Iron Lady "cleanses" XPeng after

(The one on the left is Wang Fengying)

Over a year ago, Xiaopeng Motors' chairman He Xiaopeng invited the "Iron Lady" of the automotive industry, Wang Fengying, after much effort. More than a year later, Xiaopeng Motors entered a period of super turbulence in personnel and operations, which has not subsided to this day.

Wang Fengying's "three-pronged approach" once brought immediate results, leading to a significant increase in Xiaopeng's sales at the end of last year. However, after entering 2024, Xiaopeng's performance has been mixed, with monthly sales dropping below 10,000 units. They have been overtaken by old rivals and new forces, ranking seventh, and the once shining star of the new forces has dimmed.

At the same time, intense personnel changes are still spreading within Xiaopeng. Several co-founders and executives of Xiaopeng have successively resigned, with many former Great Wall executives, Wang Fengying's husband, and son-in-law taking over multiple core departments. The Great Wall's dealers and channels have also been brought into Xiaopeng, causing a complete transformation.

He Xiaopeng has tacitly approved all these changes. Perhaps he is aiming to make a comeback and become an industry giant, taking a desperate gamble. He knows well that Xiaopeng Motors needs a profound transformation and a painful healing process to completely turn things around.

However, the effectiveness of all these changes requires sales to prove themselves, and so far, Wang Fengying has not fully demonstrated herself.

Low Point

At a Xiaomi SU7 launch event half a month ago, He Xiaopeng, who was invited, left early after the price of the SU7 was announced, leading to online jokes that he went back to the company to strategize.

Xiaomi's entry is bound to increase the pressure on Xiaopeng Motors. This year, Xiaopeng has failed to break the 10,000-unit mark for three consecutive months. Although sales in March approached 10,000 units, doubling compared to the previous month, the total sales volume of 21,000 units in the first quarter decreased by nearly 40% compared to last year.

Analyzing Xiaopeng's sales, a sense of imbalance with a "top-heavy" feeling is evident.

Nearly 40% of the total delivery volume comes from the flagship X9, which was launched at the beginning of the year. This model, originally positioned in the 300,000-400,000 RMB segment, unexpectedly became Xiaopeng's vanguard. Meanwhile, the P7i, G6, and the new G9, which were the main models in the previous quarter, each had monthly sales of less than 2,000 units, and the P5 in the 150,000 RMB segment dropped to a few hundred units.

In the past six months, Xiaopeng has implemented multiple rounds of price adjustments to "rescue" the situation, but sales growth has not been stimulated.

In December last year, the P7i and G9 were offered discounts of up to 26,000 RMB and 19,000 RMB respectively. In January this year, the P7i Pengyi Edition was given a 50,000 RMB subsidy. In March, the starting price of the G6 was reduced to below 180,000 RMB. In April, the new G9 was temporarily reduced by up to 20,000 RMB, and at the same time, a poster of "Xiaopeng P7 reappears" was released, with a configuration originally priced at 239,900 RMB for the P7, discounted to 140,900 RMB.

It's worth noting that these were once popular models for Xiaopeng. The P7, released in 2020, contributed to over 60% of Xiaopeng's sales. The G6, competing with the Model Y, held up half of Xiaopeng's sales last year, maintaining a delivery volume of over 8,000 units for several months. The redesigned new G9 in September last year also reached a peak monthly sales of nearly 6,000 units, accounting for nearly 30%.

However, their fates are strikingly similar, always becoming sales leaders after release, but quickly cooling off six months later. Xiaopeng has been stuck in this cycle At present, just as the X9 takes the lead, the pure electric MPV MEGA from Li Auto, priced at over 500,000 RMB, delivered 3,229 units in March, narrowing the gap with XPeng X9 (3,946 units); the four-seater version of ZEEKR "009 Glory" is also set to debut this month. How long can the X9 continue to sell well remains a question.

One of the reasons behind the fluctuating sales and structural imbalance is the increasingly fierce homogenized competition in the industry. The technology and intelligent driving labels promoted by XPeng have gradually become industry standards, especially after the efforts of Huawei and Xiaomi.

The more fundamental reason is that XPeng lacks a systematic capability encompassing matrix planning, production capacity management, and marketing. This is a hidden issue for XPeng during its golden age, and although He Xiaopeng has been pushing for reforms in the past year, it has not been perfected as of now.

Turmoil

In January last year, XPeng announced the appointment of Wang Fengying as President, with He Xiaopeng entrusting her with significant responsibilities such as marketing, supply chain, product planning, and quality control reforms.

Since then, there have been frequent organizational changes at XPeng, with many department heads experiencing turnover, including the sales system, the automotive powertrain center, the styling center, the autonomous driving center, and the procurement department, with similar adjustments ongoing.

The Vice President in charge of XPeng's sales has changed several times in just one year, from the technically-oriented Liao Qinghong, to Geely-affiliated Yi Han, to Alibaba-affiliated Wang Tong, and most recently to Gu Yuanqing, who was transferred from XPeng's original financial platform management.

In the second half of last year, with the departure of XPeng's Vice President of Autonomous Driving Wu Xinzhou, key personnel in perception, decision-making, LiDAR, and other autonomous driving-related roles also left one after another, and recently, XPeng's Senior Director of Autonomous Driving Liu Yilin was rumored to be leaving.

In March that just passed, there was a shake-up at the top level of XPeng, with co-founders Xia Heng and He Tao resigning from the positions of President and Senior Vice President, stepping away from the core power circle. Coupled with the early exit of co-founder Yang Chunlei, all of XPeng's founding team members have left except for He Xiaopeng.

The departure of Xia and He was actually expected, marking the complete end of XPeng's "democratic management" and era of decentralized power after the G9 incident.

With a strong management style and a belief in execution efficiency, Wang Fengying has further injected the experience, style, and even channels and personnel of the Great Wall series into XPeng, changing the company.

Today, the heads of XPeng's core departments such as product planning, production manufacturing, and marketing all come from Wang Fengying's former colleagues at Great Wall or even family members.

In terms of channels, at the end of last year, XPeng issued requirements to dealers to stockpile inventory, purchasing half of the target sales volume each month. This is a common sales model for traditional automakers like Great Wall. In fact, Wang Fengying proposed a channel reform plan earlier, merging direct and authorized dealers and starting a selection process based on survival of the fittest.

Under the tough approach of the "Iron Lady," XPeng eliminated over 130 stores last year, while introducing 160 dealer partners through the "Jupiter Plan," expanding coverage to 40 third-tier cities. Market observers believe that the core resource Wang Fengying brought from Great Wall is the distribution network, and the turnover of these dealers may well be attributed to her connections Under rounds of organizational, personnel, and channel reforms, XPeng is trying to establish mature and stable system capabilities for mass production, sales, and other aspects, which is the best choice a new force can make.

For He Xiaopeng and Wang Fengying, the opportunity to change XPeng may only be left with this last chance. In the intensely competitive environment of internal competition, XPeng does not have the physical and time capabilities to make the same mistake again.

According to automotive industry analyst Zhong Shi, XPeng is undergoing a comprehensive organizational restructuring internally, but the results are still pending.

Rebirth

In the first quarter of this year, the new energy vehicle sector has re-entered "Hard Mode", coupled with the emergence of Xiaomi's car, pushing the price war to a deeper level. In this competitive landscape, XPeng is not in an advantageous position; its brand label of intelligent driving, under the siege of Huawei, Tesla, Li Auto, Geely, and others, has also lost its strong presence.

This year marks the tenth year since XPeng was established. He Xiaopeng's plan is to deliver 280,000 units, which is not as aggressive as Li Auto and Aito. However, due to the "drag" in the first quarter, achieving a monthly delivery volume of at least 29,000 units for the next 9 months is necessary to meet the target.

Under pressure, He Xiaopeng announced a plan to launch 30 new models (including facelifts) in three years in a company-wide letter two months ago. Insiders close to XPeng revealed that in the second half of the year, XPeng will launch a sedan with the codename "F57" (XPeng P6), and a B-class SUV (XPeng G7), as well as a 150,000 yuan-level SUV codenamed "MONA" in cooperation with Didi.

These three vehicles bear the heavy responsibility of refreshing XPeng's product lineup, with the 150,000 yuan-level platform's first vehicle expected to be the sales champion for XPeng this year.

"Providing young people with a truly AI intelligent driving car" is He Xiaopeng's interpretation of the MONA project, which XPeng will transform with XNGP and Fuyao architecture. Insiders at XPeng revealed to Wall Street News that XPeng aims to benchmark Tesla's upcoming budget model Model Q with the MONA brand, with He Xiaopeng conservatively expecting sales of over 100,000 units in the first year.

Meanwhile, "F57" (XPeng P6) will take over from P7i to tap into a larger sedan market, with internal expectations for it to reach 5,000 units. This means that by the end of this year, XPeng will have a total of 8 models on sale, sharing the annual target of 280,000 units.

Supply chain sources revealed to Wall Street News that He Xiaopeng has requested suppliers to prepare for supply starting from the second half of the year with a monthly sales target of 30,000 to 40,000 units.

However, having a product matrix alone is not enough. The products and marketing of Xiaomi's car have deeply influenced the entire industry, prompting He Xiaopeng and Wang Fengying to reposition themselves.

In the company-wide letter, He Xiaopeng mentioned the strategic upgrade of the brand and marketing, as well as upgrading in the design field to make styling XPeng's strength.

As for production capacity, Wang Fengying brought in Zhang Li, the former general manager of Great Wall Motors with a million years of production experience, to head XPeng's production department. To address the issue of short product life cycles, she appointed Jiang Ziyang, who had previously worked at Lisi Consulting, as the product planning director. At the same time, in terms of channels, Wang Fengying proposed a "clearing inventory" task, allowing dealers to share the sales and payment pressure of XPeng It seems that everything is ready, only the east wind is missing. He Xiaopeng said that in the past three years, execution is more important than strategy.

When Wang Fengying took office a year ago, she set the goal of "achieving sales of one million units in three years and a market value of one trillion US dollars in five years"; as one of the earliest new forces in car manufacturing, He Xiaopeng also has the ambition to break into the top 5 in the industry. Whether it is reflection or inviting the "Iron Lady" to reform together, he has shown an unprecedented strong will to survive.

However, the road of giants is not easy. Now, competitors on the same stage all have their own unique skills. The speed and effectiveness of the "Iron Lady" systematized reform almost directly determine Xiaopeng's fate.

Is the low point in the first quarter a squatting and accumulating strength before taking off, or is it the market's feedback on Xiaopeng's reform direction? The answer may be revealed in six months