Not all joint venture car companies are "passively lying flat". Recently, GAC Group announced its 2023 market results, with a cumulative annual sales volume of 25050,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 292%。The sales volume of its mainstream car companies are: GAC Trumpchi 40650,000 units, GAC Aion 480,000 units, GAC Honda 640,000 units, and GAC Toyota 900,000 units10,000 units.
It can be seen that GAC Toyota is still the largest "contributor" to GAC Group's market sales. Not only that, GAC Toyota is also the No. 1 domestic Japanese brand in terms of sales, the No. 3 in terms of sales of joint venture automakers, and the No. 6 in sales of all industry automakers in 2023.
In 2023, Toyota's sales in China will be 17010,000 units, once again winning the sales championship of Japanese brands in China; Honda's sales in China were 12340,000 units, ranking in the middle; Nissan's sales in China were 79380,000 units, not only ranked at the bottom of the "Top Three", but also fell out of the "Million Club" for the first time after eight consecutive years of sales exceeding one million units.
The specific performance of car companies is: GAC Toyota's sales volume is 9010,000 units, which is the highest sales volume among Japanese brands; This was followed by FAW Toyota's sales of 800,000 units and Dongfeng Nissan's sales of 7910,000 units, Guangqi Honda sold 640,000 units and Dongfeng Honda sold 61 units370,000 units.
In addition, according to the 2023 retail sales ranking of manufacturers in the passenger car market recently released by the Passenger Car Association, the top 10 domestic car companies in terms of sales are BYD Auto 27060,000 units, FAW-Volkswagen 18470,000 units, Geely Automobile 14120,000 units, Changan Automobile 13720,000 units, SAIC Volkswagen 12310,000 units, GAC Toyota 9010,000 units, SAIC-GM 870,000 units, Chery Automobile 8110,000 units, FAW Toyota 800,000 units, and Great Wall Motor 760,000 units.
Among the top 10 domestic car companies, Volkswagen, Toyota and SAIC-GM have ensured their unshakable market position by virtue of their achievements in the traditional fuel vehicle market and the acceleration of electrification transformation. At the same time, it also shows that joint venture car companies still occupy nearly half of China's auto market, still hold a certain amount of market discourse, and their products are still recognized by the majority of consumers.
In particular, as the "youngest" joint venture car company among Japanese brands, GAC Toyota has not shattered the existing industrial system and business model due to the drastic electrification transformation, but has anchored the direction, tried to catch up with the changes in China's automobile market in the new energy era, and successfully opened up the market situation through new system reform, new strategic layout, new research and development direction, new technology means, new product planning and new cooperation model.
Even in the three years of the epidemic, GAC Toyota still maintained a steady growth in sales: in 2018, it achieved sales of 58030,000 units, sales in 2019 6820,000 units, sales volume of 76 in 202050,000 units, sales volume of 84 in 2021040,000 units; In 2022, the sales volume will hit the line of one million units, reaching 10050,000 units.
Although GAC Toyota's sales in 2023 are less than expected, many industry insiders believe that this slight decline does not need to be too worried, largely because of the buffer period of new energy strategic transformation, and the actual effect of its product structure adjustment will be concentrated in the next two years.
The sales volume of models with more than 200,000 yuan accounted for 445%
Don't look at the current roll, some car brands disappear when they are rolled. "In the past year, new car-making forces such as Skyrim, Ziyoujia, Weimar, Aiways and Gaohe have fallen into a life-and-death situation, and those car brands that once took pride in burning money and avoided talking about economic benefits will eventually be buried by the logic of "short-sighted car manufacturing".
After all, there is only a lower and no minimum in the first war, compared with many new energy car companies, every time they sell a car, they will have a net loss of 30,000 120,000 yuan. As a practitioner of "long-termism", Toyota has always been the company with the best financial indicators, the best operating quality and the strongest anti-risk ability among global car companies. According to globaldata data, Toyota's global sales will reach 10.65 million units in 2023, ranking first in the world for four consecutive years, followed by Volkswagen with 8.8 million units and Hyundai with 6.89 million units.
GAC Toyota, which also has the "long-termism" development gene, has been making steady progress since its establishment, not only building five world-class automobile factories in a row, but also forming a 100-billion-level automobile industry cluster, creating a cumulative industrial output value of trillions and paying taxes of more than 200 billion yuan.
In the author's opinion, the dimension of evaluating the strength of a car company should not simply think that the ultimate product and technology is everything, and sustainable profitability is also crucial.
It is worth mentioning that GAC Toyota's product structure also shows an obvious trend of "** value", with models of more than 200,000 yuan, such as Sena, Highlander, Camry, Weisa and Veranda, with a cumulative annual sales of 4010,000 units, accounting for 445%。Such a high proportion of "** value" is very rare in both joint venture car companies and the whole industry.
Moreover, GAC Toyota's product matrix is also relatively balanced, with popular models in market segments such as sedans, SUVs and MPVs. In the mid-to-high-end sedan market, Camry has won the sales championship for three consecutive years, with cumulative sales exceeding 1 million units; In the compact SUV market, the sales volume of Fenglander has exceeded 280,000 units in more than one year since its launch, and the sales volume will exceed 20,000 units for many consecutive months in 2023, successfully winning the sales championship of the joint venture compact SUV market; In the mid-size SUV market, Veranda has sold 14 percent of its annual sales30,000 units; In the MPV market, the Sena, which has been on the market for 17 months, has become the fastest hybrid MPV to achieve sales of 100,000 units.
Cumulative sales of HEV models exceeded 1 million units
It is said that the electrification of joint venture brands started late, but it does not mean that it is not worth looking forward to. In fact, GAC Toyota ranks first in the industry in terms of hybrid sales, the proportion of hybrid models and the market share of hybrid vehicles, and with the fifth-generation intelligent electric hybrid technology on the Leiling, Fenglanda and Lingshang, the cumulative sales of its HEV models have exceeded 1 million, and it is the first car company in China to achieve this milestone.
At the same time, GAC Toyota's electrification penetration rate has also reached 32 in 20232% is a record high, and few joint venture brands can reach such a high level of new energy penetration. With the installation of the latest generation of intelligent electric hybrid technology on the 9th generation Camry, GAC Toyota's electric hybrid technology will also achieve comprehensive coverage from compact models to medium and large models, further enhancing GAC Toyota's market appeal in the hybrid field.
At last year's Guangzhou Auto Show, GAC Toyota also released a new new energy brand - Bozhi, and the first pure electric SUV Bozhi 4X was also launched. Based on the potential energy in the traditional fuel vehicle and hybrid markets, as well as the continuous development in the pure electric market, GAC Toyota's development "stamina" will be further released in 2024.