The market that Huawei is eyeing is no longer a city

The technological trends are changing, and product competitiveness is also changing.

As the price war intensifies, today’s automakers have a clear direction in making products – to provide models with more advanced technology and user experience at lower prices.

Two years ago, the starting price of the cheapest 800V platform pure electric vehicle was 309,900 yuan (Xpeng G9), and the most expensive was the Porsche Taycan at over 1.8 million yuan. But now, you can get a full-range 800V model (Leapmotor C16) for less than 170,000 yuan.

Also being decentralized is the high-end intelligent driving experience.

In the past, laser radar and advanced intelligent driving were exclusive configurations of high-end models. Now, less than 180,000 yuan (Leapmotor C16) can satisfy the dream of advanced intelligent driving. In another year, it may only cost 100,000 yuan.

Leapmotor CEO Zhu Jiangming said that the A series models priced at 100,000 yuan are expected to be mass-produced next year, and he hopes to equip them with laser radar and high-end intelligent driving.

As for the popularization of 800V and high-end intelligent driving, on the one hand, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles has exceeded 30%, and the market shape has gradually changed from the previous dumbbell shape to the rugby shape, and the demand in the 200,000-level market has seen a significant increase.

On the other hand, the competition among domestic new energy vehicle companies is extremely fierce. All car companies hope to become hexagonal warriors, so they are all rolling up power, intelligent driving, new chassis technologies, etc., plus large-scale production and technology iteration, which can reduce BOM costs to a certain extent.

For example, in three years (2020-2022), RoboSense reduced the price of lidar from 22,500 yuan to 4,300 yuan.

Spending less money to experience higher technical configuration is "technological equality".

But the question that we have to consider is that new technologies have been used to compete on cost-effectiveness, so what is the high-end market relying on to tell a story?

01. If you can’t afford it today, I’ll give it to you tomorrow.

New Energy Vehicle Market How fast is it changing?

Taking the 800V high-voltage platform as an example, the first domestic 800V model, Xiaopeng G9, will be launched in 2022. Currently, there are more than 50 800V models released on the market. In the second half of the year, there will also be full-range 800V models such as Xiaopeng P7+ and Zeekr 7X.

To sum it up in one sentence, these days, anyone who buys a pure electric car will have to spend more than an hour to charge it.

In comparison, the initial charging power of a 400V vehicle is only about 80kW, while the charging power of an 800V vehicle can be maintained at about 150kW almost throughout the entire process. The former takes 90 minutes to charge, while the latter takes less than 40 minutes.

Data from Gasgoo Automotive Research Institute shows that the penetration rate of 800V models will be about 2% in 2023, with cumulative sales of 320,000 units for the whole year. It is estimated that the sales of models equipped with 800V will reach 3.782 million units in 2027, with a penetration rate of 40%, and prices are expected to further drop to less than 150,000 yuan.

The increase in market penetration and the continuous decline in vehicle prices also mean that car companies will have to continue to sell cars at a loss. After all, except for Ideal and SERES, which have turned losses into profits, most other car companies are still in a loss-making state.

According to the current "800V full range" standard, first of all, in terms of battery packs, the rated voltage must exceed 700V, the peak is close to 800V, and the voltage of a single ternary lithium battery cell is about 3.65V, requiring at least 200 cells to be connected in series, which is double the 400V.

According to Yuanchuan Auto Review, under the same boundary conditions, the more series connections there are, the higher the connection cost and production cost will be. In addition to the battery pack, the cost of components such as the motor , air conditioning compressor, electronic control, and DCDC will also increase.

Taking Chery Xingjiyuan ES and Zhiji LS6 as examples, under the premise that the configuration and performance parameters are similar, the price difference between the 400 and 800V models of the two cars is 20,000 to 30,000 yuan.

Industry insiders said that theoretically, a 800V model would be priced at around 300,000 yuan, but if it is sold below 250,000 yuan, it may be bleeding money.

In addition to the vehicle architecture, intelligent configuration has also become a breakthrough for car companies in terms of cost-effectiveness.

Take the Qualcomm 8295 chip with 30Tops AI computing power as an example. This is the benchmark product among cockpit chips.

In addition to new forces such as NIO, Li Auto, Nio and Xiaomi, traditional car companies such as Mercedes-Benz and BMW have also followed suit and replaced them with 8295 chips. Even models such as Leapmotor C10 and C16 priced under 200,000 yuan have also been equipped with 8295 chips, further lowering the entry threshold for high-performance cockpit chips.

In order to catch up with the price-performance ratio, car companies are willing to pay a higher cost. The price of 8295 has increased from 170~180 US dollars (about 1,200 yuan) of the original Snapdragon 8155 to 290~300 US dollars (about 2,200 yuan), which does not include the licensing fees and service fees for daily development.

The second is intelligent driving .

Whether it is the Lotus EMEYA with four laser radars or the purely visual EMEYA 01, both can realize the city NOA function. If you think it is too expensive, there is also the Baojun Yunduo that supports city memory navigation, and you can have an AI driver for less than 130,000 yuan.

In addition, Xiaopeng plans to remove the LiDAR and switch to pure vision to achieve intelligent driving sensor system cost halved - the 150,000-level MONA M03 supports high-speed NOA, and the 200,000-level P7+ supports urban NOA.

Huawei is also splitting and delegating intelligent driving capabilities to varying degrees. For example, Changan Deep Blue S07 will be equipped with Huawei Qiankun ADS SE intelligent driving solution. This is also the first time that Huawei's intelligent driving has entered the 150,000-level market.

Some players have already proved that high-end intelligent driving can also be available to ordinary people like 800V and 8295.

At a time when domestic competition is fierce, both automakers and consumers have strong differentiated demands for "having what others don't". Refrigerators, sofas and large color TVs are the most basic additions, and the key is how to maximize the realization of technological equality.

At present, 800V, smart cockpit and smart driving will be the powerful trump cards for car companies to focus on cost-effectiveness.

02. A high-priced luxury car is not necessarily a luxury car

In the past, when people mentioned luxury cars, they often referred to "luxury brand cars", and most of them were relatively not luxurious. But today, when people think of "luxury cars", they often refer to "cars with luxurious configurations."

For example, the entry-level version of the BMW 3 Series, priced at 299,900 yuan, has an acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h in 9 seconds, rear-wheel drive, front and rear double independent suspension, no 360-degree panoramic imaging, the most basic ACC (full-speed adaptive cruise control) costs an additional 5,900 yuan, no seat ventilation and heating, 8155 cockpit chip, and an automatic trunk costs an additional 8,400 yuan.

At the same price, Zeekr is not a traditional luxury brand, but its configuration is more luxurious.

Taking the Zeekr 001 ME version four-wheel drive as an example, it has a 100kWh battery pack, 0-100 km/h acceleration of 3.3 seconds, front and rear dual-motor four-wheel drive, dual-chamber air suspension, free NZP high-speed navigation worth 35,000 yuan, 8295 chip, and seat ventilation, heating and massage.

The luxury cars of today's new forces mostly refer to configuration, performance, materials, etc., while in the past "luxury cars" were simply "cars produced by luxury brands."

For example, the Avita 07, which is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, has dual zero-gravity seats in the front row, a touch screen on the central armrest in the back row, electric adjustment of the backrest angle, a co-pilot boss button, electric sunshades, and seat heating, ventilation and massage functions.

The seat configuration is almost fully loaded, which is higher than that of its own Avita 12, and higher than the Wenjie M7 and Ideal L6/7 of the same price. If you want to change to Avita 11, you have to upgrade to the top-of-the-line four-seater version of 400,000 yuan to match it.

However, the official positioning of Avita 07 is lower than Avita 11 and 12, which is equivalent to an entry-level model under Avita.

This is the current situation of the mid-to-high-end new energy market. Even if it means bleeding, materials must be piled up madly regardless of cost. As for the higher-end market (high-end market), it is purely technology that dominates.

Different from other market segments, players in the high-end market compete by leveraging ultimate technology and experience to bring higher added value to their products.

As the top flagship of the Wenjie brand, Wenjie M9 can be said to be the epitome of Huawei's technologies. Its high-end intelligent driving, Touring chassis, and megapixel headlights all embody the "scarcity attributes" that a luxury car should have.