Wen | New Product Finance, Author | Wu Wenwu
Dad didn’t hurt, and Mom didn’t like the car, so she suddenly got into trouble. Now it’s time for a crisis that Baidu will no longer invest.
Recently, the new force of car-making has witnessed a series of embarrassing events. First, Nezha automobile got into a quagmire, and the latest one was the extreme Vietnam automobile got into the eye of the storm.
"New Product Finance" is concerned that on the evening of December 11th, Extreme Vietnam Automobile published a "Description on Recent Situations of Extreme Vietnam" on Guanwei, saying that it is coordinating all resources to meet challenges and actively promoting financing.
Extreme Yue Automobile said that it has entered the 2.0 entrepreneurial stage, and further stated that the company is only operating adjustment, and the services involving vehicles are in normal progress, and all channels can still make normal appointments for maintenance and other services.
At the same time, the "three guarantees" and warranty responsibility of the ultra-Vietnamese products are still protected by law, and some users may be slow to deliver the car in the process of recent strategic adjustment.
In terms of supplier cooperation, Jiyue Automobile said that it is actively making financial adjustments and arranging payment in an orderly manner.
Awkwardly, New Product Finance noticed that a Hangzhou supplier publicly developed a dunning letter, saying that the cooperation fee for the CEO’s live broadcast series of Extreme Yue Automobile in Tik Tok totaled 360,000 yuan, and the account period had passed, but Extreme Yue Automobile had not paid yet. During this period, it was repeatedly collected, and no payment has been made so far.
In sharp contrast to some time ago, there was a scene on the Internet that BYD strongly asked suppliers to reduce their prices by 10%. Extreme Yue Automobile was publicly released by suppliers, which shows how difficult the situation of Extreme Yue Automobile is.
The purpose of this public statement issued by Extreme Yue Automobile is to respond to all kinds of negative news about Extreme Yue Automobile in the market recently.
Recently, some netizens posted on social media that the more layoffs began, the scale was close to 40%. However, the Vietnamese official responded to the national business daily reporter that the above-mentioned rumors of layoffs are untrue.
All new energy automobile brands have opened legal departments, one of which is to dispel rumors. Weibo, from the Ministry of Automobile Law of Extreme Vietnam, said, please don’t believe in rumors and don’t spread them.
However, what is embarrassing is that there is an anchor of the ultra-car in a live broadcast, directly discussing the situation of the ultra-car, discussing whether to punch in and discuss where to go next.
Judging from the comprehensive information of all parties, the current predicament and situation of Extreme Yue Automobile can even be said to be much more severe than that of Nezha Automobile.
Jiyue Automobile, which can be said to be a new car-making force born with a golden key, has a high starting point and a small voice, but it has never stirred up a little spray in the rivers and lakes of the new car-making force.
In the view of "New Product Finance", the current predicament of Extreme Yue Automobile may have been expected by the market, and all this should start from the past and present of Extreme Yue.
Since the great wave of development of new energy vehicles in China, various new car-making forces have sprung up like mushrooms after rain. Not only Wei Xiaoli, the representative of the new car-making forces, but also Huawei, whose sales volume has been booming in the past two years, and Xiaomi, a mobile phone manufacturer, have made cars across the border, while the ultra-car belongs to another kind: the product of cooperation between internet manufacturers and traditional car companies.
At that time, seeing the development momentum of new energy vehicles rolling, many Internet giants were eager to try, among which Baidu, which started as a search engine, couldn’t hold back.
The predecessor of Jiyue was Jidu, which was established in March 2021. It was jointly created by Baidu and Geely. The slogan was to build a high-end intelligent automobile robot brand. At that time, the label of automobile robot was quite new and there were gimmicks.
Jidu is the product of cooperation between Baidu and Geely. Baidu is an Internet giant, which has invested a lot of energy into the fields of automotive technology software and intelligent driving, and has a leading technological advantage. As a private automobile giant in China, Geely Automobile has taken a fancy to Baidu’s technical strength.
Originally, the market thought that the more powerful brand of car-making jointly launched by Baidu and Geely, both sides would invest their core resources and advantages to jointly build the company. However, I didn’t expect that the time suddenly changed in August 2023.
On August 14th, 2023, Jidu changed its name to Jiyue, and released its first model, Jiyue 01. The next day, Jidu official website changed its name to Jiyue Automobile Robot, which became a turning point of this new car-making force, symbolizing that Baidu gradually faded out and Geely strode forward.
In fact, before the name change, Extreme Yue was originally controlled by Baidu, and it also carried Baidu’s dream of building a car. However, Baidu had never obtained the qualification of building a car before, and later had to gradually fade out and hand it over to Geely. The current Baidu Encyclopedia entry shows that it is positioned as a high-end smart car robot brand under Geely Holding.
However, whether it is the previous gathering or the later renaming, it is very embarrassing in the brand camps of Baidu and Geely, which can be aptly described as: Dad doesn’t hurt, and Mom doesn’t love.
Baidu is an Internet giant. Originally, it was hoped that Extreme Yue would be a test field for Baidu’s intelligent and autonomous driving. Baidu’s dream of building a car could not be realized, and naturally it paid less and less attention to Extreme Yue.
Geely is also vigorously promoting the new energy vehicle business, such as focusing on building its high-end new energy vehicle brand, and Geely has many sub-brands, so it has no time to take care of it.
The more late it entered the market, the more it missed the opportunity for the development of new energy vehicles. When its models went on the market, the market competition was extremely fierce. Under such a background, even if the product strength and intelligent driving part of the company had good strength, it was still buried.
What’s even more embarrassing is that Ji Yue doesn’t live up to expectations himself, which is illustrated by the sales volume. The data shows that the delivery volume of Extreme Vietnam in November was 2,485 vehicles, and the cumulative delivery in the first 11 months of this year exceeded 14,000 vehicles.
The passing line of delivery of new energy vehicles is generally believed to be more than 10,000 vehicles per month. In contrast, the annual sales volume of Extreme Vietnam is less than that of other new car-making forces in one month.
When "New Product Finance" went shopping in Shenzhen Futian Shenye Shangcheng several times, it was found that it was deserted when passing by the exhibition hall of Jiyue, which was in sharp contrast with the fire scene in the exhibition hall of Xiaomi Automobile opposite.
Another heavy news about Extreme Yue is that Baidu abandoned Extreme Yue.
According to the report of China Business News a few days ago, from the afternoon of December 10th, it was reported inside the company that Baidu, the shareholder of the company, would no longer invest, and the company would close its vehicle business this week, after its production department began to lay off employees.
As mentioned above, Baidu had a dream of building a car, and it hit it off with Geely Automobile. The two sides set up Jidu Automobile. Originally, both parties and the market thought that with the foundation of Geely’s car-making and Baidu’s technical blessing, Extreme Yue Automobile should be a brand with a strong rise in car-making.
I didn’t expect that the competition among the new car-making forces in China would be so fierce. Although Jiyue shouted a distinctive slogan of car robots, it was still a car in essence, and this label was not enough to attract consumers.
Baidu, as a shareholder, is definitely not satisfied with the current market performance of Extreme Yue Automobile, and has no high expectations for the future. From the perspective of asset investment management, the more unprofitable it is, and it has been burning money. Baidu is naturally unwilling and must stop loss.
Baidu began to lay out the autonomous driving business in 2017. In March of that year, it established the intelligent driving business group, released the "Apollo Plan" at the Shanghai Auto Show in the same year, and opened the autonomous driving platform Apollo.
Over the years, Baidu has invested a lot of resources in intelligent driving business, and has completed the product layout of intelligent driving, intelligent cabin and intelligent map, and has also achieved good results in commercialization.
In April this year, some media reported that Tesla and Baidu would cooperate to launch the FSD to help Tesla FSD enter the China market as soon as possible.
Baidu has also launched a self-driving travel service platform, Radish Run, which has opened manned test and operation services in 11 cities across the country. Especially this year, Radish Run ran in Wuhan, which attracted market attention and heated discussion.
In the view of "New Product Finance", it is obvious that Baidu wants to be an intelligent driving technology service solution provider like Huawei, instead of building a car in person, which is a trial and error of Baidu. From all aspects, Baidu has long been unnecessary. If the report of CBN is true and Baidu doesn’t provide financial support for Extreme Vietnam, then Baidu has been thinking for a long time, and only now has it made a decision.
Without Baidu’s blessing, Extreme Yue is just an obscure sub-brand of Geely. Geely has been pursuing a multi-sub-brand business strategy of having more children and fighting, but now Geely is also shrinking its sub-brand. Last month, Extreme Krypton took control of Lectra, and it is possible to integrate the polar star business in the future.
At present, the brand of Extreme Yue is owned by Geely. From a certain point of view, the decision on the future fate of Extreme Yue is in Geely’s hands. If Extreme Yue wants to continue to develop, it will definitely need Geely’s support and the decision is also in Geely’s hands.
China’s new energy automobile industry has entered the second half of its development, and the elimination of the industry will continue to be fierce, just as Weilai Li Bin stated in an internal letter last month that the most cruel stage of the industry has arrived.
In the future, the competition in China’s new energy automobile market will only become more intense. Coupled with the continuous influence of the price war, the extreme is a new force that has not yet formed the scale effect, and such a big environment is very unfavorable to it.
It can be seen from Ji Yue’s statement and the internal letter of CEO Xia Yiping that at present, Ji Yue Automobile has not been laid flat, and it is trying to actively save itself, especially to find new investors as soon as possible.
"New Product Finance" believes that if Extreme Vietnam wants to continue to develop, it needs to make up its shortcomings in an all-round way, and the most important thing is to prove its value with sales.
Where will you sail in the future? Is it to continue to develop or be integrated by Geely, and the worst plan may be the dissolution of the network? Only time can tell us the answer.