On the evening of December 21st, at NIO Day, NIO's most expensive model ET9 was launched, with a starting price of 788000 yuan and a battery rental price of 660000 yuan. Delivery will begin in March 2025; 999 units of the first limited edition will be released simultaneously, priced at 818000 yuan, purchased through BaaS battery rental, priced at 690000 yuan.
At the same time, NIO's third brand Firefly officially debuted, positioned as a high-end intelligent electric car brand. The new car has a pre-sale price of 148800 yuan and is scheduled to be officially launched in April 2025.
So far, NIO has formed 11 models under 3 brands, with a price range roughly covering 150000 to 800000 yuan.
The three brands will work together to make NIO founder and chairman Li Bin confident in doubling sales by 2025. I don't think doubling our sales by 2025 (i.e. selling over 440000 units) is a particularly high requirement, because next year we have three brands, NIO and Ledo, and there will be new models. I don't think this is a fantasy
Li Bin predicted in 2019 that the automotive market would enter the final stage in 2024 and 2025. From what we can see now, it's not much different from what we expected. It's already industry consensus that 2025 and 2026 will be the most challenging years for domestic car brands
NIO's goal is to double its sales by 2025 and achieve profitability by 2026. Li Bin believes that by 2025, everyone will accelerate, and the first formation has already begun to accelerate. The distance between the first formation, the second formation, and the troops behind will definitely get farther and farther.
Complete multi brand layout
After ten years of car manufacturing, NIO has completed the layout of three brands. Li Bin has repeatedly stated that the multi brand strategy has been planned since NIO's establishment and is not a whim.
The current strategy presented by NIO's three brands is to focus on increasing gross profit through the main brand NIO, while Ledao and Firefly enhance scale through collaborative research and development, supply chain collaboration, and service system collaboration, achieving "volume growth" and "supporting the family".
Specifically, NIO's most expensive model, the ET9, has a price tag of over 800000 yuan. The gross profit margin of ET9 is definitely very good, selling one car would cost a lot of ET5 cars. And it can also dilute the R&D and manufacturing costs. Currently, the leading model of the third-generation platform is the ET9, and many technologies will be applied to subsequent models. Therefore, when we look at the cost sharing today, it's not just this car, it's the entire generation sharing (cost) Li Bin stated.
Regarding the sales expectations for ET9, Li Bin analyzed, "Currently, the monthly sales of Panamera are 1300-1500 units, Maybach is just over 1000 units, and the sales of BMW 7 and Audi A8 are relatively low. I think ET9 sales will definitely be higher than Audi A8 and BMW 7 sales
The target consumer group for ET9 is the administrative flagship users, including today's Mercedes Benz S, Maybach, Audi A8, BMW 7 Series, and Panamera. Previously it was 7, 8, S, now it's 7, 8, 9, S, "said Li Bin.
In his opinion, the high price of pure electricity is indeed difficult to sell and needs to be broken through. NIO is still very confident in its initial sales, but there are still challenges in stabilizing it. At the NIO Day media briefing, Li Bin revealed that 999 ET9 first release versions have been sold out. The situation of the order exceeded expectations.
On the one hand, the launch of flagship models aims to boost gross profit; On the other hand, sub brands such as Ledao and Firefly are leaning downwards.
On NIO Day, the third brand Firefly, positioned similar to the BMW Group MINI brand, was released with a pre-sale price of 148800 yuan.
Li Bin introduced that the Firefly brand only has one car in the Chinese market, and its operation is simpler.
Li Bin further stated, "Firefly is building the best small cars for global users, so Firefly will bear a great responsibility in entering the global market. However, due to external factors such as European tariffs, NIO has made corresponding adjustments to its overall market pace. Overall, the small car market where Firefly is located is a global market with a global market size of about 10 million vehicles. China's small car market is indeed not that large, but in Europe, the (model) size range where Firefly is located has a market size of over 4 million vehicles, reaching a very large proportion
At the same time, the second brand Ledao is ramping up its production capacity. Ledao started delivery at the end of September, delivering 4319 units in October and 5082 units in November. As a reference, the delivery volume of Xiaomi SU7 in April and May was 7058 and 8630 vehicles respectively. Starting from June, the monthly delivery volume exceeded 10000 vehicles, and starting from October, the monthly delivery volume exceeded 20000 vehicles; MONA M03 delivered over 10000 units in consecutive months after its launch.
Regarding this, Li Bin emphasized, "In December, which is the third month since Ledao began delivery, the delivery volume of Ledao L60 will definitely reach 10000 units. Xiaomi is very impressive, as it is a new brand and model that has achieved (fast delivery speed). As a brand new brand, Ledao has made a brand new model and achieved 10000 units in the third month, which is still acceptable and may fall short of everyone's expectations. Our goal is to achieve production capacity and delivery of 20000 units by March next year
Target to double sales by 2025 and achieve profitability by 2026
After 10 years of car manufacturing, NIO's multi brand strategy, which was clearly established at the beginning, has gradually been finalized. According to Li Bin's plan, the models planned by the three major brands for next year will gradually enter the market. Therefore, NIO will usher in a product boom in 2025.
Li Bin's goal is to double sales by 2025 and achieve profitability for the company by 2026.
For doubling sales, Li Bin calls it a reasonable goal. The NIO brand alone may not be able to double, but with the addition of Ledao, the increase can be achieved. This year (NIO's total sales) will reach 220000 units, and if it doubles next year, it should exceed 440000 units.
Li Bin calculated that next year, Ledao will sell an average of 20000 units per month, which is over 200000 units per year. If NIO (brand) maintains a certain level of growth on the basis of this year, the total will be over 400000 units. Plus fireflies, there are still thousands of units available every month. All in all, I think 440000 units is a reasonable number
For the 2026 profit schedule, NIO will focus on four aspects: sales growth, gross profit improvement, cost control, and operational efficiency enhancement.
Specifically, NIO will persist in investing in various aspects such as technology and services. On the other hand, it is to focus on action, improve execution ability, enhance systematic ability, and cost control ability. We have already postponed our profit target, and 2026 is indeed a bottom line and a task that cannot be missed, "said Li Bin.
According to NIO's latest financial report, the overall revenue for the third quarter decreased by 2.1% year-on-year to 18.7 billion yuan; In the first three quarters of this year, NIO's cumulative R&D investment reached 9.4 billion yuan.
Li Bin stated that NIO's annual R&D expenditure is roughly over 10 billion yuan, and it will maintain this R&D investment intensity. Nowadays, many R&D outputs will start to be monetized next year or the year after. If sales increase next year, revenue can also increase by about 60-70%. Compared with this year, if the gross profit margin can steadily increase and expenses are well controlled, the formula for profitability is easy to calculate.
Li Bin has set ambitious goals for 2025 and 2026, which are widely recognized as the most challenging years for domestic automotive brands in the industry. In the new year, NIO is facing higher dimensional competition.
Li Bin explained, "We have indeed reached the final stage of the qualification round. Not only start-up companies, but also traditional car companies and newly entered technology companies are in this battle. If the volume cannot reach a certain scale and the quality of operation cannot reach a certain scale in two or three years, it will be difficult to participate in the competition in the future
In his opinion, new entrants need to quickly establish themselves and become more aggressive; However, traditional car companies need to maintain their market share, so the tug of war between gasoline and new energy vehicles will be very difficult in the past two years. In two or three years, a new period of stable competition may enter, and the overall profitability and ability of the industry will return to basic normalcy, so these two or three years will be a very intense competitive stage. This is a bit like fighting and tug of war between cold and hot air during the rainy season.
NIO has been making cars for ten years, and when it comes to whether he is satisfied with these 10 years, Li Bin admitted that he is not so satisfied. Overall, we are about two years behind our early plans. Based on the plans we made in 2017 and 2018, we should have completed them by around 2022, so we definitely haven't achieved our goals
He believes that NIO's strategic direction is clear, whether it is investment in technological innovation, multi brand strategy, or charging and swapping network layout, there is no problem with the basic direction. But in terms of execution, such as product specific planning, product design, product definition, and execution efficiency, there is still a need for significant improvement.
Despite intensified competition, Li Bin firmly believes that the automotive industry has a natural law of non monopoly and no winner takes all. He estimates that by 2035, at least 5 of the top 10 global automotive companies will be Chinese companies, accounting for over 40% of the global market share. As for whether NIO is inside or not, it claims to double its efforts and not be left behind, and striving for success is also one of them.