Recently, Midea Group Co., Ltd. (000333. SZ) It plans to acquire (300048) 18.73% equity of Beijing Hekang Xinneng Technology Co., Ltd.. SZ) Through its subsidiary Guangdong Midea HVAC Equipment Co., Ltd., it became the indirect controlling shareholder of Hekang Xinneng by superimposing 5% of the voting rights of the transferee.
When the news came out, the four people were in an uproar!
Since Hekang Xinneng itself includes the business of "new energy vehicle assembly supporting and operating industry", does this acquisition mean that Midea has started a journey of "cross-border car building"?
Who is Hekang New Energy?
With great curiosity, I opened official website with Kang Xinneng.
Data show that the company is a high-tech enterprise specializing in industrial automation control and new energy equipment; In the field of new energy vehicles, products and services such as powertrain, motor controller, auxiliary power system, intelligent charging pile for electric vehicles and construction of new energy vehicle rental platform have been laid out.
It can be said that Hekang Xinneng has a broad layout in the field of new energy vehicles. If Midea really wants to build cars across borders, and Kangxinneng can really help.
But the question is, does Midea really want to enter the field of making cars?
Beautiful women are not afraid to jump in the street?
Midea is not a newcomer in the car-making business.
As early as 2004, Midea successively acquired Yunnan Bus Factory, Yunnan Aerospace Shenzhou Automobile and Hunan Sanxiang Bus Group Co., Ltd., and made great strides into the automobile circle. However, after several struggles, in 2008, Midea was forced to suspend production.
In fact, many enterprises in the home appliance industry are not newcomers.
20 16 Dong Mingzhu, chairman and president of gree, sounded the clarion call for the home appliance industry to enter new energy vehicles. At that time, she once put forward a famous slogan: "Take Gree mobile phone, take Gree car and blow Gree air conditioner."
Miss Dong joined hands with Wang Jianlin and other well-known entrepreneurs to raise 3 billion yuan to invest in Yinlong New Energy, and opened a long road to building a car with great pride.
After burning tens of billions of banknotes in two years, MPV Effie, Micro-surface Yinlong 5024EV and various medium and large buses were finally put on the table by Miss Dong. But unfortunately, consumers are unwilling to pay for these vehicles; Zhuhai Yinlong Company has also been criticized for this and suffered continuous losses.
In 20 17, Dyson, the home appliance brand of "network celebrity", also announced the official launch of the electric vehicle project, and planned to invest more than 2 billion pounds (about RMB17.5 billion yuan) to develop a "brand-new, distinctive" electric vehicle, and vowed to launch the first vehicle before 20021year.
Sadly, just two years later, Dyson announced the strong man wrist fracture. The reason is that the car-making project is not commercially feasible, which means Dyson realizes that he can't make money by investing heavily in the car-making project.
Examples like jumping on the street are endless in the home appliance industry.
Seeing that so many home appliance peers have lost their armor in the field of car building, Midea still chooses to face the difficulties. Is it superior?
In my opinion, Midea's commitment to building cars mainly stems from the current dilemma of the home appliance industry.
As we all know, the home appliance industry, as a typical post-real estate cycle sector, is affected by the real estate cycle in both performance and valuation. Under the strong control of the current real estate policy, the overall performance of real estate sales is flat, and the overall domestic economic growth has been under pressure since 20 18, and the growth in the consumer sector has also slowed down.
Although the overall tone of the home appliance industry is still "steady", it is inevitably affected by the macro environment.
The beauty of being prepared for danger in times of peace, choosing to set foot in the automobile field at this time, not afraid of jumping off the street; Instead, it smells the potential crisis in its own industry, actively seeks more profit growth points, and at the same time reduces its own risks by putting eggs in different baskets.
Jianfeng doesn't mean the whole car.
Although Hekang Xinneng itself includes the business of "new energy vehicle assembly supporting and operating industry", in my opinion, Midea will not rashly choose to be a complete vehicle.
On the one hand, the automobile industry is asset-intensive and technology-intensive and needs long-term technology accumulation. Any enterprise that wants to make quick profits by burning money in a short time is doomed to failure.
Gree, Oaks, Dyson, and Yuanmei all focus on the whole vehicle.
Vehicle manufacturing is not what laymen think. Simply make a car shell, install wheels and batteries and everything will be fine. It includes a series of essential links such as preliminary modeling design, design verification, small batch verification and mass production.
At each stage, you may face many changes in molds and tooling; The cost of every change may be in the millions. For amateurs, lack of experience, products designed in advance may face larger-scale modification, and the cost can be imagined.
Li Bin, founder and chairman of Weilai Automobile, has publicly stated that an electric vehicle company needs at least 20 billion yuan for mass production. Although Midea may not get bad money in the field of home appliances, the expenditure of 20 billion yuan is undoubtedly a heavy burden for any enterprise.
Although Hekang has experience in this field, its main business is the development of automobile parts such as powertrain and controller, and its qualifications in the field of complete vehicles are still shallow.
On the other hand, beautiful women who have set foot in cars should know the difficulties in this field. Once bitten, twice shy. Although it has been 16 years since the last car was manufactured, I believe that the shadow of its forced production suspension is still vivid.
The automobile business is like the Achilles heel of beauty. Act rashly, or you will be like a moth to the fire, and it is difficult to protect yourself. Therefore, Midea will not choose to manufacture the whole vehicle.
Can Midea make achievements in the field of car making?
I'm used to home appliance companies crossing the line to build cars, but maybe you're not optimistic about the United States entering the automobile industry again.
But in my opinion, beauty may achieve something.
At present, the automobile industry is undergoing a "new four modernizations" transformation. In this context, beauty may find opportunities from its electrification and intelligence.
Although there are differences in application scenarios between home appliance electronic control and automobile electronic control, the electronic control technology itself is the same. Therefore, in the field of home appliances, electronic control technology has accumulated rich beauty for many years, and we can fully play our own advantages and find a breakthrough in the field of vehicle electronic control.
In addition, I firmly believe that one day in the future, complete driverless driving can be achieved. At that time, the intelligent cockpit was a mobile living room or bedroom, so it was natural to use supporting smart speakers, intelligent air conditioners and other electrical appliances. Therefore, for the United States, it is possible to take the lead in the future by starting this layout as soon as possible.
Although there are still many obstacles to the development of autonomous driving, some auto parts companies have taken action, such as Faurecia and Yanfeng Technology, and have strengthened their layout in the field of intelligent cockpit.
Furthermore, if Midea does not choose to build a complete vehicle, but chooses to walk sideways, and only focuses on the research and development of on-board electronic control and intelligent on-board electrical products, leaving key driving indicators such as handling stability, safety and driving comfort to traditional car companies, it will be able to greatly avoid a series of problems such as body modeling, internal structural parts matching and thousands of complicated tests.
In this way, Midea's investment in the automobile field has become a relatively light asset, and it will not face huge burdens and risks in the short term. At the same time, you can also concentrate on meeting the opponents in the field of smart car products such as Xiaomi.
If Midea does this, not only will it not jump on the street, but it may even achieve something in the future.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.