AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)12/09 Report--

As of December 8, Japanese car companies Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Mazda have successively released their monthly transcripts in China in November. According to the list of Japanese car companies' sales in China in November 2022, according to Automotive Industry concern, the four car companies collectively showed a downward trend in November, with Mazda China and Nissan China falling by more than 50%. As for the reasons for the decline in sales, the above-mentioned car companies all said that they were affected by epidemic factors.

On December 5th Honda China released its latest November sales figures. Data show that Honda's China terminal sales in November were 78126, down 42.8% from a year earlier and 26.36% from a month earlier, the third consecutive month of year-on-year decline (Honda China fell 16.8% and 28.5%, respectively, from September to October). After the traditional sales peak season of "Golden Nine and Silver 10" car companies, Honda's sales in China fell more significantly. At the same time, it was the biggest drop in Honda's sales since the outbreak began in 2020.

Specifically, GAC Honda terminal sales in November were 45512, down 34.2% from a year earlier, while Dongfeng Honda terminal sales were 32614, down 51.7% from a year earlier. As for the reasons for Honda's continued decline in sales in China, industry analysis may be affected by the global shortage of semiconductors, and some models have to adjust their production plans. According to previous reports, production at Dongfeng Honda's three vehicle plants in Wuhan was suspended for two days from November 28 to 29 due to the epidemic.

Nissan sold 47983 vehicles in China in November, down 52.5% from a year earlier. Unlike other carmakers, Nissan's sales in China include passenger and commercial vehicles. Nissan passenger vehicles (Nissan, Qichen and Infiniti brands) fell 53.3% to 45346 in November from a year earlier, while commercial vehicles (Zhengzhou Nissan) fell by 34.2% to 2637, according to the data.

As for the reasons for the decline in sales, Mr. Shohei Yamazaki, senior vice president of Nissan, chairman of Nissan's China Management Committee and president of Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd., said: "the continuing shortage of chips and parts and the control of key cities caused by the intensification of COVID-19 's epidemic have had a continuous impact on the company's sales." In short, the decline in sales was also affected by the epidemic and parts shortages, and it should be noted that Nissan China did not release sales figures for its specific models this month, or because of the severe decline in model sales. According to data from New car Traffic Insurance, from January to October in 2022, the sales of Xuanyi, a pillar of Dongfeng Nissan, was only 336200, down 19.30% from the same period last year; Teana was 126500, up 0.60% from the same period last year; Xiaoke was 122000, down 7.40% from the same period last year; as for Qijun, there were only 15100, down 82.86% from the same period last year.

In the 11 months to the end of November, Nissan's cumulative sales in China fell 20.2% year-on-year to 974715 vehicles. The impact of the epidemic and the shortage of parts may be only a small part of the decline in sales. What is more, the performance of subdivided models this year may be poor. At present, Dongfeng Nissan's main models are in the stage of product renovation. Among them, the medium-term change Teana went on sale on September 30. a total of five new models have been launched, with a price range of 17.98-239800 yuan. The replacement failure of Xinqi Jun directly led to the decline of Dongfeng's daily production and sales, and the market performance after the listing of New Teana plays a vital role in Dongfeng Nissan.

According to the list, Mazda sold only 5959 new cars in China in November, down 59.6% from a year earlier, the biggest decline of the four companies. This is the 20th consecutive month of year-on-year decline in Mazda. According to Automotive Industry concern, Mazda's continuous collapse in China is mainly due to its slow product renewal and slow electrification transformation.

Since FAW Mazda withdrew, Mazda mainly relied on a car company in Changan Mazda in the domestic market. Changan Mazda's official website shows that at present, Changan Mazda has Anksera, Atz, CX-8, CX-5, CX-4 and CX-30/CX-30 EV7 models, while the only one with good sales performance is Oncella. According to the insurance figures, Changan Mazda sold a total of 91671 vehicles in the first 10 months of 2022. The year-on-year decline was 41.53%, of which Onksera was 52471, CX-5 14896, CX-30 10232, Atez 7041, CX-4 5862, and CX-8 1169. According to the plan, the Changan Mazda CX-50 will be launched in China on the 15th of this month. The car will be released as early as November 2021 and is based on the front-drive horizontal platform. It uses the family's new design language in appearance and is expected to provide 2.5L engines on power.

In terms of electrification transformation, Changan Mazda has only one electric car, CX-30 EV. After entering 2022, Honda, Toyota and Nissan all launched Toyota bZ4X, Honda eVision N and Nissan Ariya pure trolley products, while Mazda's CX-30 EV, which was launched in 2021, is based on oil to electricity and sells for 159800-201800 yuan. By contrast, Mazda's electrification transformation is very slow. According to CAC retail data, there are only 318 Mazda CX-30EV from January to October in 2022, of which 27, 24, 9, 31 and 22 were sold from June to October, respectively, with monthly sales of only double digits and similarly dismal sales. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the Federation of passengers, said in an interview that Mazda wants to change the status quo, and it is an inevitable trend to join the new energy competition.

At the end of November, Mazda announced that it would be fully electrified at a cost of $10.6 billion. According to the plan, Mazda electric cars will account for 25 per cent of global sales by 2030, up from previous expectations of 25 per cent. Mazda is expected to achieve net sales of about 4.5 trillion yen in the fiscal year to March 2026, an increase of about 45 per cent in the fiscal year to March 2022.

As for the latest Toyota sales on the list, the latest sales are also not optimistic. New car sales in China in November were 140400, down 18.4% from the same period last year and the first year-on-year decline in nearly six months. Toyota said the spread of the epidemic limited the operations of dealers and led to a significant reduction in customers. At the end of November, due to the closure of the epidemic, a number of car companies in China are facing production suspension or production cuts, in which Toyota spokesman ShinoYamada said that due to a number of factors, the company is adjusting some production (production cuts) at its plants in China, but declined to elaborate.

Judging from the sales performance of the four Japanese car companies in China in November, the common ground of the collective Waterloo on sales in November all points to the impact of the epidemic and supply chain instability. However, Automotive Industry concern believes that the epidemic and parts shortage have become a regular problem for Japanese car companies, and Japanese brands represented by Honda and Nissan in the same period last year were affected by supply chain instability. therefore, it may only be part of the reason for the decline in sales, and the deeper reason is that the share of Japanese car companies in China is shrinking.

The market share of Japanese cars in China was 24.1% in 2020, and has been continuously divided since then, according to the Federation of Carriage data. Japanese cars' share surpassed German cars for the first time in 2021, but fell 1.5% from a year earlier, and the market share from January to October in 2022 was only 20.5%. Among them, Japanese car joint venture brands had the highest market share decline in October, down 3.7% and 18.9% from a year earlier.

At present, Chinese car companies are experiencing the transformation from traditional fuel vehicles to new energy vehicles, while the penetration rate of new energy vehicles is rising, the performance of independent brands is gradually "strong". BYD, for example, saw its wholesale sales of new energy vehicles rise 152.60% year-on-year to 230400 units in November, far exceeding the combined sales of Honda's two joint ventures in China.

Although Japanese car companies are also actively laying out the new energy car market, Japanese car companies are very conservative in terms of investment and product landing. At present, the only electric models launched by Japanese car companies in China are Xuanyi Pure Electric models, Mazda CX-30 EV, Guangzhou Automobile Toyota iA5, Guangzhou Automobile Honda e:NP1, Guangzhou Automobile Honda EA6, Lexus UX300e, Guangzhou Automobile Toyota C-HR EV, Dongfeng Honda e:NS1, Guangzhou Automobile Toyota bZ4X and Dongfeng Nissan Ariya products, among which Honda eREX N, Toyota bZ4X and Nissan Aliya pure tram products were launched in 2022, but the product performance is mediocre. According to the data of the Federation of passengers, Dongfeng Honda sold 297 e:NS1 vehicles in October; GAC Honda e:NP1 sold 629 vehicles; Nissan Aiya sold 456 vehicles, which does not have a high sense of presence in the market. Japanese car companies are still not optimistic in the new energy vehicle market in the short term.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat