On July 18, SAIC Group announced that Jia Jianxu, the president of SAIC Group, will no longer hold the concurrent post of the general manager of SAIC Volkswagen; Tao Hailong, the former general manager of Huayu Automotive Systems Co., Ltd., will take over as the general manager of SAIC Volkswagen.
The official press release shows that Tao Hailong was born in 1968, is a member of the Communist Party of China, has a bachelor’s degree in engineering, is a senior engineer, and is currently the general manager of SAIC Volkswagen Automobile Co., Ltd.
Looking back at his work resume, Tao Hailong also has rich employment experience in the automotive field. He has been working in the automotive industry for more than 30 years and has worked for a long time in the quality assurance department and manufacturing department of SAIC Volkswagen. Later, he served as the executive director and deputy general manager of the quality assurance department of SAIC Passenger Vehicle Branch; the general manager of Shanghai Automotive Transmission Co., Ltd. and the general manager of Huayu Automotive, the leading enterprise of Chinese auto parts.
Tao Hailong is the second senior executive from parts enterprises that SAIC Volkswagen has迎来. The former general manager of SAIC Volkswagen, Jia Jianxu, is also a senior executive from parts enterprises. Jia Jianxu was born in February 1978, is 46 years old now, is a member of the Communist Party of China, graduated from graduate school, has a master’s degree in business administration, and is currently the president and deputy secretary of the Party Committee of SAIC Group.
In February 2023, SAIC Volkswagen announced that Jia Jianxu, the former general manager of Yanfeng Automotive Trim Systems Co., Ltd., would take over as the general manager of SAIC Volkswagen; in December of the same year, SAIC Group announced the appointment of Jia Jianxu as the vice president. And 8 days ago on July 10, SAIC Group announced the decision of adjusting the main leaders, among which, Mr. Jia Jianxu served as the president of SAIC Group. Judging from the change of Jia Jianxu’s position, Jia Jianxu has been promoted very quickly. In less than a year, he was promoted to the group vice president, and then less than a year later, he was promoted to the group president.
The official website shows that SAIC Volkswagen is a Sino-German joint venture auto enterprise, jointly operated by SAIC Group and Volkswagen Group, and this year happens to be the 40th anniversary of the establishment of SAIC Volkswagen. Forty years ago, Volkswagen Group signed a joint venture with Shanghai Automotive Group and jointly established SAIC Volkswagen, becoming one of the earliest established joint venture auto enterprises in China.
Data shows that in 2015, SAIC Volkswagen’s sales exceeded that of FAW-Volkswagen and became the sales champion of domestic passenger car enterprises, and then held the sales champion position steadily for four consecutive years. By 2019, SAIC Volkswagen (2.0018 million units) was slightly surpassed by FAW-Volkswagen (2.0462 million units) with a slight advantage, and then successively lost the sales champion in the Chinese passenger car market, and the sales continued to decline. The sales in 2020 to 2022 were 1.5055 million units, 1.4571 million units, and 1.2420 million units respectively. By comparison, SAIC Volkswagen’s sales exceeded 2 million units for four consecutive years from 2016 to 2019, among which the sales in 2018 was 2.0651 million units and in 2019 was 2.0018 million units.
The pressure on sales also led SAIC Volkswagen to urgently make a series of changes. SAIC Volkswagen adjusted the marketing system in March 2022 and March 2023 respectively, and there were also personnel adjustments during the period. But from the analysis of the sales situation in the past two years, SAIC Volkswagen has not shown outstanding performance in the auto market.
According to the sales data released by SAIC Group, the cumulative sales of SAIC Volkswagen in 2023 was 1.215 million units, a year-on-year decline of 8.01%. And since the beginning of 2024, SAIC Volkswagen has not had too many surprises either. The cumulative sales in the first half of the year was 512,100 units, with only a slight increase of 1.75% year-on-year.
At present, SAIC Volkswagen owns three brands including Audi, Volkswagen, and Skoda, which are respectively laid out in the luxury, mainstream, and mid-to-low-end markets. But with the new energy transformation and facing the upward impact of new forces and Chinese brands, traditional auto enterprises generally face the pressure of electrification transformation, and SAIC Volkswagen is no exception.
As one of the earliest established joint venture auto enterprises in China, SAIC Volkswagen has also actively laid out the electrification transformation, but still faces pressure on the sales side. The official website shows that currently SAIC Volkswagen has a total of three pure electric models such as ID.4 X, ID.6 X, and ID.3. The first two are sister models of ID.4 CROZZ and ID.6 CROZZ of FAW-Volkswagen, while ID.3 is the exclusive model of SAIC Volkswagen. Retail data shows that in the first half of 2024, the sales of ID.3 was 37,400 units, that of ID.4 CROZZ was 20,000 units, that of ID.4 X was 12,600 units, that of ID.4 CROZZ was 4,476 units, and that of ID.6 CROZZ and ID.6 X were 2,790 units and 1,252 units respectively. In other words, currently SAIC Volkswagen has not had a blockbuster pure electric model yet.
Facing the challenges of the new automotive era, SAIC Volkswagen urgently needs a capable general to help SAIC Volkswagen restore its development vitality. Regarding Tao Hailong taking over as the general manager of SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC Group said: “As a professional leading talent in the field of automotive production and manufacturing and quality control, Tao Hailong is familiar with the operation of the entire vehicle enterprise and the parts and components supply chain system, has rich enterprise management experience and team leadership ability, and is full of innovative spirit. In the new stage of technological co-creation in the joint venture cooperation, Tao Hailong returns to SAIC Volkswagen again, which will further promote the win-win integration of all parties and lead the enterprise to accelerate the building of a new automotive industry ecological chain by connecting the upstream and downstream; deeply promote technological innovation and accelerate the new energy transformation and upgrading of the Audi brand and the Volkswagen brand; respond to the market challenges efficiently and agilely and promote the high-quality and sustainable development of the enterprise.”
At present, SAIC Volkswagen is accelerating the promotion of electrification transformation and laying out more new energy models. In May this year, SAIC Group announced that it signed a cooperation agreement with Audi under the Volkswagen Group. The two sides will jointly develop a new platform specifically for the Chinese market – the Advanced Digitized Platform. The first batch of models based on this platform will be three pure electric models covering the B-class and C-class vehicle细分 markets. The new models will be equipped with the top hardware and software in the industry. Among them, the first pure electric vehicle will be launched to the market in 2025.
According to the plan, within the year, SAIC Volkswagen will mass-produce the new Tiguan L Pro, the new Passat, the new Polo, ID.7 S, and a compact SUV. Among them, the new Tiguan L Pro was launched on May 30 and a total of 6 models were introduced, with the price range of 23.68-26.68 million yuan. After being launched, it will be sold together with the current Tiguan L; while both the Passat and ID.7 S have appeared in the application catalogue of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
As for whether SAIC Volkswagen can present a situation of breaking and then standing up after this change of the general manager in the face of the “big reshuffle” of the global automotive industry, let’s wait and see.