(Text/Pan Yuchen, Editor/Zhou Yuanyuan) Dongfeng Motor has not been peaceful recently. After the wave of government and enterprise subsidies launched by its various brands, its high-end new energy brand Lantu has been troubled again.
On March 9, it was rumored on the Internet that Lantu Auto employees said that the company had started layoffs due to poor sales and continuous losses, involving multiple departments such as outbound calls and sales support. Regarding this rumor, the observer network checked with the relevant person of Lantu, and the other party said that they were not aware of the relevant situation.
According to Sohu Finance, Lantu has denied the rumors, calling them false news, and claiming that this business adjustment is actually a transfer of business within Dongfeng Group, transferring the original Lantu self-operated outbound call business to professional institutions within the group.
Landscape Dreamer, Image Source: Visual China
However, the recent market feedback from Landmap is indeed unsatisfactory.
According to the official data disclosed by Landmap, in 2022, the company sold a total of 19,400 cars, failing to achieve the annual sales target. At the beginning of last year, Landmap CEO Lu Fang set a sales target of 46,000 cars for the whole year, but it fell to 31,000 cars by the middle of last year. But even so, Landmap’s annual target completion rate is still only 62%.
In the first two months of this year, Landmap sold only 2,655 vehicles. It is worth mentioning that this year’s Spring Festival holiday is in January, but Landmap’s delivery data in February was only 1,107 vehicles, a 28% decrease from January.
At the same time, Lantu’s financial situation is also deep in the quagmire. Dongfeng Motor’s financial report data shows that in the first half of 2022, Lantu achieved revenue of 1.887 billion yuan, an increase of 6.8% year-on-year, but the net loss also reached 738 million yuan, an increase of 5% year-on-year.
Lan Tu’s embarrassment was just a microcosm of Dongfeng Motor’s overall predicament.
According to the data disclosed by Dongfeng Motor, in 2022, the group sold 2.4645 million cars for the whole year, down 11.19% year-on-year. Among them, the passenger car segment sold 2.1532 million cars, down 4.4% year-on-year. From January to February this year, Dongfeng Motor sold 297,000 cars, down 49% year-on-year. Among them, the cumulative sales of passenger cars 217,000 cars, down 51.3% year-on-year.
Specifically, sales at the two Japanese joint ventures, Dongfeng Motor’s main source of profit, have both plummeted. Among them, Dongfeng Nissan sold 101,000 vehicles in January-February this year, down 52.5% year-on-year; Dongfeng Honda sold only 62,000 vehicles in the first two months, down 54.8% year-on-year.
Vehicles for sale parked in the Dongfeng Nissan parking lot, image source: Visual China
In addition, the French joint venture brand Shenlong Automobile was sluggish, selling only 10,700 vehicles in the first two months, down 48.2% year-on-year.
Dongfeng Automobile’s own brand also fell. Dongfeng passenger car company sold 14,500 vehicles in January-February, down 52% year-on-year; Dongfeng Liuqi sold 17,700 vehicles in January-February, down 45.3% year-on-year.
Faced with the severe market situation, in order to stimulate sales, Hubei Province, where Dongfeng Motor is headquartered a few days ago, jointly launched a large government-enterprise joint car purchase subsidy, including Dongfeng, with a maximum discount of 90,000 yuan. This round of preferential activities involves Dongfeng Honda Civic, Dongfeng Nissan Xuanyi and many other hot-selling models in the past. Shenlong Automobile and Dongfeng’s own brands also participated.
Dongfeng Honda government and enterprise subsidy promotion poster
In addition, on the eve of this year’s two sessions, the Central Organization Department announced that according to the needs of the work, in accordance with the relevant provisions on the age of central enterprise leaders, the chairperson and party secretary of Zhu Yanfeng Dongfeng Automobile Group would be removed, and the current deputy secretary of the party committee and general manager Yang Qing would preside over Dongfeng work.
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