A press conference that "detonated" the Internet
At two o'clock yesterday afternoon, Xiaomi held an automotive technology conference, Lei Jun changed the previous "jeans + casual shirt" collocation, wearing a formal black shirt and gray blazer, and the speech lasted for three hours, far exceeding the original scheduled two hours. He hopes to present the technical highlights of Xiaomi cars in all aspects, but he still makes the audience have a sense of "this is a mobile phone conference".
This Xiaomi automotive technology conference,It can be called a XiaomiSU7Pre-conference conference,In addition to the price that everyone is most concerned about,Lei Jun almost talked about SU7 from software to hardware,Fully introduced the motor、Battery、Intelligence、Body shape、Interior and even color,And "science and technology X ecology" of the concept of car manufacturing.
Lei Jun didn't want to save a car. At the beginning of the press conference, Lei Jun expressed his attitude: "If you save a car, it will be almost the same if you invest three or four hundred R&D personnel and one billion yuan." In the 1,003-day car research and development process, Xiaomi invested more than 10 billion yuan and more than 3,400 engineers.
Lei Jun said that since integrated die-casting is an industry trend, Xiaomi must be ahead of the trend. Xiaomi's full-stack self-developed large die-casting achieved 9,100 tons, surpassing Tesla's 9,000 tons that had just landed in the United States.
For Lei Jun, it is of little significance to surpass the weight alone, and Xiaomi has also made another consideration from the user's perspective while saving manufacturing costs. The use of integrated die-casting models, often for users to repair the cost is higher, Xiaomi car adopts a three-stage serviceable design - integrated die-casting rear floor + medium and high-speed collapse area + low-speed collapse area, in the middle and low-speed collision, there is no need to replace large die castings, and in high-speed collision, this design can also meet the 90km/h rear collision standard.
The Xiaomi Super Motor V6/V6s is in mass production at 21,000 rpm, and the Mi Super Motor V8s is in mass production and will be launched in 2025 with the highest speed in the industry at 27,200 rpm. Xiaomi has also carried out rotor pre-research technology, and the laboratory pre-research has achieved a speed of 35000rpm. This will also refresh the ceiling of the world's motor speed, which is the world's top motor, and it is not too much to say that it is far ahead.
In the field of batteries, Xiaomi has developed the world's first inverted CTB integrated battery (that is, the battery and the vehicle floor are integrated) battery. The battery pack has a maximum capacity of 150 degrees and a theoretical CLTC range of more than 1,200km. In terms of battery technology, Xiaomi's self-developed 800V silicon carbide high-voltage platform can achieve a charging voltage of up to 871V, for which they have also built their own battery pack factory. In terms of battery safety protection, the battery pack of Xiaomi Auto SU7 has 17 layers of high-voltage insulation protection and uses 165 pieces of aerogel insulation, which is a material applied to astronauts' spacesuits. Lei Jun said that the material can withstand temperatures of 1,000 degrees Celsius, but the cost is high.
Xiaomi Auto 800V Silicon Carbide High Voltage Platform Diagram / Xiaomi Auto Official
Lei Jun also talked about the progress of intelligent driving today, in terms of hardware, Xiaomi cars use two NVIDIA Orin chips with computing power of 508TOPS, and the perception hardware also includes 1 lidar, 11 high-definition cameras, 3 millimeter wave radars and 12 ultrasonic radars on the Max version of the model. In terms of software, Xiaomi Auto has adopted the most mainstream scheme - BEV+ occupies the network. Xiaomi Auto's adaptive zoom BEV technology can zoom like a human eye, and adaptively invoke different perception algorithms according to different scenarios. The perception grid is as small as 0.05m and as large as 0.2m, and the recognition range extends from 5cm to 250m.
Objectively speaking, looking at the whole press conference, there is indeed nothing worth a "lying x" black technology in technology, but it does reflect the slogan of Lei Jun's car: ten times the investment, seriously make a good car.
"The age of adults has changed"
At this press conference, Mr. Lei even used the "fifty most words" to mark the leading aspects of Xiaomi cars, and used the "both want and want" method to express the "expensive and reasonable" characteristics of Xiaomi cars.
However, judging from the market performance on the day, Xiaomi's share price fell slightly by 0.25% on the same day, and the trading volume increased slightly. According to the analysis of institutional investors, this means that investors are divided on the current Xiaomi, and the press conference has not yet given content that investors think exceeds expectations. The downward setback in the stock price has shot out doubts about Xiaomi's new direction and uncertainty about the future.
Perhaps in Lei Jun's eyes, this conference should be exciting and full of sincerity, but at least judging from this press conference, the debut of Xiaomi cars does not seem to have fully achieved the expected effect. Many netizens feel that it's over, don't be friends with me anymore.
At the press conference, Lei Jun bluntly said that the price of SU7 should not be 99,000, impossible, and should not be talked about 149,000, we still have to respect technology. However, there were still audience members shouting "199,000!"
A number of automotive analysts and industry analysts believe that Xiaomi Auto should rely on its own supply chain capabilities to make the low-profile version cost-effective, with a price of less than 200,000 yuan, and at the same time increase the price of a single car through the intelligent driving version as the main force. Zhu Yulong, an analyst in the automotive industry, bluntly said that in terms of configuration, SU7 gives consumers a feeling worth 300,000, and it will take some time to set the price. Some people close to Xiaomi Auto said that the pricing is still being discussed, and it is not an easy decision.
It may be that Xiaomi really hasn't decided on a price yet, but Xiaomi's ambitions have long been exposed, and Lei Jun said he hopes that Xiaomi cars will not become obsolete in five years. The first and second phases of the Xiaomi factory have a total planned annual production capacity of 300,000 vehicles, and the first priority at the moment is how to achieve a balance between supply and demand.
So at present, Lei Jun probably hasn't thought about it, but what he said about "expensive" is not necessarily really expensive, and it may also be a marketing strategy. Lei Jun has always been a master of expectation management,Before the release of Xiaomi Mi 9,It was claimed that this mobile phone would be "a lot more expensive" than Xiaomi Mi 8",But in fact,Mi 96GB+128GB version is priced at 2999 yuan,Mi 86GB+64GB version2699 yuan,A gap of three hundred yuan and double the memory progress,It's really not expensive。 And what "the last 1999 mobile phone", "the last 2999 mobile phone" and so on, the words were told to him.
Although most netizens are talking about price, technology is more worth discussing. In terms of performance, beating Porsche seems to have become a reserved program for global car companies, but the acceleration of 100 kilometers in 2.78s can only be regarded as okay, and the Tesla Cybertruck next door can run 2.7s as a pickup truck.
In terms of autonomous driving, which everyone is concerned about, Xiaomi has also adopted the BEV+Transformer scheme to remove high-definition maps. This is the intelligent driving solution that Tesla, Xpeng and others have advocated in the past two years. Xiaomi Auto plans to enter the first echelon of intelligent driving in 2024, hoping to achieve urban pilot assisted driving in 100 cities. In contrast, Huawei has been able to achieve nationwide availability, and Xpeng Motors' XNGP has also been implemented in more than 50 cities. However, Xiaomi's current price has not yet been determined, and the delivery is far away, and intelligent driving needs to accumulate a large amount of real data, and with more feedback from real users, the intelligent driving system can be better improved.
The Xiaomi car mobile phone is interconnected with the car machine. Photo / Xiaomi Auto Official
Xiaomi Auto SU7 armor cage steel-aluminum hybrid body, the torsional rigidity of the vehicle is 51000N· m/deg, Lei Jun called it "the world's first", but ignored the NIO ET9 with higher parameters than them, reaching 52600N· m/deg。
Frankly speaking, it is not that Lei always does not work hard, but that the volume is the standard configuration of this industry is not worth paying attention to, self-developed batteries, self-developed chassis, large models of cars, intelligent cockpits, smart lights, etc., it is already the basic operation in the basic operation, and it is embarrassing to develop a development conference without these.
Therefore, Lei Jun no longer emphasizes market disruption, but focuses on creating an "expensive but reasonable" product. Such a shift is clearly a departure from Xiaomi's usual user image – the preferred brand for young people and synonymous with cost-effectiveness.
Xiaomi also needs to clarify its strategy
As an industry insider interviewed by Auto Business Review said: "Most of the users of Xiaomi cars are very price-sensitive groups. This group is not only sensitive to price and value, but also sensitive to self-perception, and is Xi using multiple labels such as 'geek' and personality to cover up their socially vulnerable positioning. Some netizens said more directly: We just grew up and didn't have money.
Judging from the ASP (average shipping price) of Xiaomi mobile phones, in the case of including the Redmi brand, it will only be 966 yuan in the third quarter of 2023, which is basically in the lowest range in history, which is equivalent to saying that the average consumption power of Xiaomi's entire user base is more than 1000 mobile phones, of course, if you only look at the Xiaomi brand, it should be a little higher, but it is certainly not as high as Apple. After excluding overseas users (mainly Indian users), the average daily ARPU of Xiaomi platform users hovers around 35 yuan, which is about the same as Meituan. This migration to new energy vehicles is likely to lead to a lack of interest in optional products among Xiaomi owners.
As Xiaomi's first car, its main audience is bound to be the previous rice fans, and this car is bound to take a "low price and high configuration" route. Of course, Lei Jun hopes to have both face and lining, the design comparable to Porsche or the best SUV within 10 million is just a marketing gimmick, Xiaomi's current basic plate determines that Xiaomi can't afford to take a risk. In the end, it may be that Lei always has to suffer himself.
There are many people who like to say that Xiaomi is the king of the Internet with its own traffic, and it can sell tens of thousands of dollars a month if it is born with a golden spoon and does it casually. But the automotive industry is a capital-intensive and technology-intensive industry, and who doesn't have a strong enough background and not enough talent? If you do something wrong, it may be difficult to become a mainstream player.
Polestar has made the serious mistake of not positioning its products clearly. In the case that domestic consumers have not yet established a basic understanding of the Polestar brand, Polestar 1 and Polestar 2 have been launched one after another. The Polestar 1 is a high-end product, with prices starting at $1.45 million and a limited edition of 500 units worldwide per year. But when everyone's appetite was satisfied, the Polestar 2 became a volume model again, with a price starting at 257,800, and there was not even any model in the middle to bridge the price gap, resulting in mediocre sales being attributed to others.
Although Xiaomi SU7 has the shadow of Porsche everywhere, Lei Jun should not really benchmark the price against Porsche. The real opponent is Tesla model Y or Xpeng P7 or BYD Han, etc., you can't think of a car to win the world because only one model is currently planned, in today's market is gradually saturated and growth is weak, the market leaves little room for trial and error for Xiaomi.
Lei Jun said at the press conference: I think I can build a good car for these drivers, a car that carries all their dreams! No matter how cold it is and how strong the wind is this winter, your car and your heart are warm, and your steps and wheels are all the same steady and powerful.
It's a good thing to say, but it's not as good as the price of Xiaomi cars to meet most people's expectations in one step, so as to warm people's hearts.