Xiaomi was revealed to be building a car again.
Recently, there are media reports that according to multiple sources, Xiaomi Group has decided to build a car and has designated the car-building plan as a strategic decision. Moreover, Lei Jun is likely to lead the team in building the car.
Fifteen minutes after the car-building news was reported, Xiaomi Group’s share price rose by more than 10%. Although the increase subsequently declined, it still had an increase of more than 6% at the close, which shows how much the capital market is now pursuing car manufacturing and how popular it is.
This time, Xiaomi Group’s response to the media was not as firm as before, saying that it had no plans to build a car or it was just a rumor. On the contrary, the statement "wait and see, it's not available now" does not directly reject the possibility.
It seems that Xiaomi is on track to build a car this time.
Some information about Xiaomi’s car-making
In fact, as early as 2014, Xiaomi had already begun its layout in automobile-related fields.
In 2014, Xiaomi invested in map navigation manufacturer Kaili De. At that time, Kay Rucker still had a place in map navigation. When it introduced investment, it was explained that it was to prepare funds and resources to implement the Internet of Vehicles strategy and expand mobile Internet business.
In 2015, Xiaomi invested in NIO through Shunwei Capital and participated in its Series A investment. And among the patents Xiaomi applied for in the same year, there were 10 patents related to automobiles, such as cruise control, energy supplement, vehicle control, navigation, assisted driving, etc.
In 2019, Xiaomi participated in Xpeng’s Series C financing and became a new strategic partner. In the same year, Xiaomi Xiaoai voice assistant reached a cooperation with Mercedes-Benz, which can control smart devices at home through the voice assistant in the car.
In June 2020, Xiaomi continued to play tricks. At that time, Xiaomi Weibo posted a Weibo with the text "We are serious about building cars" on the picture, and there was also a car in the picture. Although the final product was just a remote-controlled toy and the whole thing was just a marketing tool for Xiaomi, the heated discussion at the time also proved that people from all walks of life had expectations for Xiaomi to build a car.
The last "revelation" was in December 2020. At that time, there were rumors that Xiaomi launched the Blue Sky Project and worked with BYD to build "young people's first convertible", and the accompanying posters were very clear. , there are even pictures of the convertible with the hood closed and the hood open, and even some technical parameter descriptions.
Although Xiaomi officially stated that it had no plans to build a car, BYD also refuted the rumors. But judging from the current time point, this can be said to be a success if the fly does not bite the egg. Some things become true when they are passed on. This convertible may not be real, but Xiaomi's car-making is not necessarily fake. Xiaomi's car-making can be said to be a high probability event.
Why did you choose to build a car?
This question is not only for Xiaomi, but also for other new forces entering the market later. The answer can be summed up in a simple idiom: profitable.
In fact, Baidu also announced its own car-building plan not long ago. On January 11, Baidu announced the formal establishment of a smart car company, personally participating in this trend as a vehicle manufacturer.
Among them, Geely Holding Group is the strategic partner of the new company, providing a vast SEA architecture, while Baidu is responsible for the entire industry chain of design, research and development, manufacturing, sales and services. Incidentally, Baidu's own accumulation in artificial intelligence, Internet technology, and autonomous driving will also be applied to vehicles.
Baidu’s car-making method, in which the original machine manufacturer provides the basic framework and is responsible for design, production and manufacturing, is likely to be one of the options for other companies to cross-border entry in the future.
If you are an older mobile phone player, when you experienced the birth of Xiaomi Phone 1 and the first Redmi phone, you should be familiar with a word: ODM.
This word is very similar to another word OEM. OEM production can be said to be the production method commonly used by many home appliance brands and digital brands. In short, all production is based on the design drawings provided by the upstream. The actual manufacturer is just one With the status of "helping in processing", Weilai and Xiaopeng both chose the OEM method in the early stages of production.
The difference between ODM is that OEM is commissioned manufacturing and ODM is commissioned design. In the former, the client is the designer and has higher requirements for capabilities; in the latter, the client can be said to be the product manager. , the key parts do not require too much effort, and can save a lot of R&D costs.
It can be said that due to the entry of Tesla, the catfish, the layout of the domestic electric vehicle-related industry chain is now very complete. As long as you have the money and the will, each key assembly will be directly entrusted to the relevant parts manufacturers for matching development. Even, as long as you can give a sufficient quotation, you can directly ask the OEM to customize a car specifically for you. The D1 special car jointly launched by Didi Chuxing and BYD is such a product. Didi Chuxing does not need to know how to produce and calibrate the motor, how to lay out and connect the vehicle bus, nor does it need to know the geometric movement of the suspension, or even how to integrate different components. It only needs to put forward relevant requirements, while BYD Responsible for realizing various needs put forward by Didi Chuxing.
Therefore, there are actually several ways to build cars before Xiaomi. You can design the entire vehicle yourself, like Weilai and Xiaopeng, and increase investment in all aspects to have complete independent intellectual property rights; you can also like Baidu, let others provide the basic framework, and complete the rest of the design on this basis; of course , Didi’s method is also a way. Commissioned design + commissioned production can reduce a lot of early investment.
But no matter which way it is, the current R&D and production threshold for electric vehicles is much lower than in the previous era of pure fuel vehicles, and the related initial investment is much less than before. This is also the case recently. One of the reasons why various new forces were born in the year.
In addition, low initial investment is only one of the reasons. Even if the investment is low but cannot generate relevant benefits, businessmen will not spend energy. Compared with the prospects of the new energy automobile market, the current development level is still at a very low level. It is far from too late to enter the market now. What's more, we still don't know how we will use cars in the future, but the potential value contained in so-called smart cars can make Xiaomi strive for it. If it can enter the game early and occupy a position, then Xiaomi will basically be able to provide most of the things that individuals can use. If smart homes, routers, mobile phones, tablets, computers, etc. are all provided, the personal data generated will most likely be Bringing huge and extremely stable profits.
What do you think of Xiaomi’s car-making
Answer: I don’t like it, I don’t want to, but I can’t do anything about it.
I wonder if you have noticed a problem, why words like "Weislin" and "Techui" appear now. I think one of the reasons is that the new forces now bind users too deeply, so deeply that I even think they are a bit "kidnapped".
In the previous era of fuel vehicles, Sinopec and PetroChina went to Sinopec and PetroChina to refuel. For maintenance, you can go to 4S or an outside repair shop. To buy engine oil, you can choose from Mobil, Total, Great Wall, Valvoline, and Shell. If you want to buy filters, you can choose from Mahle, West, and Bosch. To be honest, as long as there are no spare parts outside, buying a fuel vehicle can really be completely disconnected from the original factory channels.
However, the new forces are different. Judging from the current models of new forces, the degree of official control over vehicles is really too high. Take the OTA function, for example. At best, this function can update vehicle functions and provide a better user experience, but at worst, is this a backdoor?
And after no maintenance is required, owners of new power models probably only have these few things to do with their cars on a daily basis: driving, using the car, and charging. New forces in the charging area are also making arrangements. NIO has a battery swap station, and Xiaopeng also has its own charging station. It can be said that as long as the new force is willing, the services it provides can form a closed loop. While this closed loop becomes a brand moat, it also deeply binds car owners.
In addition, if you really use Internet thinking to operate your car life, it may be a disaster for individuals. Those who can read this article are probably people with Internet life experience. Are you satisfied with the current Internet products? No joke, in China, the so-called bottom line of some Internet manufacturers is really pitifully low. Endless advertising and endless monitoring make "personal privacy" no longer privacy.
Baidu Robin Li said that Chinese people are willing to trade privacy for convenience. This is not our choice, but we have no choice at all. Just now, when I opened the Xpeng APP and wanted to take screenshots as material, WeChat simultaneously provided me with an advertisement for Xpeng Motors in the circle of friends. I dare not and cannot say that there is a huge correlation, because I I don’t have the ability to decompile the APP and check the source code to determine the relevant logic, and I don’t have the ability to hack into the relevant server to view the data, but this feeling is really uncomfortable.
Moreover, if you are a Tesla owner, a NIO owner, or a Xpeng owner, you can compare the apps of these three companies. The Tesla APP has a very simple interface and only has vehicle-related functions. NIO and Xiaopeng APPs have added pages such as car enthusiast discussions and shopping malls. I believe its intention is to facilitate car enthusiasts, but is this related to the Internet's "enclosure" and "traffic" to a certain extent?
Summary
Whether Xiaomi builds cars or not, this is a choice of capital and a game of capital. However, if possible, I hope that the car I build can be a little purer. I only hope that in today's era of big data, I can truly have my own world in the car.