This crisis may not necessarily be a bad thing for Nezha. Only after going through the gates of hell can Nezha truly grow his "three heads and six arms".

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During the Guangzhou Auto Show, I heard many colleagues chatting during meals and smoking breaks. The most frequently mentioned sentence was, "This year is tough. It feels like Nezha is about to collapse, and there may be more new forces going bankrupt."

I don't know if other new forces will collapse or not.

But Nezha Automobile has already taken the sword to commit suicide and completed its rebirth.

In just over a month from October to November, almost all the senior management of Nezha, including Zhang Yong, were silent.

Even during the lively Guangzhou Auto Show, Nezha stood quietly in a corner, proving with the news of a 3 billion yuan injection and the action of giving away free American coffee at the show that it was truly "fine".

This silence conveyed a lot of information to the outside world.

Some people believe it was the quiet before dusk; others believe it was the silence before dawn.

In my opinion, Nezha belongs to the latter.

Behind more than a month of silence, there is likely to be one thing: Nezha is undergoing internal rectification and strategic adjustment.

The period from October 2024 to the end of the year is crucial for Nezha.

What is the problem with Nezha?

It is certain that as the sales champion among new forces in 2022, Nezha encountered problems in 2024.

This year, Nezha has been exposed to issues such as declining sales, factory shutdowns, salary cuts and layoffs, delayed payments to suppliers, and slowed delivery of new vehicles.

Each problem alone could put an automaker on the hot seat, let alone when Nezha faces so many problems simultaneously...

It is precisely because these problems occurred simultaneously that there is a widespread sentiment in the outside world that Nezha is declining, and that Hezhong Auto, the company behind Nezha, is on the verge of "bankruptcy".

Actually, when we put these problems together, it is not difficult to find that there are only one or two core dilemmas faced by Nezha.

Among the new force brands, Nezha and Lingpao are actually very similar.

First, they both lead with affordable cars and have a good start, but they are prone to issues like insufficient momentum when striving for upward growth; second, they both attach great importance to independent technology research and development, pursuing higher mechanical quality for their products.

In my opinion, the automotive manufacturing mindset of Nezha and Lingpao is a real test of systemic capabilities.

The hardest cars to make in the world are not high-end cars priced at 400,000 to 500,000 yuan, but affordable cars priced at tens of thousands of yuan that need to demonstrate comprehensive product strength.

Behind this lies the economic reality: Good cars priced at tens of thousands of yuan place very high demands on the supply chain costs and personnel cost control of automakers. For high-end brands like Li Auto and NIO, they can invest heavily in various capitals. After all, the profit margins of their vehicles are high, which can offset the investment costs.

However, for Nezha, the biggest problem lies in the difficulty of offsetting costs.

Compared to Lingpao, which received a 1.5 billion euro (approximately 11.57 billion yuan) investment from Stellantis, Nezha finds it difficult to continue investing heavily in employee operations and supply chain links.

It is precisely because Nezha struggles to stabilize the financial issues of its supply chain and employees that it leads to a shortage of funds, factory shutdowns, and further leads to delivery difficulties.

And delivery difficulties, as the core of the entire problem chain, have also brought turmoil to Hezhong Auto up and down.

For the market, Nezha's inability to deliver vehicles will reduce consumer confidence, directly leading to a decline in sales; for Hezhong Auto itself, this will also directly affect sales and profitability.

Therefore, the biggest problem for Nezha at this stage is still a lack of money!

But while lacking money, Lingpao really needs to reflect on whether its profitability and investments in various aspects are truly proportional.

Nezha Reborn, My Fate Is In My Own Hands

Previously, we compared Nezha with Lingpao and found that they are actually quite similar in terms of market operation mindset and product shaping mindset.

However, from an enterprise perspective, the differences between the two are very large.

The main shareholders behind Lingpao are founder Zhu Jiangming, Dahua Technology, and Stellantis Group, with very little state-owned capital.

Behind Nezha, Hezhong New Energy's shareholders, in addition to private enterprises like 360, include the Nanning SASAC and Yichun SASAC, which hold a large share of the equity; at the same time, government funds from Tongxiang, Hefei, Jiaxing, and other places are also shareholders of Hezhong New Energy.

Compared to Lingpao, Nezha has a solid state-owned capital foundation behind it.

To put it bluntly, even if Nezha wants to collapse, it probably can't. Because under the background of state-owned assets, if Nezha Automobile collapses, it will result in the loss of tens of billions of yuan of state-owned assets, which is definitely not something that can be resolved by simply walking away like Jia Yueting.

So when Nezha faced practical problems, the local state-owned assets were also very supportive.

On the eve of the Guangzhou Auto Show, Nanning Industrial Investment brought a 3 billion yuan injection to Nezha.

The 3 billion yuan may not fundamentally solve the problems currently faced by Nezha, but it is enough to alleviate the immediate pressing need.

After the funds are in place, the most urgent task for Nezha is to "resume production". Settle supply chain arrears, restart production lines, and ensure that new vehicles can be delivered to users as soon as possible.

Actually, compared to those new forces that failed and fled due to broken capital chains, Nezha's current situation is still considered very fortunate.

On the one hand, there is support from local state-owned assets; on the other hand, Nezha still has a large number of orders.

We don't need to go into detailed data. You can open the comment section of Nezha's Bilibili account or Zhang Yong's Douyin account, and you will see that all the comments are about "urging for car delivery".

In a highly market-oriented automotive business environment, as long as there are orders, there is still hope.

Especially in overseas markets, Nezha is currently ranked second in the sales chart of Thai new energy vehicle brands, and the amount of overseas orders is still increasing.

Previously, the collapse of manufacturers like WM Motor was nothing more than a lack of market competitiveness in their products, leading to difficulties in corporate development. Relying on cost-effectiveness and mechanical quality, Nezha has a considerable potential market size.

So no matter what, with state-owned capital support and a large number of market orders in hand, Nezha will not collapse.

As a last resort, at this stage, the automotive manufacturing qualification possessed by Nezha is definitely a valuable and scarce resource in the industry.

Do you think Nezha will retreat when the going gets tough?

To acquire three heads and six arms, one must first sever an arm to commit suicide.

Many people compare the current predicament faced by Nezha to "Nezha committing suicide".

Indeed, at this moment, Nezha has already placed itself in a desperate situation and then been reborn, quite in line with the sentiment of "my fate is in my own hands".

On the one hand, Nezha is actively struggling for survival; on the other hand, market opportunities still exist.

At the beginning of the article, we already mentioned that the period from October to the end of the year is very important for Nezha.

For Nezha to continue to establish itself in the market, there are still many changes that need to be made.

First, it is the change in the entire corporate system.

When Fang Yunzhou and Zhang Yong from Chery took the helm of Nezha, they also drew on many past experiences. For example, launching cost-effective models and expanding the product line very widely...

But after all, Nezha is a new force, while Chery is a large automaker with a very sound supply chain system.

Perhaps it's simpler to put it this way: Chery has a solid foundation and can afford to wait; while Nezha's industrial foundation is thin and cannot afford to wait.

Although the investment from Nanning Industrial Investment can alleviate the immediate difficulties faced by Nezha, it is difficult to alleviate the long-term thirst.

It is time for Nezha to streamline its product base and adjust its operating efficiency.

Currently, Nezha has 6 models on sale, covering A0-class cars, mid-to-large hunting vehicles, and even sports cars. The larger the portfolio, the greater the burden on Nezha.

Different models, different platform architectures, and different technologies have all become a burden for Nezha.

To put it bluntly, Nezha is just "too stubborn" when it comes to making cars, insisting on giving each model different features and labels. In the end, this will increase its internal consumption.

As a new force, it is good that Nezha has the determination to create products. But everything has two sides, and too much of a good thing can be bad.

At this point, if Nezha can streamline its product line and establish a family of product features, it would actually be a more cost-effective approach.

Whether it's Li Auto, Lingpao, Volkswagen, or other manufacturers, they all share a mindset: platform-based creation and family-style design. This can save a lot of research and development costs, procurement costs, and quality costs, which is definitely good for the development of the entire brand.

To this day, we can almost conclude that Nezha is definitely undergoing a rectification and transformation internally.

Whether the senior management of Nezha will carry out changes based on the above ideas is unknown to us.

But it is certain that Nezha's resilience will not diminish. Even if it faces such crises in the future, it will have more experience to deal with them and provide a reference for future judgments.

Therefore, this crisis is not necessarily a bad thing for Nezha.

Only after going through the gates of hell can Nezha truly grow his "three heads and six arms".

Conclusion:

In 2024, too many stories unfolded in the ranks of new automotive forces.

The collapse of HiPhi, the rise of Xiaomi, and the struggle for survival of Nezha... This series of stories vividly demonstrated the excitement and cruelty of the automotive industry.

By the end of 2024, after experiencing the trials and tribulations of the times and the industry, Nezha will inevitably be reborn. But in the future, Nezha will inevitably face ups and downs. This time, the resilience demonstrated by this brand will undoubtedly bring greater confidence to people.

As an observer of the new energy automobile industry, the author only hopes that after Nezha has overcome these obstacles, no matter whether it is a bright moon and clear breeze or hardships and sufferings, it can remain true to its original aspirations and move forward unswervingly.