Youth Lotus million auto capacity planning bubble

At the Chengdu Auto Show, among the entire venues, the first to host the launch event was the young Lotus. At the scene, the modified version of Lotus L3 appeared in a high profile. “The new car we bring this time is this modified version. At the Guangzhou Auto Show, our L5 model will be unveiled.” Xie Wei, deputy general manager of the Youth Lotus Passenger Vehicle Sales Company, told the “First Financial Daily”.

Chengdu is a blessing for young people. At the Chengdu Auto Show last year, the youth Lotus released the L3 model, which ended the history of “sprint racing”. As of July this year, according to the statistics of the CLUCC, the monthly sales of the youth lotus were stable at around 3,000 vehicles, gradually gaining a firm foothold in the compact car market.

However, compared with the current sales of Youth Lotus, its capacity planning in the field of passenger vehicles is still intriguing.

In July of this year, Young Lotus was granted an L6 sedan manufacturing project in Jinhua, Zhejiang. The project plans to invest a total of 2 billion yuan and use 1,000 mu of land. The first phase of the project will invest 1.2 billion yuan, and it is planned to start construction this year, and it will be completed and put into production in 2012. The second phase of the project is scheduled to start construction in 2012 and will be completed and put into production in 2013, and will strive to reach 50,000 capacity in 2014.

Jinhua Base is already the fifth production base planned after the young Lotus entered the passenger vehicle manufacturing field. As a company that entered the field of passenger vehicle manufacturing in 2004, although young Lotus has not sold much, the planning of the production base has taken the lead in domestic independent brands.

Previously, Young Lotus had obtained 50,000 passenger car production capacity in Guizhou Anshun through rectification of the original Guihang Lark, and in the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” period, the production capacity has reached 100,000; in addition, Lotus Car In addition, two passenger car production bases have been built in Jinan and Tai'an, Shandong, with a total production capacity of 150,000 vehicles. This year, Young Lotus has built a 300,000 capacity production base in Hangzhou.

In summary, plus the Jinhua Base to be started, the sum of the five major production bases, the capacity planning of the young Lotus has reached 1 million, and its annual output this year may not exceed 40,000 vehicles. Behind the huge capacity deployment, the bubble has emerged.

However, at the Chengdu Auto Show, Weiwei told reporters that there was a misunderstanding about the issue of overcapacity. The release of all planned production capacity will be slow, rather than overnight. The sales volume of the young Lotus L3 was only 300 units in 2009, and it reached 15,000 units in the first half of this year. This growth rate will only exist in the Chinese market. Reserve capacity for future development is the fundamental reason why the young Lotus made the above plans.

Young Lotus will launch 8 passenger car products in the next 3 years. The products cover Jiajia, MPV, SUV and many other models, with displacement ranging from 1.6L to 3.0L.

At present, besides the Anshun Guizhou, Jinan, and Taian domestic L3 series, the first B-class model L5 will be rolled out at the Hangzhou base in the second half of the year, while the L6 series will be put into production at the Jinhua base. As for the L7, L8 and L9 series of high-end models, the current production area is still pending status.

In any case, the future development of the young Lotus is facing the challenge of speeding up. The huge funds of the five major bases are being precipitated. The model input efficiency and capital operating efficiency of this young car company are being tested.