2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 1048 Market Value Recovery? It's only just begun.

December 5, 2022, was a special day.

Starting today, there has been a fundamental change in policy. We will no longer identify contacts or designate special areas. It's all over.

However, Tan Jincheng knew that it would take about half a month for production to resume. The situation in early December was still quite severe, and some of Weilai's employees would be unable to work normally.

Many of Tan Jincheng's relatives have also been infected, including Old Comrade Tan.

How come you're completely unharmed?

Tan Lihua, who is 63 years old, retired early and has been living a life of ease and comfort all these years. He has long since recovered from the hardships he suffered working in the petrochemical plant when he was young. Judging from his appearance, he looks much younger than his actual age, like he is in his 50s.

"Hehe, I don't know either, maybe it's because of my special constitution."

Tan Jincheng shrugged. If we're talking about who in the family is at the highest risk, it's definitely him. He's been traveling around a lot in the past three years, but he hasn't gotten hurt at all. If he was fine in his previous life because he stayed at home and didn't have much contact with the outside world, then that condition definitely doesn't apply in this life.

"Can we go back to our hometown for the Spring Festival this year?"

Comrade Lao Tan, who has recovered, is still a little weak, but he is somewhat happy about today's regulations. His family has not been back to their hometown for the Spring Festival for the past three years, and to be honest, he misses home a little.

Tan Jincheng nodded: "Yes, that's fine. Let's all go back to our hometown and stay for a few more days."

For the past three years, the family has mostly stayed in Ningbo and rarely goes out. It's really time to go out and explore, and going back to our hometown for the Spring Festival is a great idea.

Regarding his hometown, Tan Jincheng could not do what his father did. In both his past and present lives, he left home at the age of 18 to make his way in the world. During his childhood and school years, he mainly lived in the urban area of ​​Yicheng. He could not do what Dongzi did for his hometown.

To put it bluntly, their living environments are different, but over the years he has provided a lot of help to his relatives in his hometown. Among his relatives, those with average abilities have stable jobs in the county town, and those with some ability have been promoted.

Some capable individuals who wanted to start businesses also received funding through the family foundation controlled by Tan Lihua. Some of these businesses have done quite well, and they are now living a comfortable life.

It wouldn't be considered a complete rise in status, but a worry-free life is certainly not a problem.

"Alright, then your mom and I will get ready. You go ahead and do your thing. I don't have anything to do here."

With his son's approval, Tan Lihua felt much better. Today is the twelfth day of the eleventh lunar month, and the Lunar New Year is not far away.

"Okay, I'm off then."

Seeing that his father was indeed alright, he saw no need to stay at home. Today was also a special day for Wei Lai.

尉来汽车在今天公布了2022年1至11月份的全球汽车总销量，自九月份新能源汽车总销量单月突破20万辆以来，尉来已经连续三个月销量稳居20万辆以上了。

In the first 11 months, Weilai Auto's total sales of new energy vehicles reached 162.83 million units, achieving its 2022 sales target one month ahead of schedule. December is also a traditional peak sales season. With Weilai Auto's current momentum, its annual sales will remain above 1.8 million units.

Emerging brands have encountered some troubles in the second half of the year. Many, like Xiaopeng Motors, have not responded to the market in a timely manner, which has allowed the top three brands to gain a larger share of the market.

With the lifting of restrictions, the car market saw a significant increase in growth in December. Although this only lasted a few days, the data from Weilai's backend system shows a very positive trend.

The new ten measures have promoted the market and consumer sentiment. The expiration of some policies, the guidance of the Spring Festival holiday, and the continuous decline in industry terminal prices have all stimulated consumers' desire to buy.

With monthly sales of 14.8 vehicles and an average monthly sales volume of 1.34 vehicles across 11 models, this is something no automaker can ignore. Furthermore, the fact that new energy vehicles hold over 18% of the global market share makes them impossible for established automakers to overlook.

With the rapid rise of BYD, its sales volume surpassing others, and its technological advancements catching up, the companies that feel the greatest sense of urgency, besides traditional automakers, are BYD and Tesla. In the fourth quarter, both of these automakers lowered prices on multiple models.

The pressure from Wei Lai is too great. BYD is better off; they have a leading advantage in hybrid technology and a wide range of models, so their sales and profits shouldn't be too affected.

For Tesla, the pressure from Musk is immense. Ever since Musk began acquiring Twitter, Wall Street investors have shown great concern for him, with prominent retail investors even publicly accusing him of "abandoning Tesla," and market confidence in his leadership has plummeted.

Tesla's stock price fell by nearly 70% throughout the year, wiping out more than $7100 billion in market value. In addition, Musk's sale of 2200 million Tesla shares in the three days before the release of Tesla's delivery data, cashing out $3.58 million, has also been questioned by the market as an attempt to profit from undisclosed information.

After the delivery data was released, although it set a new record, the results were lower than market expectations, which made Musk's behavior of cashing out early even more questionable. The delivery data that was lower than market expectations was also seen by some people as Tesla "not selling well".

"It's not that sales are bad, but Tesla definitely needs to make some changes."

In Luzhou, at the Global Automotive Intelligent Industry Summit, Tan Jincheng, who was attending the event, took some time to visit the nearby Weilai Experience Store. A consumer asked Tan Jincheng a question about this statement. In this era where everyone is a self-media, being able to meet Tan Jincheng at the Weilai Experience Store is a testament to his influence.

"Could Mr. Tan suggest what changes Tesla should make?"

"That's Elon's business. You'll have to ask Elon or Ms. Zhu Lin, the president of Tesla ZG."

Under the dual pressure from WTI and BYD, Tesla is indeed having a tough time. This year has seen Tesla's biggest price cuts. If it weren't for the intense competition, Tesla wouldn't be in this situation.

Currently, Tesla only has four models on sale, with the Model 3 and Model Y being the main models for driving sales volume, which is indeed a bit limited in terms of model lineup.

The Emoji 3 and Emoji Y remain popular, but the ET5, ES3, Seal, and Han EV series are not to be easily ignored, and the Xiaopeng P7, which saw a price reduction in December, also has considerable market appeal.

If in the past only BYD could pose a certain threat to Tesla, and the difference in their technological approaches allowed Tesla, which was leading in the pure electric vehicle field, to maintain its position with two models for many years, how should Tesla respond now that Wynn has joined the fray?

Tesla's strengths lie in pure electric vehicles and autonomous driving, which are also the main areas it promotes. As a top-tier new energy vehicle company with pure electric vehicles as its core strength, Tesla is indeed facing a major headache in the fiercely competitive domestic market.

The only advantage Tesla currently has is that top domestic automakers, including WooLong and BYD, have no presence in the North American market, allowing Tesla to guarantee its sales and profits in North America with an absolute advantage.

There's no way around it; the traditional automakers in North America and their emerging players are just too weak. If they were even half as good as the domestic automakers, Musk wouldn't be able to relax so much and dare to focus his energy on things other than Tesla.

Compared to Musk, who focuses his energy on things outside the automotive business, Tan Jincheng has completely focused on his core business, putting all his energy into Weilai Auto. The two attitudes have led to a clear difference in the performance of their listed companies in the capital market.

Tesla's market capitalization in the US stock market has fallen below $5000 billion, while Weilai Co., Ltd.'s stock price has bucked the trend and risen despite the overall unfavorable market environment.

After several months of adjustment, before the sales report was released, the stock price of Weilai Co., Ltd. had already begun to recover. On December 5, the day the company was listed, Weilai Co., Ltd. rose by 4.57% to 663.12 yuan.

Based on its current share capital, Weilai Co., Ltd. has a market capitalization of 1.62 trillion yuan, ranking second in the A-share market. Compared with Gongshang Co., Ltd., which ranks third, Weilai Co., Ltd.'s market capitalization exceeds 2000 billion yuan.

JPMorgan Chase gave Tesla a sell rating, while giving Weilai Shares an overweight rating. Major international investment banks and domestic securities firms have given Weilai a market value range of 2.1 trillion to 2.3 trillion yuan.

Based on the current average exchange rate of RMB to USD, investment banks value Weilai at over USD 3000 billion.

Top sales volume, synergy between two business lines, and technological advantages are the main reasons why Weilai was able to recover its market value despite the current unfavorable market environment. Tan Jincheng's focus on the main business has made most investment institutions more optimistic about Weilai.

According to data from authoritative research institutions, Tesla's net favorability rating plummeted from 31% at the beginning of the year to 10% in November, while Weilai's net favorability rating rose further.

The new energy vehicle market has undergone a fundamental change with the emergence of "Weilai".

"What is Mr. Tan's opinion on Mr. Wang's call for the industry to share the Ascend architecture to promote the localization of chips?"

Tan Jincheng is very popular in Luzhou. His appearance at the Weilai Experience Store attracted not only curious onlookers but also reporters attending the conference. The Intelligent Vehicle Industry Conference held in Luzhou was a large-scale event hosted by government agencies and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, with nearly a hundred attendees representing the entire automotive industry chain.

Besides big names like Boatman Brother and Tan Jincheng, tech companies such as Tencent, Baidu, and Huawei also participated.

"Weilai has always maintained an open attitude towards domestic supply chains, and we absolutely support collaboration in the industrial chain."

Faced with such a problem, Tan Jincheng was really troubled. Domestic substitution of chips is necessary for both political reasons and supply chain security. As a car company that has already developed its own MCU chips, Weilai absolutely supports it, whether for its own needs or for other reasons.

However, it is debatable whether a specific architecture is being used. First, it remains to be verified whether the existing autonomous driving algorithms are compatible with the Ascend architecture. In addition, there are differences in migration costs and performance.

In addition, in the digital age, data is extremely important for any company. Given his own strength, Wei Lai would never hand over his core data to Chrysanthemum. However, he really didn't dare to say it out loud.

Even setting aside chrysanthemum fans, such public opposition is not in line with the image of Weilai as a leading enterprise, and could easily damage the brand goodwill that Weilai has worked so hard to build.

Of course, Huawei also has its own ulterior motives. How much commercial benefit would it generate if all companies used their architecture? Although the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other agencies support domestic chip substitution, they have not mandated the adoption of a specific architecture.

In reality, most car companies only offer symbolic support for Chrysanthemum's initiative. Wang Jun, as the COO of Chrysanthemum's Intelligent Vehicle Solutions BU, issued this initiative out of Chrysanthemum's own business and his own development needs.

Within the Chrysanthemum system, Wang Jun's influence was second only to Yu Dazui, and for a long time, his influence even surpassed that of Yu Dazui. Wang Jun was the first president of the Chrysanthemum Intelligent Vehicle Solutions BU.

For Juhua's automotive business, the rivalry between Wang Jun and Yu Dazui can be described as a battle between a dragon and a tiger. Before 2022, Juhua's HI model, which was led by Wang Jun, held the upper hand.

The cooperation models with large state-owned enterprises such as Changan and BAIC are of a very high standard, while the model dominated by Dazui can only choose companies like Seres.

However, with Seres's efforts, the situation of both companies has changed significantly. The hot sales of Seres' two range-extended electric vehicles have made Da Zui very successful, while Wang Jun's situation is not so good.

With Changan and BAIC's models still unable to be launched, and Seres rising from a nobody to a main player with its cars selling better and better (the X5's monthly sales have exceeded 10,000), these large state-owned enterprises are starting to have other ideas.

Simply put, they also want to follow Da Zui, especially Chang'an, which is also located in a mountain city; in the same city, the local government, with limited resources, will definitely give priority to those who are doing well.

Wang Jun's public appeal at the summit was less a response to company business needs and more a struggle over his own position within the chrysanthemum system. Rumors had been circulating in the industry since December that Wang Jun would be transferred.

However, Wang Jun's appeal gave Tan Jincheng a different idea.

"Could you perhaps try contacting Mr. Wang, the CEO of Chrysanthemum?"

"Huh? Boss, that's a very bold idea. Will it work?"

As the CEO of Weilai Technology, Zeng Jixiang also attended this summit of 100 people. Weilai Technology's business focuses on the acquisition of Lifan and the pre-research of early technology, positioning itself between a supplier and a research institution.

In terms of business, Weilai Technology is quite low-key, and this is true throughout the entire Weilai system.

Tan Jincheng laughed and said, "Why not give it a try? Maybe we'll have a chance. We're just taking a shot, no matter what."

As the key figure in the Chrysanthemum Motors system, Yu Dazui is absolutely unlikely to be poached, while Wang Jun, another key figure, may not be so in his current situation.

Moreover, Tan Jincheng knew that if Wang Jun still wanted to engage in the automotive business, his position within the Chrysanthemum system would only become more and more awkward.

The debate over whether or not to manufacture cars has always revolved around Chrysanthemum. Da Zui's attitude is actually that he wants to manufacture cars. He even tried to use Chrysanthemum's brand, but it was quickly rejected. Wang Jun's thinking is more inclined to not manufacture cars, but to become the Bosch of the intelligent vehicle industry.

Without Big Mouth and Seres, Wang Jun's model might progress slowly, but it wouldn't be "resisted". If Chrysanthemum doesn't make cars, Wei Lai wouldn't mind cooperating with Chrysanthemum, and even using the Ascend architecture wouldn't be out of the question.

However, the current switching between these two models and their own wavering strategies are the reasons why most car companies hesitate.

Essentially, it's difficult for the "big mouth" (referring to a specific brand or brand) and Wang Jun (another brand) to coexist. Tan Jincheng believes that other car companies that previously adopted the HI (high-end) model will definitely side with the "big mouth," given the sales figures of Seres.

From January to November, Seres' cumulative sales have approached 70,000 units. The X7 has only been on the market for a few months, and its monthly delivery volume in November has exceeded 5000 units. No car company can resist such sales.

"Well, if this gets out, you'll be under a lot of pressure, boss."

Having been a top secretary before, Zeng Jixiang's first thought was about Tan Jincheng's situation. These industry insiders knew some inside stories, but Chrysanthemum's fans didn't. If Wang Jun really joined Weilai, then Tan Jincheng and Weilai would definitely face pressure from Chrysanthemum's fans.

"Let's try accepting privately. There's no need to take any stance for now. Just treat it as making friends."

Poaching such a key figure in a company is not something that can be done in a year or two. Back when he tried to poach Wang Fengying, it took him several years. Even if Wang Jun lost power internally, it was impossible for him to leave Juhua in a short period of time.

"That's fine, Mr. Wang often comes to Chongqing."

Zeng Jixiang felt much more relaxed. He didn't express his opinion but approached the matter by discussing cooperation and making friends. It just so happened that President Wang was calling on the industry to share the Ascend architecture, so it wasn't impossible for the two companies to discuss it.

"But am I high enough level?"

Given Zeng Jixiang's position as CEO of Weilai Technology, he certainly doesn't have the authority to directly contact Wang Jun. If anyone should have contact, it would be someone like Li Xiang or Hu Zhengnan. It's perfectly normal for Zeng Jixiang to have such concerns.

"Don't forget you have another identity."

The position of CEO of Weilai Technology is indeed a bit lacking, but what if he were Tan Jincheng's personal assistant?
The future automotive competition will be a battle between China and the US, while traditional automotive powerhouse Germany is destined to fall behind. In the era of intelligent driving and software-defined vehicles, the strategy of relying on sheer numbers is no longer effective.

Software development is an era of heroes; a single technical genius can be worth a thousand troops. Wang Jun led the research and development and implementation of the Chrysanthemum HI full-stack intelligent vehicle solution, and promoted cooperation between Chrysanthemum and car companies such as BAIC and Changan.

He was the key driving force behind the development of Chrysanthemum Automotive from scratch. If Wang Jun can be invited to join, the implementation of Weilai L3 intelligent driving can be promoted earlier.

After sales increased, Weilai's next strategy was to rapidly advance the research and development of L3 intelligent driving technology, and to build its own technological moat before the policy was implemented.

Wei Lai, who developed more practical L2 assisted driving technology, is often criticized for his L3 intelligent driving. Tan Jincheng's attitude towards assisted driving is often regarded as a lack of his own technology.

To say it's frustrating wouldn't be accurate, since in terms of technological research and development, Weilai doesn't tend to be as forward-looking as other companies.

However, with the increasing adoption of L2, this pragmatic strategy has become relatively outdated.

Of course, all of this is difficult, mainly depending on Wang Jun's own wishes and gaining Ren Zong's understanding. As a competitor and partner, Tan Jincheng does not want to end up like Xiaomi and Geely.

"It seems I need to find an opportunity to go to Shenzhen; how about this, you just make normal contact for now, and don't do anything else."

"Okay, I know."

Zeng Jixiang breathed a sigh of relief. Sometimes, the boss's thought process really put a lot of pressure on them. Today, he came up with such a wild idea just from Wang Zongfeng's speech at the summit. If outsiders knew, they would just think he was daydreaming.

To be honest, he was really afraid that his boss would give him a death order, forcing him to take down General Manager Wang.

(End of this chapter)