The Spring Festival allows people to temporarily forget the fierce competition in the market, but the laws of the business world do not stop because of the festival. The gunpowder smell in the auto market has become more intense with the fireworks of the Year of the Snake.
In the first month of 2025, China's new energy vehicle market continued its high growth trend, with Xpeng, Ideal, and Leapmotor leading the first echelon, followed by Xiaomi and NIO, and brands such as DeepBlue and Zeekr catching up. The popularization of LiDAR, the popularization of ultra-fast charging and the price war are intertwined, and the industry has entered a difficult mode of "both piling up materials and controlling costs".
January 24, 2025, new energy vehicles are ready to go in the parking lot in Pudong, Shanghai.
In January, Xpeng Motors stood out among many automakers with a delivery volume of 30,350 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 268%. The hot sales of MONA M03 and P7+ provided support for its sales growth.
The MONA M03 equipped with dual laser radars starts at 129,800 yuan, rewriting the 150,000-level intelligent driving configuration standard.
To continue to sell well, it has to go through many tests. For example, the recent exposure of Xiaopeng's NOA's ability to cope with actual road conditions in the city is still controversial, and a social platform exposed a video of "the logic of reversing in a parking lot is confusing", which triggered a discussion on the reliability of the technology.
Ideal Auto delivered 29,927 vehicles in January, down 4% year-on-year. Among them, L6 still ranks first in the extended-range category, but the delivery of the pure electric model MEGA has been delayed, and investors are worried that its "extended-range dependence" will be difficult to break. On the other hand, when each company gradually fills the extended-range vehicle segment, Ideal's advantage will no longer be obvious.
Leapmotor delivered 25,170 vehicles in January, a year-on-year increase of 105%, leading the industry in growth rate.
The modified C11 crushes its competitors with its "150,000-level standard Orin chip + 800V platform", and comes with a "charging pile + insurance" package, and is known as the "Pinduoduo in the car circle."
At the same time, Leapmotor has achieved profitability in the fourth quarter of 2024, which has laid a solid foundation for its future development.
However, as the market becomes more saturated, Leapmotor also needs to pay more attention to product quality and brand image. Some users reported that the smoothness of the car-machine interaction was not as good as expected, and netizens jokingly said that it "never lost in parameters, but never won in experience."
Xiaomi Auto delivered more than 20,000 vehicles in January, maintaining this level for four consecutive months.
Xiaomi SU7, a new energy car priced at more than 200,000 yuan, has been able to gain a foothold in the fiercely competitive market, which is enough to prove its product competitiveness. SU7 opened up the market with differentiated designs such as Mi Fan Ecological Linkage (mobile phone/watch non-sensor control of the car) and retractable tail wing, but the mandatory playing of advertisements on the SU7 car machine also caused complaints.
Wenjie Automobile sold 20,926 vehicles in January, down 36.5% year-on-year and 30.7% month-on-month. The decline in sales may be related to the increasingly fierce market competition and the pace of product updates. Hongmeng Intelligent Driving's "Four Realms" will challenge the sales target of 1 million vehicles this year. As one of the main forces, Wenjie undoubtedly shoulders a heavy responsibility.
NIO delivered 13,863 vehicles in January, a year-on-year increase of 37.9%. Among them, the sales of the Ledao brand contributed significantly, showing the results of NIO's efforts in diversified development, but the premium ability of NIO's main brand was also under pressure. Data shows that the second brand Ledao contributed more than 60% of sales in a single month. The BaaS 2.0 solution lowers the threshold for car purchases; the battery swap station is compatible with the "charging + short-term rest" function, and the average daily usage rate has increased to 78%.
At the same time, NIO has also launched a number of financial preferential policies to attract more consumers.
Other car companies such as DeepBlue Auto and Zeekr Auto also have their own characteristics. DeepBlue Auto achieved year-on-year sales growth thanks to the hot sales of its main model DeepBlue S7; Zeekr Auto achieved monthly sales of over 10,000 units; and Avita reached nearly 9,000 units.
According to past industry practices, automakers will make sales push at the end of the year, especially in December, to achieve their annual sales targets. This will inevitably affect sales in January of the following year, causing temporary weakness, and the rankings in February may change again.
In 2025, the number of LiDARs, computing power parameters, and energy replenishment speed will become the main battlefields for marketing. Automakers that lack technological reserves or scale advantages will face huge risks of elimination.
