Throw in the towel? It's not time yet
Text/Wu Yuchen
Friends familiar with Chinese chess may know that chess is divided into opening, middle and endgames. But what is not quite the same as everyone expects is that people who are new to chess generally learn the residual chess first, then learn the opening game, and then the middle game.
The reason is also very simple, it is always relatively easy to clean up the mess and play the opening cannon, and how to simplify the situation in the ever-changing mid-game, or maintain the complexity, is a crucial step to winning the game.
Didi, which is about to be delisted, is in the chess game.
On April 16, Didi Chuxing announced that it would hold a shareholders' meeting on May 23 to vote on the delisting of the company's shares from the New York Stock Exchange. In order to better cooperate with the cybersecurity review and rectification measures, the company will no longer apply for listing on other stock exchanges until the delisting is completed.
Didi also said it would continue to explore appropriate measures in the interests of the company and its shareholders, including exploring the possibility of listing on another internationally recognized exchange, subject to applicable rules, regulations, policies and guidance.
The CSRC commented on this matter for the first time, and the person in charge said that the specific case of Didi's independent delisting has nothing to do with other Chinese stocks listed in the United States, and has nothing to do with the ongoing Sino-US audit and regulatory cooperation consultations, and does not affect the cooperation process between the two sides.
Therefore, Didi, which has become a foregone conclusion, really wants to admit defeat?
The financial report was mixed
Along with the news of the upcoming delisting, there are also didi's financial reports for the fourth quarter of last year and the whole year of 2021.
First of all, Q4, Didi achieved revenue of 40.777 billion yuan in Q4, down 12.7% year-on-year; the single-quarter loss was only 170 million, narrowing by nearly 99.4% compared with the dismal Q3 loss, and narrowing by 94.7% from 7.221 billion yuan in the same period last year.
Taking the business apart, the revenue of China's travel business is still the mainstay of Didi, and although the amount of 37.47 billion yuan fell by 12.7% compared with 46.7 billion yuan in the same period of the previous year, it only fell by 4% compared with 42.675 billion yuan in Q3, which is considered to have stabilized in the second half of the year.
The international business that Didi has always valued has risen amazingly, with revenue reaching 1.05 billion, a sharp increase of 51.2% compared with the same period last year; on the other hand, Didi's revenue in other exploration businesses is also quite impressive, with a report card of 2.26 billion yuan also increased by 22.2% compared with the same period last year.
Didi, which was still losing money madly in the first half of the year, how could it have revenue after the APP was fully removed?
The reason for this is that Didi threw off the heaviest burden on its own body in Q4 - Orange Heart Preferred, as the community group buying business department that Didi once gave high hopes, from the second half of 2021, Orange Heart Preferred began to shrink and lay off a large number of employees.
Daily Auto Telecom learned that since August last year, several core business departments of Didi have been continuously recruiting the remaining employees of Orange Heart Preferred, and Didi also confirmed the net investment loss of 20.8 billion yuan of Orange Heart in Q3 last year, and Orange Heart Preferred was subsequently removed from the Didi Chuxing APP.
The failure of Orange Heart Preferred also led to a very interesting phenomenon in Didi's 2021 annual financial report, with the three main businesses growing across the board, with China's travel business increasing by 20% year-on-year, international business increasing by 55.4% year-on-year, and other exploration businesses increasing by 68.1% year-on-year. However, the net loss attributable to common shareholders reached a staggering 50.031 billion yuan, nearly 4 times larger than the same period last year.
Nowadays, Didi's troika pattern has been very solid, and the three parts of the Chinese travel sector (domestic online ride-hailing, taxi, substitute driving and hitchhiking businesses), the international business sector (international travel and takeaway businesses) and other businesses (shared bicycles and motorcycles, car services, freight, autonomous driving and financial services and other businesses) are basically difficult to shake as The basic disk of Didi.
After all, even if last year was so difficult, Didi's market share in online ride-hailing only fell from 90% to 70%, and the average daily single volume fell from 25 million to 20 million, although it was a heavy blow for Didi itself, but other travel software is still difficult to really change the phenomenon of Didi's dominance in the travel market.
Building a car, it is difficult to distinguish between true and false
But can Didi, which has retired from the market, really sit back and relax? Not necessarily.
Since being exposed to the "Da Vinci" plan, Didi, which has always been low-key, has a "I don't pretend, I have a showdown" posture, and the news of various acquisitions and cooperations is flying everywhere.
In early April, according to foreign media reports, Didi was negotiating with Haima Automobile to cooperate in the production of electric vehicles, and Didi was also discussing potential partnerships with other automakers. But discussions are ongoing, and Didi has yet to make a final decision on cooperation.
Speaking of Haima, most people may think of Xiaopeng, before getting the production qualification of the self-built factory, Haima Automobile had produced its first mass production car, the Xiaopeng G3, for Xiaopeng OEM. Until December last year, Xiaopeng's factory was fully prepared, and cooperation with Haima came to an abrupt end.
Xiaopeng, who is moving towards the high-end, may no longer need Haima, but Didi, which targets the online ride-hailing market and household A-class pure electric vehicles, is still very eager for a partner that has been recognized by the market.
In addition to car manufacturing, another heavy news from Didi is the intention to acquire Cao Cao Travel, there is news that a number of Didi employees joined Cao Cao Travel, such as Gong Xin, who was the general manager of the Didi Chauffeur Business Department and was responsible for driving, chauffeur-hailing and regional online ride-hailing business, as CEO of Caocao Chuxing, and Didi intends to acquire Caocao Chuxing at the appropriate time.
Although the relevant person in charge of CaoCao Travel said that the rumors were untrue, the management adjustment of Cao Cao Travel has become imperative, and Zhou Hang, the founder of Easy to Use Car, has become the chairman of Cao Cao Travel.
As Geely Holdings, Cao Cao Travel, which only completed a B round of financing of 3.8 billion yuan in September last year, although the position of the second echelon of the industry is now very stable, the gap between it and Didi in daily and monthly activities is already an insurmountable gap in a short period of time.
After the number of users and the number of drivers have reached the ceiling, players in the travel market have fallen into a zero-sum game, and each additional user/driver means that there will be one less user/driver on their side, which is an irreversible trend. Many people in the industry feel that Cao Cao Chuxing is borrowing rumors from Didi to complete a new round of financing, or even sprint IPO.
But from another point of view, Didi is not the beneficiary of rumors, after the car-making plan was exposed, as a player who entered the market after the entry, Didi naturally needs some momentum and gimmicks, but the most important card held by Didi is currently in the domestic "thunder, rain is small" in the field of automatic driving, the development of technology has never been gradual, but in the window period will usher in a huge leap, do not want to miss the outlet of Didi has invested a huge amount of money in it.
For the whole of 2021, Didi's R&D investment increased by 49.0% to 9.415 billion yuan. Even in the case of the decline in Q4 revenue, Didi's research and development expenses in the current quarter still increased by 34.3% to 2.466 billion yuan.
How to support the "long-term return of automatic driving" is the most important problem for Didi in the field of car manufacturing.
Write at the end
Didi, which has become a foregone conclusion, is far from the moment of the endgame game, on the contrary, in the "idle moment" related to the listing, Didi has enough time to sort out and integrate the current three major product lines, clean up the mess left by the orange heart, and reserve enough ammunition for the car, after all, as of the end of December 2021, Didi's cash reserves are still as high as 43.4 billion yuan.
Having money is the biggest way out.