AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)07/27 Report--

According to relevant media reports, a number of multinational car companies around the world have announced the latest financial results, including Nissan, Daimler AG and Tesla. The newly released report card highlights the tremendous pressure on car companies amid the global economic slowdown and changes in the auto industry.

On the one hand, electric vehicles and clean energy vehicles continue to seize the market share of traditional energy vehicles, on the other hand, the wave of self-driving cars is not willing to fall behind. Affected by the slowdown in world economic growth and the intensification of global trade frictions, the overall demand side of the automobile industry has also weakened.

In the face of many pressures at different levels, car companies are also struggling to cope. Hope to actively adjust the business and cut costs.

In June, Daimler announced a cut in its profit forecast. In just 12 months, Daimler has issued four profit warnings. According to Mercedes-Benz sales figures for the first half of 2019, global sales fell 4.6 per cent year-on-year to 1134729 vehicles, with Mercedes-Benz falling in all major car markets and growing only in China.

In response, Durham said that in order to improve profitability, it will significantly reduce Mercedes-Benz's R & D spending and actively seek external cooperation.

Just as Daimler CEO Corinson, which took over in May, plans to cut back on a number of Mercedes-Benz models to further save the group money. Mercedes-Benz X-Series and a number of popular models could be cut. It is understood that poor sales of models are likely to be cancelled, such as Daimler X-class pickup trucks, E-class All-Terrain models and Cabrio models, Citan are all on the cancellation list.

In addition, on July 23, BAIC announced that in order to strengthen the long-term strategic cooperation between the two sides, it would invest in Daimler AG, which currently owns 5% of Daimler AG, including 2.48% direct shareholding and the right to obtain additional voting rights equivalent to 2.52% of the shares. In addition, Bosch and Daimler jointly developed the world's first driverless car automatic valet parking system has been approved for trial operation in Germany.

At the same time, Nissan, which needs to adjust its business in the face of various unfavorable factors, had a negative impact on Nissan due to the former chairman scandal, and the impact of the market environment led to a sharp decline in profits.

According to Nissan's consolidated results for fiscal year 2018 (April 2018-March 2019), sales fell 3.2 per cent year-on-year to 11.5742 trillion yen (726.22 billion yuan). Net profit fell 57.3% to 319.1 billion yen (20 billion yuan) from the previous fiscal year, marking another record low for Nissan after eight years.

In order to restore performance and improve profit margins, Nissan also announced some upcoming measures. Including significant layoffs around the world. It plans to cut at least 5200 more jobs worldwide, and the company announced in May that it would cut 4800 jobs, bringing the total number of layoffs to 10000, more than 7 per cent of Nissan's global workforce. And launch new models of all the main models, increasing the sales proportion of electric vehicles to 30%, and so on.

If it is said that the profits of automobile companies are affected by the poor external environment, then the changes brought by the "New four modernizations" to the automobile industry will also determine the real driving force for enterprises in the future. In particular, a new generation of cutting-edge technologies, such as electric vehicles and self-driving, are constantly "devouring" the R & D funds of major enterprises, forcing the originally deep-pocketed car giants to huddle together for heating and business restructuring.

The tightening of emission regulations in various countries is also prompting enterprises to speed up the pace of electrification, which requires not only technology, but also capital. Audi said a few days ago that in order to reduce costs, it plans to cut 10% of managers, or about 10% of departmental executive positions. GM also said it would double its investment in electric vehicles and self-driving by 2020.

At present, BMW and Mercedes-Benz, as well as Volkswagen and Ford, have respectively announced a partnership to jointly promote the research and development of driverless car technology.

With the gradual replacement of internal combustion engine cars by electric vehicles, it will inevitably lead to the loss of many jobs in the traditional automobile manufacturing industry. The transformation from traditional fuel vehicles to electric vehicles has become an active or passive choice for all car companies. On the one hand, enterprises are laying off staff, the adjustment of product structure, the impact of service forms, resulting in some traditional business contraction; on the other hand, enterprises in travel, new energy, car networking and other new areas to increase and recruit new personnel. These more reflect the structural adjustment of enterprises, and the impact of the 'new four modernizations' is relatively great.

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