinting into the high-end new energy vehicle market has been gradually set up, and the next is the "protagonist" debut. The first contestant to take the stage did not make everyone wait too long, as the first model of the Avita brand, the Avita 11 was officially unveiled in November last year. And just yesterday (April 7), Avita officially reported new progress, based on Avita 11 to create a co-brand model - electric coupe SUV Avita 011. It is reported that Avita 011 is a joint model of Avita and fashion brand MMW, which adopts a black design inside and outside, and the LOGO of MMW is printed on the side skirt, which is limited to 500 units worldwide.

Avita 011, Image source: Avita

As a prototype car, the date of the official arrival of the Avita 11 is also getting closer and closer. According to the previous product planning of Avita, Avita 11 will be officially released at this year's Beijing Auto Show (which was supposed to open in April, but due to the current domestic epidemic, the Beijing Auto Show has been postponed to June), and the delivery will begin in the third quarter.

Chang'an can't afford to delay the new energy plan

In about a year, Avita will go through the whole process from the establishment of the brand to the delivery of new products, even in the current domestic new energy vehicle market, which is generally focused on "fast pace", Avita is also a rare "fast gunner".

Why pursue fast?

From the perspective of the external environment, there are more and more potential opponents in the market segment. In addition to the new car-making forces such as Weilai and Ideal, high-end new energy projects also incubated by traditional automobile companies have recently sprung up like mushrooms. Dongfeng's Lantu, SAIC's Zhiji, Geely's Krypton, BYD's upcoming high-end brand and the Denza project that has been re-empowered, etc., the domestic high-end new energy vehicle track has gradually become crowded. Avita of Chang'an is a complete latecomer, and speeding up is an inevitable choice.

Avita logo, image source: Avita

More importantly, Avita focuses on the tripartite division of labor of Changan Automobile + Ningde Era + Huawei, and the biggest gimmick is undoubtedly "Huawei Car". When Avita 11 debuted last year, it took the huawei HI (Huawei Inside) full-stack smart car solution as a big publicity point, but the problem is that this point is a breakthrough attempt inside Changan Automobile, but there is not much mystery in the entire market.

First of all, although the gimmick of "Huawei-made car" is very sufficient, Huawei officials do not admit that Huawei has repeatedly stressed that it will not build its own car and will not invest in car companies (last year, there was no Huawei figure among the three new investors introduced by Avita Technology). Secondly, the mass production of Huawei's intelligent solution is not the first time, even if it is more like Huawei's "pro-son" question (official delivery has begun in March), the Same With Huawei's full-stack intelligent car solution, the Polar Fox Alpha S, which is also equipped with Huawei's full-stack intelligent car solution, has been mass-produced and delivered at the end of last year, and Avita has not been able to grab the marketing flash point of the first installation.

All indications show that Avita can't afford to drag it out, and if Chang'an wants to make a name for itself in the new energy market, it can't afford to drag it out.

Inside Changan Automobile, there is a relatively clear understanding of the industry consensus that new energy vehicles represent the future. In the past few years, there have not only been independent new energy vehicle projects, but also jointly created a number of new energy vehicle projects with other partners. Changan Automobile can also be described as ambitious in the field of new energy, but the actual effect is not ideal.

The sales data compiled by Gaz Automobile shows that 2021 is definitely a year of independent picking of beams within Changan Group. In 2021, the Group will sell a total of 2.3 million vehicles, of which the cumulative sales of passenger cars will be 1.636 million units, and the sales volume contributed by Changan Group's own brands will be about 1.2 million units.

The independent business is making great progress, but in the new energy market, Changan Automobile's explosive power is obviously insufficient, and the only volume model is Changan Ben E-Star. Under the background of the collective development of the domestic micro-electric vehicle market in 2021, Changan Ben E-Star achieved a substantial increase of more than 300%, with 76,000 vehicles sold throughout the year. But in addition, Changan Automobile has no other bright spots in the field of new energy.

Ben E-Star, image source: Changan Automobile

Compared with the new version of the electrification plan that Zhu Huarong, chairman of Changan Automobile, just formulated for Changan Automobile not long ago: in 2025, the sales volume of new energy vehicles will be 1.05 million, accounting for 35% of the sales of new vehicles; by 2030, the annual sales of 2.7 million vehicles, accounting for 60% of the total, it has to be said that Changan's goal of catching up in the field of new energy is not small.

Chang'an's new energy needs to be broken

Obviously, Changan Automobile has not eaten the market dividend of the rapid growth of the domestic new energy market in recent years, and the reason in the final analysis is that it misjudged the situation when promoting the new energy strategy.

Similar to the situation of many other independent car companies, many years ago, Changan Automobile also saw the signs of the imminent full outbreak of domestic new energy vehicles, and based on this, drew a grand new energy pie. In October 2017, at the China International Energy Conservation and New Energy Vehicle Exhibition, Changan Automobile launched the Shangri-La Plan, which was once seen as a prelude to Changan Automobile's electrification transformation. According to Shangri-La's plan, Changan Automobile has formulated two important time nodes, one is to build three new energy dedicated platforms by 2020, and the other is to realize the electrification of full-spectrum products by 2025. In order to successfully promote the above goals, Changan Automobile announced at that time that it would invest 100 billion yuan in the field of new energy vehicles to support the Shangri-La plan.

Changan Automobile launches Shangri-La Plan, image source: Changan Automobile

With great ambition and determination, Changan Automobile has put up a posture of giving it a go in the field of new energy, and even set up a new energy division of Changan Automobile (after which Changan Automobile divested the division and became an independent subsidiary - Changan New Energy). However, Changan's electrification transformation plan, which has been highly concerned by the industry this time, is thunderous and rainy, and a number of new energy models have not enjoyed the treatment of the new energy exclusive platform, and they are still taking the primary route of oil to electricity. In the past few years, Changan Automobile has successively launched Yidong EV, Yidong PHEV, Benben EV, Oriway EV, CS75 PHEV, Changan CS15 EV and other models in the new energy vehicle market, without exception, all of which are transformed from oil vehicles.

Overall, in the initial stage of the domestic new energy vehicle market, there are indeed many domestic and foreign car companies are focusing on "oil to electricity", looking forward to relying on their experience and platform advantages accumulated in the traditional power field to take a shortcut to the new energy market. However, in the face of a number of menacing new car-making forces, the advantages of the "oil to electricity" route of traditional car companies (the rapid launch of new products to seize the market) have not been played, and the disadvantages have been infinitely magnified. Although the new energy vehicles based on the fuel vehicles of each car company will be optimized in details, the types of models have a congenital defect that is difficult to make up, because the core components such as batteries need to be reloaded (the assembly position was not reserved at the beginning of the model design), and had to occupy the space inside the car, which also led to the internal space of most of the oil-to-electricity models on the market is relatively limited, and the final result is that the market space is not large.

After two consecutive years of large losses in 2018 and 2019, at the end of 2019, Changan Automobile said that the difficulty of developing new energy business alone will continue to increase, and it is necessary to introduce external resources to resist risks. To this end, Changan Automobile announced that it will introduce strategic investors to Changan New Energy, diluting the self-owned share ratio from 100% to 48.9546%.

Shangri-La's plan to promote is blocked, Changan Automobile's previous simple oil to electricity route is an important influencing factor, but looking back at the moment, Changan Automobile's previous attachment to the oil reform circuit line also has its practical reasons. Soon after the announcement of the Shangri-La plan, Changan Automobile's original smooth oil truck business also experienced relatively large fluctuations, the market performance once plummeted, and it was difficult for the enterprise to maintain the original basic market disk, and it was obviously not time to distract from the new energy business, in other words, Changan's core resources should not have really begun to tilt to the new energy business in the previous few years. In addition, Changan Automobile's progress in the field of new energy has been slightly lagging behind, and the lack of core technology has led to Changan Automobile at that time can only adhere to the transition policy of oil to electricity.

Fortunately, after about three consecutive years of corporate adjustment, Changan Automobile has returned to positive development. In 2020 and 2021, Changan Group has sold more than 2 million vehicles for two consecutive years. Especially in terms of independent business, under the collective efforts of Changan CS75 series, Yidong car series, UNI family, etc., as well as the continuous hot sales of many models under the Auchan brand, Changan has once again demonstrated the confidence of "independent brother".

Based on this, it is a logical choice to re-map new energy.

Changan UNI-K hybrid, image source: Changan Automobile

This time, Chang'an's new energy road should take the high-end market as a breakthrough. Although the previous cooperation with Weilai has not produced results, the successor Avita has a more weighty "partner", CATL is the second largest shareholder, Huawei is an important partner, Changan Automobile has obviously poured more resources, and the next thing to do is to race against time under the premise of ensuring product quality, and strive for an opportunity to catch up later. In addition, in the current hot hybrid market, Changan Automobile has also begun to layout. At the 2021 Chongqing Auto Show, Changan Automobile released the Blue Whale iDD hybrid system, and the first model under the system, The Changan UNI-K iDD, has been put on the market (two versions, priced at 176,900 yuan and 192,900 yuan respectively). Pure electricity and hybrid two routes under the high-end road, Changan Automobile is currently trying, I hope this time, waiting for Changan new energy business will be a good result.