At the global new energy vehicle supply chain innovation conference in September this year, there was a seemingly small but meaningful thing. At the meeting, the technical roadmap of energy-saving and new energy vehicles (version 2.0) passed the expert review. The biggest change in this road map is that the view of "hybrid power" has changed, and it is proposed to actively promote the "hybrid" of traditional cars. It is also clearly pointed out that by 2035, the annual sales of energy-saving vehicles and new energy vehicles will each account for 50%, and the number of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles will reach about 1 10,000, achieving the goal of hydrogen-powered transformation of commercial vehicles.
This detail makes sense!
In other words, by 2035, except for pure electric vehicles, all the remaining traditional fuel vehicles will be converted into hybrid vehicles. Even the policy of not producing pure gasoline vehicles before 2025, which is enforced by the state, seems to be weakening gradually, putting forward more things and driving more new energy vehicles.
At present, according to the details of the disclosed documents, there is a very clear road map. The existing 48V system will gradually give way to strong hybrid in 2025 -2030, and the ratio of PHEV (plug-in hybrid) and BEV (pure electric) will transition from the current 20% to 15% to 5%.
According to the peak of about 25 million vehicles in 2025, the corresponding automobile sales will be 6.5438+0 million PHEV, 4 million BEV, 5 million HEV (plug-in hybrid) and 5 million 48V, 6.5438+0 million fuel vehicles.
With the change of market environment, Toyota is also changing.
As early as April 3, 20 19, Toyota Motor Corporation announced that it would open 23,740 patents of motor, electronic control (PCU) and system control accumulated by Toyota for free. In addition, Toyota will provide paid technical support to enterprises using its electrification system.
For this move, the outside world mostly interprets it as Toyota's fear that the automobile industry represented by China and the United States will turn to pure electric vehicles in an all-round way, and hybrid vehicles will lose their market position. There are also views that Toyota's move is to resist the pure electric wave and rely on hybrid technology to continue to dominate the future development direction of the automobile industry.
However, the author disagrees with these explanations. Although I am not an anti-pure electric vehicle family, I always think that electric vehicles are not the final solution, but only a tiny branch of many new energy vehicles. Moreover, pure electric vehicles, which have made great strides in recent years, still cannot solve such problems: slow charging, low preservation rate, difficult recycling, few charging piles in remote areas, and difficult to get on the road.
The greater hope of Toyota's move is to enlarge the market scale, so as to encourage enterprises that have been lacking in the hybrid vehicle business to enter and improve the market competitiveness of hybrid vehicles by providing them with technology for free. At the same time, if the external sales demand of hybrid technology-related parts increases, the cost of similar pure electric vehicles is expected to further decrease.
It can be said that this is the original intention of Toyota's open patent or authorization. As the saying goes, the rapid development of hybrid technology helps to strengthen the competitiveness of pure electric vehicles with the same main components.
Moreover, compared with pure electric vehicles, hybrid vehicles, especially HEV models, perform much better in these problems. Most importantly, when you often encounter traffic jams, HEV models can really save your wallet.
What is missing inside Toyota?
At present, there are two technical routes for Toyota to provide hybrid electric vehicles in China, namely, hybrid twin-engine and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, 65,438+00 vehicles and two pure electric vehicles. Including compact cars (Corolla twin engine, Ralink twin engine,? Corolla twin-engine E+, Ralink twin-engine E+), medium-sized car (Asian Dragon, Camry twin-engine), compact SUV (brand-new Fangrong twin-engine, Willanda twin-engine, C-HR? EV, Yize e enters the engine) and MPV (Wilfa double engine, Erffa double engine).
These models not only cover the current mainstream new energy driving methods and fuel vehicle sales models. Moreover, the dual-engine model can maintain the same value preservation rate as the fuel vehicle, and the price gap is relatively low. Compared with other joint venture models, it has obvious advantages.
Can Toyota remain the king in this way?
Toyota's positioning of new energy vehicles is relatively simple, mainly focusing on fuel saving, which is difficult to satisfy some car buyers who pursue high performance; In addition, Toyota's new energy vehicles in China have all replaced the power system of fuel vehicles, so it is the general trend for new energy vehicles to adopt a special platform that is more suitable for their layout.
From the market point of view, although the guiding price of hybrid cars and fuel cars on the same platform of Toyota is close at present, the actual transaction price is quite different. Coupled with the hidden concerns of battery life, do consumers in third-and fourth-tier cities have any reason not to buy hybrid cars?
How will domestic rivals respond and what challenges will Toyota face?
My answer is not necessarily. Toyota faces challenges from two aspects: in terms of hybrid platforms, other Japanese brands will choose other hybrid technology paths to provide a user experience close to Toyota and cover the front end of the product line. Some China brands are moving towards the high performance+intelligent route in mixing, emphasizing indicators such as 100 km acceleration, trying to outflank the product strength.
Another problem is that in recent years, with the platformization of pure electric vehicles and the further sinking of some car companies, mini-cars similar to K-Car have been developed in an attempt to subvert the ecology of electric vehicles, reconstruct the demand for electric vehicles, and try to distinguish electric vehicles from fuel vehicles. A typical example is Wuling Hong Guang MINI? EV, the price is 28,800-38,800 yuan. What is the sales volume of 1 1 in 2020? 33,094 vehicles, ranking seventh in China's automobile sales list, second only to Toyota Corolla.
What should Toyota do if there is containment before and pursuers after?
What Toyota needs most is to calm down.
What should Toyota do in the face of the tens of millions of markets and its own expertise in the hybrid field? In my opinion, Toyota should do three things well:
First, further improve the penetration rate of hybrid vehicles, increase efforts to feed back the terminal market, and reduce prices to at least narrow the actual terminal price gap between hybrid vehicles and fuel vehicles. Give consumers more reasons to choose hybrid models.
Second, it strengthens the high-performance route, and strives for some performance-sensitive users by appropriately improving performance in the hybrid field.
The third is to introduce a new platform in China as soon as possible. There are many new energy technology routes in Toyota's toolbox: MIRAI, its fuel cell vehicle, is about to mature after two generations of development. Toyota BZ, a pure electric vehicle, will be officially unveiled on 202 1, and six electric vehicles will be built based on the e-TNGA electric platform.
Toyota is a mess, and a little reinforcement is the way to prosper the dynasty.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.