Constant policy support, gradual market recognition, continuous technological upgrading and gradual system improvement-a benign industrial cycle has been formed more and more.
With the continuous improvement of technology maturity, the gradual improvement of supporting facilities and the natural cost advantage, the recognition of new energy vehicles by ordinary consumers has been greatly improved, and the development of new energy vehicle industry is at the key node of the transition from policy-driven to market-driven
The new energy automobile industry is largely in the escape sequence, that is, "overall surplus, but high-quality production capacity is scarce". In this case, we can't simply do "one size fits all"
Compared with overcapacity, China's new energy automobile industry is facing a more severe challenge of being small and scattered.
"On the tuyere, pigs can fly." This is a famous saying in the investment community.
New energy vehicles seem to be such "pigs". Not only Internet giants such as Xiaomi and Baidu have entered the market one after another, but some real estate companies have also played cross-border cars. Unwilling to lag behind, traditional car companies have accelerated the pace of transformation and strived to make a large amount in the field of new energy vehicles.
In response to the enthusiasm of capital, the new energy vehicle market continues to be hot. According to the data released by China Automobile Industry Association, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China are1810.3 million and10.799 million respectively, and the cumulative sales penetration rate is close to 1 1%. This means that for every 10 vehicle sold, 1 vehicle is a new energy vehicle.
After years of development, the situation of strong market and weak technology of new energy vehicles in China has been significantly changed, and a complete industrial system has been established, breaking through key technologies such as batteries, motors and electronic control. Among them, power battery technology is leading the world.
According to the data of Wisdom Bud, the number of patent applications for new energy vehicles in China accounts for 66.79% of the total patent applications for new energy vehicles in the world, and China has become one of the most important technical sources of new energy vehicles in the world.
Constant policy support, gradual market recognition, continuous technological upgrading and gradual system improvement-a benign industrial cycle has been formed more and more.
"There is no doubt that China has become an important leader in the global new energy automobile industry." Fu, executive vice president and secretary general of China Automobile Industry Association, said in an interview with the reporter of Outlook News Weekly.
In 20 12, the State Council issued and implemented the development plan of energy-saving and new energy automobile industry (20 12-2020), which officially opened the curtain of large-scale development of the industry. "Sharpen a sword in ten years", driven by policy, market and technology, China's new energy automobile industry is entering a key area where quantitative change leads to qualitative change.
China automobile industry's desire to "change lanes and overtake" with the help of new energy track is being realized step by step.
There are two backgrounds to analyze why various capitals are scrambling to lay out new energy vehicles.
First, from the data point of view, China's new energy vehicles are facing serious overcapacity.
According to the statistics of CCID Research Institute, the total production capacity of new energy vehicles in China has reached 26.69 million in 2020, while the cumulative sales volume of new energy vehicles in that year was only about 654.38+0.367 million, and the capacity utilization rate was only 5. 1%.
Second, China's financial subsidies for new energy vehicles have been declining, and the target of subsidies has shifted from manufacturers to users, and the path of some new energy vehicle enterprises relying on subsidies for profit has been basically blocked.
In this context, social capital sensitive to investment returns and business risks is still pouring into new energy car tracks. In particular, Baidu, Xiaomi, DJI, Didi and other technology companies have entered the game, which is more worthy of attention. After all, commercial cross-border is inherently risky, and building a car is recognized as a project with many investments and great difficulties. Over the years, the global automobile pattern has been highly solidified, and few latecomers can succeed.
Behind the seemingly unreasonable phenomenon, there is a most convincing explanation-capital is fully optimistic about the development prospects of the new energy automobile industry.
Whether the state extends the implementation period of the subsidy policy for new energy vehicles to the end of 2022, or the new version of the "double-point policy", or the release of the "New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (20021-2035)", it will be of great benefit to the new energy vehicle industry.
The the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee meeting clearly put forward support for accelerating the development of new energy vehicles.
"This is the first time that new energy vehicles have appeared at the Politburo meeting." The state's concern and support for new energy vehicles has always been straightforward.
In the longer term, under the guidance of "peak carbon dioxide emission, carbon neutrality", new energy vehicles are likely to usher in a period of rapid growth in the industry.
China Society of Automotive Engineering has released the roadmap of energy-saving and new energy vehicle technology 2.0, and put forward six goals for the development of China automobile industry in 2035. The first is that the carbon emissions of the automobile industry will peak ahead of schedule in 2028, and the total carbon emissions will drop by more than 20% in 2035. Accelerating the development of new energy vehicles is the only way to achieve this goal.
The unified car consists of three parts: engine, gearbox and chassis. The core of new energy vehicles is "Three Electricity", and only the chassis can be applied to the technical basis of traditional vehicles, which also means that the development of new energy vehicles needs to build a brand-new industrial chain. This makes many industry enterprises that have little or no relationship with the traditional automobile industry deeply participate in the development of the new energy automobile industry.
Especially with the continuous improvement of intelligence, new energy vehicles have broken away from the "car" attribute of traditional cars and become scientific and technological products in a sense. This also explains why there are many internet giants behind the new round of new energy vehicle fever, because new energy vehicles give them a stage to play their own technological advantages.
With the continuous improvement of technology maturity, the gradual improvement of supporting facilities and natural cost advantages, the recognition of new energy vehicles by ordinary consumers has been significantly improved.
According to the compulsory traffic insurance data, the increase of private new energy vehicles accounted for 54.3% of the total increase of new energy vehicles in 20 19, and this proportion increased rapidly to 7 1.5% in 2020.
Among them, the policy of non-restricted cities is less binding and more telling. According to the statistics of the National Information Center, the sales volume of private new energy minibuses in non-restricted cities and restricted cities is 607,000 and 303,000 respectively, which is about 2: 1, and the proportion of purchases in non-restricted cities is higher.
"The development of the new energy automobile industry is at the key node of the transition from policy-driven to market-driven, and the sustainability of the industry development has been significantly enhanced." China automobile dealers association President Shen Jinjun said.
With multiple favorable blessings, the market for new energy vehicles is hotter than expected. During the interview, many insiders predicted that the annual sales of new energy vehicles in China could reach 2.5-3 million. The goal of 20% new energy vehicle penetration rate and 5 million vehicle sales in 2025 set in the New Energy Vehicle Industry Development Plan (202 1-2035) is likely to be achieved in 2022 or 2023.
"This market prospect is undoubtedly very attractive to capital." Shen Jinjun said that many competitors will be eliminated in this process, but the competitive pattern of the industry is still in the "Warring States Period", and it is far from certain who will eventually "be king".
"It's like taking part in the Olympic Games. Everyone knows that only three people can win medals in the end, but no one will give up the opportunity to participate easily. After all, no one knows who will stand on the podium in the end. " In his view, this may explain why various capitals are particularly fond of new energy vehicles.
This attractive track is crowded with gold prospectors from all walks of life. While boosting the development of the industry, it has also brought some side effects-the problem of overcapacity may become more and more serious.
The industry usually regards capacity utilization as an important indicator of whether there is overcapacity. It is generally believed that the normal range of capacity utilization is 79% ~ 83%, and if it exceeds 90%, it is considered that the capacity is insufficient; Below 79% indicates that there may be overcapacity.
Based on the association's forecast, the "Tenth Five-Year Plan" of various provinces and cities, the projects under construction and the capacity plan of automobile enterprises, CCID Research Institute believes that by 2025, the total domestic capacity of new energy vehicles is expected to reach 36 100, and the market size of new energy vehicles in that year is expected to be 5.3 million. Based on this calculation, the capacity utilization rate will still be at the low level of 14.47%.
An Qingheng, director of China Automobile Industry Advisory Committee, and other people in the industry said in an interview that overcapacity will undoubtedly lead to idle and waste of funds, land, talents and other resources, but China's new energy vehicles have not yet entered the stage of large-scale popularization, so we should look at this issue from a development perspective.
First of all, the planned capacity is not equal to the actual capacity.
Some insiders have analyzed that the so-called capacity utilization rate is simply understood as how much actual capacity is in operation to play a production role, which should be the ratio of actual output to actual capacity. However, when calculating the capacity utilization rate of new energy vehicles, it is inaccurate for some analysis to replace the actual capacity with the so-called planned capacity.
"A lot of planned capacity only exists in files or PPT, but it does not exist in reality." Although there is no authoritative statistics on the actual production capacity of new energy vehicles, it is certain that it is far less than the planned production capacity. Therefore, the actual degree of overcapacity is not as serious as some people think.
Secondly, overcapacity has opened up the space for qualitative change in the industry. In history, many industries have experienced overcapacity or so-called "bubbles" in the development process, but it is often this phenomenon that forces industries to realize self-quenching and upgrading.
From the 1980s to the early 1990s, the United States set off an Internet technology revolution, and the Internet bubble burst around 2000, causing huge economic losses. However, we should also see that in this process, related industries in the United States have developed rapidly and become the leader in the global Internet industry. With its dominant position, the United States has formulated most of the standard systems and game rules of the world Internet, and gained great voice.
At home, when the new energy automobile industry in China was just emerging, there were hundreds of domestic power battery manufacturers, and there were many bubbles in the industry. In order to win in the fierce competition, relevant enterprises have been developing new technologies, such as silicon-doped lithium supplement technology, dry production technology, blade batteries, etc., which have pushed China's power battery technology to a new level and spawned contemporary Ampere Technology Co., Ltd., BYD and other internationally influential battery enterprises.
During the interview, experts stressed that in the international automobile standard system, the China standard is hard to find, and many standards for power batteries formulated in China have been adopted by international standardization organizations, which is not unrelated to the improvement of China's technical strength of power batteries.
"From another perspective, overcapacity reflects the optimism of capital on the prospects of this industry. After all, there will be no overcapacity in an industry with no future and no one to manage it. " Shen Jinjun emphasized that the essence of market economy is to achieve survival of the fittest through competition. When there is a bubble, the competition will be fierce. Only through competition can we produce the strong, screen the strong, and then promote the industry to improve quality and efficiency.
Finally, resolving overcapacity cannot be simply "one size fits all". From the perspective of new energy vehicle sales market, there has been a clear polarization: a few head enterprises are booming in production and sales, and most enterprises are not performing well, or even struggling to survive.
In 2020, eight domestic auto companies that sold more than 40,000 new energy vehicles accounted for nearly two-thirds of the market share. The monthly sales of most brands are less than 1000 vehicles, and the production and sales of individual enterprises are only single digits.
In this regard, Ye Shengji, chief engineer and deputy secretary-general of China Automobile Industry Association, said that it is not difficult to see some judgments of the terminal market on high-quality production capacity from the phenomenon that the sales of new energy vehicles are mainly concentrated in top brands. It is expected that with the gradual outbreak of the market scale of new energy vehicles, the contradiction between scarce high-quality production capacity and huge market demand will become more and more obvious.
"The market performance is uneven, which proves that the pressure of overcapacity in head enterprises is not great or even insufficient." In Anqing Heng's view, the current new energy automobile industry is largely in the escape sequence of "overall surplus, but high-quality production capacity is scarce". In this case, we should treat it differently, not simply "one size fits all". On the one hand, we must curb the disorderly expansion of low-end production capacity; On the other hand, for the head enterprises with core competitiveness, it is necessary to increase support, improve the key technology chain as soon as possible, and help China automobile enterprises gain advantages in the fierce global new energy automobile market.
"Don't ban." For escape order, the ideal governance idea is to relax the investment threshold and let the market mechanism fully play its role, but to raise the threshold of product listing will force enterprises to improve the quality of development.
Compared with overcapacity, China's new energy automobile industry is facing more severe challenges, which are "small" and "scattered" and the resulting "weak".
According to industrial and commercial data, there are 479 new energy vehicle manufacturers in China, most of which are small and medium-sized enterprises, of which large enterprises with a registered capital of over 400 million yuan only account for 14.6%, and small enterprises with a registered capital of less than 40 million yuan account for 410.3%.
Different from general consumer goods, the automobile industry has the characteristics of long industrial chain and large R&D investment, which needs certain scale effect. Without sufficient industrial concentration, it is difficult to cultivate enough head enterprises to lead the development of the industry.
In the field of new energy vehicles, although China ranked first in global sales of new energy vehicles for six consecutive years, it has not yet formed an internationally competitive automobile enterprise in China, and it also lacks star models and internationally renowned brands.
More urgently, the competitive situation is changing. Under the background of global carbon reduction and speed-up of electrification, the new energy vehicles parked in China in advance are not the new track, but the main track aimed at by all parties. Many multinational auto giants who didn't pay much attention to electrification, or "much cry and little rain", began to make practical actions frequently in this field: represented by ID series, Volkswagen accelerated the landing of electrified products.
If China has a certain advantage with its start, can the small and scattered domestic new energy automobile industry turn its advantage into victory after the multinational giants get serious?
The challenge is obvious. "Whether it is manufacturing technology, financial strength, research and development capabilities or capacity supply, multinational auto giants have advantages."
Taking R&D investment as an example, as the representative of domestic new energy vehicles, the three new forces of "Wei Xiaoli" continue to maintain R&D investment accounting for more than 9% of revenue. Especially, the R&D investment ratio of Xpeng Motors, which is mainly based on intelligent technology, is close to 265,438+0%, which is much higher than the R&D investment ratio of 4% ~ 6% of international giants such as Volkswagen, Daimler, Toyota and BMW. But even so, the R&D cost of the former is only over one billion yuan a year, and it goes without saying that Volkswagen spends 50 billion euros just for a MEB electric vehicle platform.
But the advantages are obvious to all. For example, at the press conference held by the State Council Office, Xiao Yaqing, Minister of Industry and Information Technology, praised China's new energy automobile industry for achieving "three breakthroughs" in technology, products and market.
"As the largest producer and seller of new energy vehicles, China has strong cost advantages and industrial chain advantages." Gong Min, chief analyst of UBS China automobile industry, said that the United States has advantages in technology, but the manufacturing cost is high; Europe has a good consumption environment, but it lacks batteries and autonomous driving. Japan and South Korea have certain advantages in batteries and raw materials, but they are weak in other aspects.
"Without calculating subsidies, the cost of China products is 20% ~ 60% cheaper than similar products in Europe, which proves our cost advantage; In the manufacturing process, our industrial chain has better scale, integrity and manufacturing efficiency, showing strong comprehensive competitiveness of the whole chain. "
Therefore, although it is not easy, China's new energy automobile industry still has enough opportunities to achieve its grand goal of "changing lanes and overtaking". The key is to keep the whole industry running on the right track.
The department in charge of the industry clearly pointed out that it is necessary to promote new energy automobile enterprises to become bigger and stronger from four aspects.
First, give full play to the role of the market, encourage enterprises to become bigger and stronger through mergers and acquisitions, and further improve industrial concentration.
The second is to strengthen the popularization and application, speed up the construction of charging and replacing infrastructure, continue to carry out the activities of new energy vehicles going to the countryside, and also do a good job in the pilot project of all-electric vehicles in public areas.
The third is to promote cross-border integration and promote the integration and development of electrification and intelligent networking technology.
The fourth is to improve product quality, put forward higher standards and stricter requirements in terms of quality, safety and low-temperature application, and guide enterprises to improve product quality, improve service level and establish brand image.
"These measures have pointed out the direction for the future development of China's new energy automobile industry-coping with more intense market competition with higher development quality." Shen Jinjun talked about, for example, encouraging mergers and acquisitions of enterprises. Facing the trend of global electrification, it is obvious that China car companies can't keep pace with the times by fighting alone or tinkering around the edges. Integrating superior resources through mergers and acquisitions and concentrating on making breakthroughs in technology, products and markets can not only enhance brand competitiveness, but also purify the market.
During the interview, insiders said that China's new energy automobile industry, after years of accumulation, is opening a new future for the development of the industry. After experiencing the pain of subsidy recession, China faces direct competition from overseas giants. Facing the great changes in the automobile industry, the road to becoming a powerful automobile country faces new opportunities and challenges. It can be predicted that with the deepening of various measures, China's new energy automobile industry will usher in a key shift from focusing on scale effect to focusing on development quality.