The influence of supply chain has spread in the industry.
On April 9, Weilai released the "statement on recent production and delivery". Weilai said that since March, due to the epidemic, the company's supply chain partners in Jilin, Shanghai, Jiangsu and other places have stopped production one after another, and have not yet recovered affected by this, the production of Weilai complete vehicle has been suspended
Due to the above reasons, many users will delay the delivery of their vehicles in the near future.
The automobile industry chain is long and complex. Even if Weilai automobile is produced in Hefei City, Anhui Province, there is no large-scale sealing and control locally, but because many upstream supply chain enterprises are unable to guarantee supply normally in Jilin, Shanghai and other places, Weilai's whole vehicle production is also affected
Suspension of vehicle production is a helpless move. Weilai said that many users' vehicles will delay delivery recently. "Please understand. The company will work with its supply chain partners to resume production as soon as possible and deliver the vehicles to you as soon as possible on the premise of meeting the epidemic prevention requirements."
Now is the key period for the delivery of Weilai new car.
According to the data, in the past March, Weilai delivered 9985 vehicles, with a year-on-year increase of 37.6% and a month on month increase of 62.9%. Despite the year-on-year and month on month growth, Weilai has a lot of pressure compared with the year-on-year growth of other new car building forces.
According to Weilai's plan, the delivery of its first pure electric car et7 will begin on March 28. However, from the feedback of users on Weilai app, few people have successfully collected the car. One user said that Weilai staff said he would be the "first pick-up in Foshan". The new car was offline at the end of March, but it has not been shipped yet.
logistics resources are in short supply, and local epidemic prevention policies lead to difficulties in passage. The delivery chain is facing the same challenges as the production chain Weilai said that et7 itself is in the production climbing stage. Except for the impact of the supply chain, everything else is normal. After the supply chain is restored, production will be accelerated.
supply chain challenges remain severe
The second quarter has just begun, and factors such as rising raw material prices and chip shortage have not improved.
Ideal CEO Li Xiang wrote that "the increase in battery costs in the second quarter will be very outrageous."
He Xiaopeng sighed, "there are still big challenges in battery supply this year, and the proportion of price increase is beyond our imagination. We are communicating. It is expected that China's battery supply will be greatly improved in the second or third quarter of next year."
In addition to the pressure on auto enterprises caused by the rise of raw material prices, the chip shortage crisis since 2020 has not been alleviated. A number of people in the automotive industry said that the current chip shortage is still serious. The chip supply in the fourth quarter of 2021 has eased compared with the third quarter, but there is no significant relief at this stage compared with the fourth quarter of 2021.
Li Bin, founder of Weilai, said at the 2021 earnings conference call a few days ago that the main challenge is chip supply, especially the fluctuation of basic chips. "Weilai needs about 1000 chips per car, of which 10% will face the problem of tight supply from time to time, mainly some basic chips. If we lack these chips, we can't produce cars, but we will use alternative materials or buy them in the spot market, but it must be a little more complicated."
In addition, the epidemic has also affected some important cities in the automobile industry chain. For example, many automobile enterprises and parts enterprises have gathered in Changchun and Shanghai. Some factories have stopped production, and production and sales have been affected.
Shen Yanan, co-founder and President of ideal automobile, said, "due to the impact of the epidemic in the Yangtze River Delta, the production is affected by the supply shortage of some parts. More measures are being taken to ensure the supply of parts, ensure production as much as possible, and shorten the waiting cycle for car collection of ideal one users."
However, despite the severe challenges facing the supply chain, new car manufacturers have launched heavy-duty models since the second quarter, and the pattern of new energy vehicles may be reshaped.
With the market scale of Weilai, ideal and Xiaopeng approaching 100000 units, the three auto companies have begun to attack each other's territory in the key stage of new energy vehicles entering the qualification competition.
