00:00We're here at one of the brands of Gili, and that is Zeker, sort of a higher-end EV brand.
00:06What is the health right now, after all the stresses with the price war?
00:11From your perspective, Gili's perspective, what is the health of the auto industry right now?
00:15Well, I think overall the Chinese auto industry is going on the right track
00:21because we have started the journey of electrification and smartification 10 years ago.
00:25I think we have all the technology supply chain that, you know, users have been ready now
00:34for the booming, still growing, fast-growing of EV and PHEV products.
00:40Of course, people are competing strongly here, but not only on the price level,
00:46but also on, you know, the design, engineering, quality, features, you know, the ADAS capability.
00:52Yes.
00:53And overall, the brand experience and service capability.
00:56That's why we are trying to build up, you know, a higher brand like Zeker.
01:01That's one strategy to kind of combat, of course, the price war, right?
01:06But these car makers, you have dozens of them in China.
01:10There is a coming reckoning.
01:11There should be a consolidation probably in the next few years.
01:14That's something even He Xiaopeng at Xpeng told me.
01:17In the next four years, there's going to be do-or-die phase, right?
01:20So, one way is to start offering higher-end premium cars, right?
01:25The other side, to keep market share, is to keep driving prices down.
01:31And we've seen data from China Auto Market data that BYD, even Gigli, are continuing lowering
01:38their average prices.
01:40Is that what you're seeing?
01:41Or have you been ordered stop cutting prices?
01:43No, I think we are trying to introduce higher-end models and different brands.
01:50Although Gigli is positioned to be an entry-level mainstream brand, but we have, you know, C-Segma
01:57or D-Segma cars coming in the next few years to increase the average price, retail price
02:05of the car, the portfolio, and also for Zikra and Lincoln Co., we will do the same.
02:11But at the same time, you're right, we need to still increase the market share so that
02:16we can have synergy within the group so that we can achieve the economy of scale.
02:22And overall, when you lower the retail price to make the car more attractive to the customer,
02:28but on the other hand, we want to increase the margin and profitability at the same time.
02:34So where are you still lowering prices?
02:37No, for the small cars, I think they are quite competitive on the retail price.
02:44But for the higher-end products under each brand, I think they are still having a premium there.
02:50It's not that low as you imagined.
02:53Where are your export priorities right now?
02:55Because, again, capacity utilization in China between what China's auto factories can build
03:01and what they're actually selling is right around 50%.
03:03That's not sustainable over the long term.
03:05So you're looking at overseas.
03:07The U.S. is probably off the map right now given their anti-EV push of the Trump administration.
03:13But what about a place like Canada?
03:15They've opened up to 49,000 EVs per year.
03:19The rumors are that you want to take this brand, Zikra, there.
03:22Can you tell us your strategy for North America minus the U.S.?
03:27For Canada, it's an interesting market.
03:31We are looking at the possibility of going there.
03:34We are making feasibility studies.
03:36But we will start from higher-end products and premium brands like Zikra.
03:40But we have several major regional markets that we have really fast growth like the ASEAN countries,
03:49like the Middle East, like South America and Europe.
03:54You know, for the first two months, the overseas sales really doubles compared to last period last year.
04:03But for March, the export is like around 80,000 units already.
04:09We still have a momentum to grow.
04:12But the long-term plan is not just exporting the cars made here in China.
04:17We will have a localization strategy to have the cars assembled in the local or regional market.
04:25The long-term plan in five years to come, we want to have two sets of the overseas sales to
04:33be locally manufactured in that regional country.
04:37Well, you and I talked about Brazil as one where you're going to be using that as kind of a
04:41testbed with your partner, Renault.
04:43So how does your plans for Brazil dovetail with what you want in North America?
04:48Because I can also kind of bring in the U.S., where Ford has said that they have been trying
04:54to talk to you
04:55or are talking to you about cooperation in Europe.
04:58But at the same time, absolutely, they don't want to see Chinese EVs in America right now.
05:02We have a long-term partnership with Renault, several steps.
05:08The first step is to combine the powertrain units from Renault and Geely to make it a dependent unit called
05:16house powertrain.
05:17And we will focus on the development of small, lightweight, high-efficiency plug-in engines and transmissions.
05:30At the same time, we are working with Renault in Korea.
05:34We are utilizing their capacity in Korea to manufacture the new Kaleo and also some of the Polestar cars.
05:42The GV with Renault in Brazil actually was launched last November.
05:46They have a factory there.
05:48We will make the Renault-branded and Geely-branded vehicles in the same plan so that we can have a
05:55better cost structure.
05:56And we will sell the Geely products in the Renault dealership.
06:01The dealers will set up a different showroom alongside Renault so that we can really enter the market fast.
06:08We got to go.
06:09But very quickly, are you talking to Ford about cooperation in Europe, maybe?
06:12We do not have a plan to go to the North America, to the U.S. market in the short
06:19and medium term.
06:20Yeah.
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