2003: Starting with Foreign Trade

Chapter 766 "The Best SUV Under 100 Million Yuan!"

"The third largest e-commerce website? Haha, not at all."

“There are many excellent e-commerce websites, such as Taobao, JD.com, and Dangdang. We are far from having that kind of strength. However, we can take this as an encouragement from the media and consumers.”

The general direction of the cooperation between Tencent and Orange Technology was discussed by Tan Jincheng and Pony Ma, but the specific operations were handled by Sun Tongyu.

Both Tencent and Orange have invested considerable media resources in promoting their collaboration.

Sun Tongyu was the one in charge of creating momentum.

In the past month, Sun Tongyu has given numerous interviews to the media and participated in several speeches, looking radiant with health and vitality.

After four years of keeping a low profile since joining Orange in 2008, Sun Tongyu has rarely appeared in the public eye except for necessary interviews.

Sun Tongyu is not an ostentatious person. He joined Orange Technology with his own investment and was regarded as a model of a professional manager. The company went public within a few months of joining, and his wealth also grew rapidly in the shortest time.

But deep down, being kicked out by his former employer was a lingering regret for Sun Tongyu.

Currently, there are hundreds of e-commerce websites of all sizes across the country, making it a diverse and vibrant landscape.

The internet has a monopolistic nature, and the actions of these giants in recent years show that their ambitions are growing. Among these hundreds of e-commerce websites, none can guarantee their survival except for Taobao.

Even companies like Orange Technology, which have already gone public, could very well be squeezed out of the market and barely survive one day.

Jingdong, Chengpin Hui, and Dangdang, which take a differentiated approach, are actually trying to avoid direct competition with Taobao in order to survive. However, there are just too many vertical e-commerce websites, especially clothing flash sales similar to Chengpin Hui.

Dongzi didn't say one thing: there are just too many vertical e-commerce websites.

If Orange Products wants to survive and thrive, it must eliminate competing products and squeeze out their market share.

In the mobile internet era, the boss found a mobile application entry point for Orange Products Club, and now Tencent has been added as an entry point. Sun Tongyu can finally make a big splash.

Due to the company's strategic issues, Orange Products will not have the opportunity to meet with its former employer. However, Sun Tongyu does not want the flash sale app he built from scratch to just disappear, as that would only make his resentment worse.

As for meeting up with his former employer to resolve his inner conflict, that will have to wait for another opportunity.

Ali's current development direction leans towards Tmall, but Sun Tongyu still believes that Taobao has a chance. However, Tmall is currently at its peak, and Ali is also in its growth phase, so it would be too difficult to directly compete with it.

I wonder if the boss still remembers the group-buying model we talked about back then, which involved not setting up a shopping cart?

Tan Jincheng certainly remembered, but he was waiting for Huang Zheng to lose interest in the borderline adult games and start a new business. Pinduoduo's model was similar to that of food delivery and ride-hailing services, all of which relied on burning through large amounts of money to seize the market.

Furthermore, Pinduoduo's success was essentially Huang Zheng's all-in bet; he bet everything on human nature and the global economy.

Similarly, Dongzi and Lao Ma also went all in on human nature and the global economic situation. Two of them went all in on economic growth, while the other went all in on economic decline. It's just that Huang Zheng won by going all in.

If the economy weren't in a downturn, Pinduoduo wouldn't have been able to achieve such a large scale.

"Don't rush, wait for an opportunity. What you need to do now is to do a good job with Orange Products and further expand your market share."

"As you responded in the media, being third or not is not important, but we must at least be number one in the flash sale category to keep the app active."

It's only natural that Tan Jincheng could see through Sun Tongyu's thoughts.

Put yourself in his shoes. If he were Sun Tongyu, and his ideas differed from his boss's but he wasn't given any chance to prove himself and was instead kicked out, he would also want to prove himself.

This is different from the situation of ordinary office workers; outstanding people have their own pride.

Given Alibaba's scale at the time, even if it wanted to develop Tmall, it was fully capable of developing both platforms simultaneously, giving Sun Tongyu a chance to prove himself.

"Haha, I'm not in a hurry."

Sun Tongyu did not deny his feelings. He had already waited for four years, so what was a little more waiting?

"In the mobile internet era, the entry point is important, but the retention rate is actually the most important. I need to pay attention to the retention rate of our apps. Now that you have money, you can expand that farm project."

The app may lead users to it, but if the app lacks unique features, users can simply leave. Shopping apps have a natural disadvantage in this regard.

Once users buy the products they need, they close the app, unlike social apps where users can stay on it for a long time.

This is also the reason why Ali has been absorbing the blood of acquired companies.

"Haha, we're on the same page as the boss. Tencent's $5000 million can be used as seed money."

Although Happy Farm was sold to Tencent, Kaixin.com is still operating, and the project to help farmers has been maintained. In the future, Kaixin.com will inevitably decline, which is unavoidable in the mobile internet era.

Kaixin001 couldn't be stopped, nor could the major portal websites; this is the wheel of time.

However, some of Kaixin.com's technologies can be embedded into Orange Products Club. For example, the ongoing project to help farmers has already been embedded into Orange Products Club, but it was not large-scale due to funding constraints.

Tan Jincheng was referring to the Ant Forest project from his previous life. This thing hasn't been launched yet. Ali could do it, and Orange Technology, with its money, can do it too.

Farm, Manor, and Ant Forest are among the most effective ways for Taobao and Alipay to maintain user retention rates, and they were also among the ways that major e-commerce websites maintained user retention rates in the past.

Orange Products could have been the first to develop it.

$5000 million is definitely not enough, but it can certainly be used as seed money. We no longer need to reach the scale of Ali.

This plan had actually been discussed internally for a while, but it was limited by funding. Now that a major investor has appeared, we can get started.

Pony Ma's ambitions in e-commerce have always been quite large. Even after giving up his own e-commerce business, he still made quite a few small-scale attempts, especially with WeChat's mini-program system, which was a real blow to e-commerce websites.

In its previous life, Tencent did not have any e-commerce website on the surface, but through investment and the mini-program system, it still occupied a certain position in the e-commerce system.

Why are Jack Ma, Pony Ma, and even Lei Jun so obsessed with e-commerce?

It's actually quite simple. E-commerce generates enormous cash flow. Owning a full-category e-commerce website and achieving a certain market share is equivalent to having a large amount of cash on hand.

Consumer goods related to clothing, food, housing, and transportation are always the categories with the most abundant cash flow and are always the safest.

Not to mention the massive amount of user data behind this, and how their consumption habits can be used to train big data analytics.

Although he had told Zhang Xupeng that he wouldn't stay for too long, it was already the end of February when they returned from Hong Kong. In addition to purchasing property in Hong Kong, Tan Jincheng and his wife also went to the United States and met some Wall Street celebrities.

Tesla later replaced all its in-vehicle chips with Nvidia chips, and the current in-vehicle system is basically modeled after Tesla's, and the future path it will take is also similar to Tesla's.

The direct competitor of the gasoline-powered vehicle is Great Wall Motors, while the target of the new energy vehicle is actually Tesla.

You can't beat Director Ma when it comes to rockets, but you can go toe-to-toe with him when it comes to electric cars.

In the niche circle of new energy vehicle enthusiasts, the Weilai ES6 is considered one of the most anticipated models, alongside Tesla's Model S. BYD's Qin series is also highly anticipated, but its counterpart is the Aion S.

Starting in mid-February, the ES6 had already entered a small-batch delivery period. In the early stages, the deliveries were placed in self-operated stores and to some customers with connections.

With March approaching, both the Aion S and ES6 will be entering their delivery period, and Tan Jincheng is eagerly anticipating the market response to these two models.

In the past few days, the ES6 has been appearing on the streets of Ningbo and other first-tier cities in China. After returning, Tan Jincheng also got himself an ES6 as his car.

All of this is, of course, for publicity and promotion.

The Beijing Auto Show in April provided a special opportunity for the WILAY ES6 to make its official debut. Also making an appearance at the Beijing Auto Show was WILAY's new design director, Chris Thomas.

Wei Lai had already started promoting this car two months in advance.

Also showcased at the Beijing Auto Show was a concept car from Weilai, which is actually a popular model that will be common in the market after 2022, and is closer to the Weilai ES8.

Ten years from now, these new energy vehicles will be commonplace, but right now they can definitely be released as concept cars.

As the first new energy vehicle in Weilai Auto's high-end brand, the ES6, priced between 300,000 and 500,000 yuan, carries Weilai's dream of entering the high-end market. Once this price difference is accepted by the market, it will be natural to launch more expensive models in the future, and even luxury cars in the million-yuan range are not out of the question.

"Actually, we're definitely losing money. We've invested so much in R&D just to bring users a different driving experience."

In March, Tan Jincheng arrived in the capital.

Now he is a delegate to the National People's Congress (NPC), a national-level delegate who is eligible to attend the NPC and CPPCC sessions. As the head of a company worth tens of billions of yuan, Tan Jincheng receives comparable attention to figures like Ma Huateng and Pony Ma during the NPC and CPPCC sessions.

There was no way around it; he was just too young, involved in car manufacturing, and incredibly handsome—he was just too much of a topic of conversation. Upon arriving in Beijing, Li Bing, taking advantage of his proximity, arranged an interview. After having his exclusive interview snatched several times by NetEase's automotive channel, Li Bing finally realized his mistake.

When asked about the cost of the Weilai ES6, Tan Jincheng made no secret of the fact that the car was sold at a loss.

Last year, due to poaching talent and investing in the construction of a design institute, Weilai Auto's R&D expenses soared to 22.4% of its annual revenue. It's worth noting that the R&D expenses for traditional car models these days are generally around 5%.

Even Dizi, which claims to have huge R&D investment, only has 6.7%. Moreover, Zhang Yong, the CEO of Weilai Automobile, announced that Weilai will always maintain an annual R&D investment of around 10% in the future.

Tan Jincheng wasn't lying. The production cost of the ES6 is basically over 30 yuan per vehicle, but the starting price is only 33.8 yuan. This is definitely a loss-making business, so the sales volume of this car is destined not to be very high.

Unless it can generate 10 orders like the Yuechi A1, but that's obviously impossible in 2012.

The ES6 is the first model to introduce the Weilai family design language. Like the upcoming Maodou S, the ES6 is equipped with a 10.4-inch central control screen and an 8.8-inch digital instrument panel.

It pays great attention to detail, such as the shape of the air conditioning vents, the steering wheel, and the layout of the multi-function buttons, etc., which maximizes the sense of luxury.

It can be said that, apart from its inferior intelligent driving capabilities compared to later models, the ES6 was a car that was ahead of its time.

In addition, Tan Jincheng has effectively grasped the pain points of users in terms of marketing.

The reason why the Yuechi A1 sells so well is largely due to Weilai's excellent marketing. There are plenty of cars on the market priced at around 100,000 yuan, and many of them offer similar value for money as the Yuechi A1. So why is the Yuechi A1's sales unmatched?
When it comes to what consumers think when buying a car these days, besides space and features, the main considerations are handling and acceleration.

In particular, the 0-100 km/h acceleration, which seems useless to ordinary users, is especially popular with consumers, who always mention its speed.

Take the ES6 pure electric model as an example, Wei Lai directly achieved a 0-100 km/h time of 5.4 seconds!
What mass-produced SUVs on the market can currently achieve a 0-60 mph time of under 5 seconds? These include high-end models such as the Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8, Land Rover Range Rover Sport, BMW X5 M, and Mercedes-Benz/Porsche.

There are basically none of them under 1 million. Although the ES6 has not yet achieved a sub-5-second 0-60 mph time, it can be marketed as the best SUV under 1 million!

This is still the base model of the ES6!
With Serene's sports car technology and having disassembled Tesla's electric sports car, they are certainly capable of handling 0-100 km/h acceleration. The ES6 Sport version can achieve 0-100 km/h acceleration in under 5 seconds, but there are no plans to launch it at the moment.

This tactic was learned from Apple and Intel, two companies that squeeze out incremental improvements by selling their technology at a super low price.

We want to see how the market reacts before making a decision on the ES6. If the response is good, then we will launch a sports version.

"Mr. Tan, could you talk about your original intention in developing this car and selling it at a loss?"

The reporter Li Bing sent to interview Tan Jincheng was their star car reviewer, a beautiful female reporter. The elegantly dressed reporter seemed a little reserved in front of Tan Jincheng, who was dressed casually.

He has a very good reputation in his private life. Apart from a few days of rumors with Liu Yifei in the early stages of his business, there have been no other rumors.

The beautiful female hosts in the automotive industry have seen many wealthy people, and some of them may have dreamed of rising to the top overnight. However, it depends on the person. A self-made millionaire like Tan Jincheng is simply beyond their reach.

"Haha, we have no choice but to sell at a loss. We, Weilai and Shanchi, have always been committed to being the most cost-effective companies. If the price is too high, not only will consumers not be able to accept it, but it will also not be in line with our corporate culture."

"Furthermore, the losses are only temporary. I believe that with the advancement of technology, the cost of ES6 will definitely come down, and then we will make a profit."

“Okay, but we’ve found that the ES6 has a lot of highlights. Its 0-100 km/h acceleration alone is comparable to that of a million-dollar luxury SUV. In addition, its interior is no less impressive. It could definitely be priced higher.”

Tan Jincheng has been making quite a splash in the internet industry lately, and Li Bing wants to ride on his coattails.

Yiche's performance after its IPO has not been as good as expected. As one of the Chinese concept stocks that have been shorted, Yiche's current market value is only US$2.05 million.

After the IPO, ByteDance's shares were diluted to 9%, with a market value of $1845 million. In terms of equity investment, it really didn't make any money.

Li Bing also wants to increase the market value of Yiche through mergers and acquisitions. As the first listed professional automotive website, Li Bing wants to expand Yiche through mergers and acquisitions, with Autohome as the primary target.

The merger of Youku and Tudou is still fresh in people's minds. At the end of February, there were rumors in the market that Yiche wanted to acquire Autohome with 1 million yuan in cash plus 15% of its shares.

Prior to this, rumors that Autohome intended to IPO and raise $2 million had been denied by its executives. Although Yiche executives, including Li Bing, did not respond to the rumors, the market generally believed that it would be much simpler for Autohome to abandon its IPO and directly merge with Yiche.

Li Bing did have such an idea. Autohome's brand marketing would be a supplement to Yiche's, and a merger would definitely be beneficial, but he didn't have the money.

A 15% stake is easy to negotiate, but Yiche really can't come up with 100 million yuan in cash right now.

Sending reporters to promote the ES6 in all aspects could be seen not only as an opportunity to ride on Tan Jincheng's popularity, but also as an attempt to curry favor with him, as this major investor is the only original shareholder of Yiche that has not reduced its stake so far.

"Haha, there's no need. On the one hand, we need to consider the difficulties in promoting electric vehicles. On the other hand, we also want to make the cars as cheap as possible, or rather, as cost-effective as possible."

"In terms of configuration, we have achieved the configuration of a million-dollar luxury car, but the price is only 30% of theirs. We can say that under one million, the ES6 is the best SUV model."

"The automotive industry is a high-tech industry, but technology should not be something that is out of reach, but rather something that serves everyone."

The beautiful host's eyes lit up: "Technology shouldn't be something unattainable, but rather something that serves everyone?"

After a moment of contemplation, the host slowly said, "Mr. Tan's words are truly insightful; they could be the topic of today's interview."

That's exactly right. For just 300,000 to 500,000 yuan, you can enjoy the experience of a million-yuan luxury car from a foreign brand. Isn't that how technology serves the people?
"Haha, you flatter me. Actually, I heard this from Lei Jun of Xiaomi. Their Xiaomi 1 is exactly like that."

Businesses are certainly profit-driven, but if they can offer the best value for money at the same price point, instead of simply exploiting customers, then they can be considered to have a clear conscience.

In addition to being interviewed by Yiche, Tan Jincheng also accepted interviews from numerous media outlets, including professional automotive websites, internet media, financial media, and even state media.

The questions asked were varied and numerous, but of course, the most discussed topic was ES6, which was a rule set before the interview.

No matter what media outlet you're from, if you want to interview me, you have to help promote the ES6; it's a kind of exchange of benefits.

Besides Tan Jincheng himself, executives including Zhang Yong and Chris also received publicity tasks. The sales volume of ES6 is not important, but brand awareness must be raised so that consumers know more about the development details.

At the Two Sessions, Tan Jincheng's proposals were similar to those of previous years, focusing on education issues in impoverished mountainous areas. This year's proposal continued with the Free Lunch Program, a public welfare project launched last year.

Regarding Tan Jincheng's proposal, many media outlets have asked why he didn't address industry-related development issues, given his current influence; he could certainly have made such proposals.

The media's questions are not entirely unfounded. Leaving aside its leading position in the two-wheeled electric vehicle market, even in the automotive sector, Weilai Auto is no longer the company that people doubted would last more than a few years before going bankrupt.

Judging solely from the sales figures of the Yuechi A1, who dares to say that Weilai will easily go bankrupt? So what if they lose money in the new energy vehicle sector? Weilai has the financial strength to do so.

As the leading domestic brand in the SUV market and making steady progress in the pickup truck market, these are the reasons why Weilai is so confident in investing heavily in new energy vehicles.

In February, the Yuechi A1 still achieved sales of 16712 units.

The Tiguan stole the show in January, but was overtaken by the Yuechi A1 in February. The Tiguan sold 15487 units in February, a decrease of 4921 units compared to January, making it the popular SUV model with the largest decline.

The main reason is that the delivery of Tiguan is not keeping up with demand. It is difficult to get one, and the phenomenon of price increases and long queues has always been a common trick of foreign brands. As long as a car sells well, they have to raise prices.

This was the case with the CRV and RAV4 a few years ago, and it remains the same with the current Tiguan, but the Yuechi A1 does not have this problem.

Although the second-generation model will be launched in April, there are plenty of cars available. With significant discounts, the Yuechi A1 can be picked up within a week at the latest, which is much more convenient than the Tiguan, which has a markup.

Those who couldn't wait or were unwilling to pay a premium opted for domestic brands. Great Wall, BYD, and others saw stable sales in February, with the S6 even experiencing an increase.

Mr. Tan, from his previous life, had a deep understanding of this. Some domestic brands also played these tricks, but when it came to playing the trick of raising prices, foreign companies played it the most ruthlessly. Not only did you have to wait to buy a car from them, but you also had to pay extra.

As for other preferential policies, consumers have little room for negotiation; the 4S store is incredibly arrogant.

Just wait, you'll enjoy a few more years of good times.

Just look at the Japanese brands this year. The CRV, which was incredibly popular last year, only ranked outside the top five in sales in the first two months of this year, with monthly sales failing to exceed 10,000 units.

When the market abandons you, the mistakes you made before will be repeatedly brought up and magnified infinitely.

Dongfeng Nissan set a sales target of 100 million vehicles at the beginning of this year, but now it seems that this is really difficult to achieve.

Mr. Tan stayed at a hotel near the venue of the R conference. After another interview, he had to repeat the same things to different people, and he was somewhat tired.

Doing publicity is not as easy as you might imagine. Even if you have a well-prepared script, you not only have to memorize it, but you also have to be wary of reporters setting traps for you.

Human nature is a strange thing. In recent years, public intellectuals have become more prevalent, and there are even more public intellectuals in the journalism circle. One can easily fall into a trap without realizing it.

"Boss, here's an invitation, take a look."

Just as Tan Jincheng lay down on the sofa, Zeng Jixiang came in with the invitation. Tan Jincheng couldn't help but curse inwardly.

(End of this chapter)