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On the last day of 2019, Dongfeng Yueda Kia officially announced the transfer of four senior executives. At a time of declining performance and poor sales, this is also Dongfeng Yueda Kia's last internal adjustment in 2019.

According to Dongfeng Yueda Kia announcement, according to the arrangement of the company's Oriental personnel, Mr. Li Zhijun, deputy general manager and head of management department appointed by Yueda recently, Mr. Jin Xuandui, minister of purchase, appointed by Asia, Mr. Min Jianzai, director of the research institute appointed by Asia, Mr. Ye Lei, deputy head of sales, appointed by Yueda, will no longer hold relevant positions in Dongfeng Yueda Kia Automobile Co., Ltd., and be transferred back to Dongfang.

At the same time, this is another adjustment plan made by Li Feng since he took over the operation and management of Dongfeng Yueda Kia in September.

In September 2019, Hyundai Kia officially appointed Li Feng as vice president of Hyundai Motor Group (China) and general manager of Dongfeng Yueda Kia, which is the first time that the group has hired a Chinese CEO for the joint venture Dongfeng Yueda Kia. After taking office, Li Feng is mainly responsible for managing Kia's local production, sales, planning and other businesses, leading Dongfeng Yueda Kia to boost the performance of the Chinese market.

Li Feng has 20 years of experience in the automotive industry, and has worked in BAIC Foton, Chery, Beijing Hyundai, BAIC, Baoneng Automobile and Guanzhi Automobile. Kia said that this will enable enterprises to respond more quickly to local market conditions, and will make efforts to improve the original competitiveness, marketing ability and customer service quality of the Chinese market in the future.

As a second-tier joint venture brand in the Chinese market, Dongfeng Yueda Kia has been in a difficult situation in the past two years. In addition to the influence of some external factors, the unclear brand positioning, the lack of competitiveness of vehicle models and the decline of brand premium all make Dongfeng Yueda Kia market performance flinch. Dongfeng Yueda Kia sold 23426 new cars in November, down 41.5 per cent from a year earlier, and accumulated sales from January to November to 264616, down 16.9 per cent from a year earlier, according to the Federation. Compared with the peak sales of 650000 vehicles in China, there is still a big gap between Dongfeng Yueda and Kia.

Entering 2019, the cold winter of the automobile industry is becoming more and more prominent, and car companies and dealers are also facing profit difficulties. Due to the decline in new car sales and unsustainable operation, many depressed brand dealers choose to withdraw from the net or turn to other brands to sell. The continuous reduction of dealers also makes car companies face the problem of market terminal coverage. Li Feng, general manager of Dongfeng Yueda Kia, chose to restore the market coverage of dealers first, reflecting the current performance boost of enterprises, and the increasingly prominent role of dealer channels.

In mid-December 2019, Dongfeng Yueda Kia held a dealer investor forum in Shanghai, hoping to promote the growth of car sales by optimizing channel operations. After communication at the meeting, 22 unnetted and dormant dealers finally signed a restart agreement.

"at present, there are many problems that enterprises have accumulated over a long period of time, and everyone's feelings are very mixed and anxious, and this requires us to face and break through together," says Li Feng.

Li Feng also put forward six strategies to optimize the operation of dealers: first, to be highly open, fair and transparent in terms of basic rules; second, to establish retail-oriented operating rules and gradually transition to BTO order system (products are produced according to customer orders and made according to users' needs); third, to establish a hierarchical management system to encourage dealers to continuously strengthen their capabilities. Fourth, the implementation of distribution according to energy, superior resources tend to be more capable, more confident dealers; fifth, the implementation of new car policy, according to the proportion of the report plan for vehicle distribution; sixth, the old strategy, new cars on the market at the same time do not give up cash models.

From the last point of view, Dongfeng Yueda Kia will continue to implement the strategic policy of "new and old sales together". Since the beginning of this year, Dongfeng Yueda Kia has launched the smart running 1.4T model, the new KX5 and the new K3, and speed up the layout of new energy vehicles. However, the decline of brands and the decline of product competitiveness have kept sales in the doldrums.

Dongfeng Yueda Kia acted frequently after Li Feng took office, but the market is cruel after all, and consumers are willing to accept products with market competitiveness. Now, apart from restoring the dealer layout, Dongfeng Yueda Kia needs to enhance the competitiveness of its products, and there is still a long way to go.

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