Taking the wind of new energy, China's tire manufacturing opportunities

1.2. Oems are under great pressure to reduce costs, and cost performance is king

The cost control and supply chain management of new energy vehicle enterprises are more stringent. Taking NIO as an example, its ES6 sports version of the original tire replaced the 2019 Mainland MaxContact MC6 with the 2020 Hankook Ventus S1 evo2, which significantly reduced the retail reference price of a single tire, contributing to the reduction of vehicle production costs. For Tesla, after the 2020 Model 3 standard life upgrade replaced the battery from a ternary lithium battery to a lithium iron phosphate battery, the production cost also dropped significantly, and the vehicle price was adjusted to 249,000 yuan, down about 8.1%.

In the context of rising global automotive raw material prices, the price of domestic Tesla is more stable, on the one hand, there is room for domestic production costs to fall, and on the other hand, it is difficult to raise prices under the pressure of cost reduction. From the Model 3 high-performance version in the United States and China's price point of view, the price of the domestic version of Model 3 is more stable, only increased this year, while the American version of Model 3 has experienced several price increases, the current price is about 35,000 yuan higher than the domestic version, since 2021, the price difference between the two places has expanded significantly. On the contrary, because the Model S is a pure import car, its price is affected by the production cost of the United States factory, and the Model S long-life version in China and the United States has increased several times since 2021, and the domestic price adjustment is even larger.

The profitability of traditional car companies is under pressure, and the pressure to reduce costs is huge. In recent years, traditional car companies such as SAIC and General Motors have experienced a downturn stage, while in comparison, new energy vehicle companies represented by Tesla will achieve a net profit of about 35.2 billion yuan in 2021, an increase of more than 6 times.

Tires, as the main parts of automobiles, are an important part of the cost reduction of automobile companies, and domestic tires are more cost-effective in comparison. Through the comparison of prices on the mainstream Tire e-commerce Tuhu and Simple Tire at home and abroad, it is found that the price of tires of the same specification is generally lower than that of overseas enterprises, and the average price is about 1/3 to 1/2 of that of major overseas enterprises.

From the perspective of production costs, domestic tire enterprises have low labor costs and more advantages. Michelin's official website shows that the proportion of labor costs in its cost structure has reached 32%, while raw material costs account for about 20%, and the proportion of labor costs is very high. In contrast, the product cost of the domestic representative enterprises Senkirin, Linglong tires and wheel tires is mainly raw materials, accounting for more than 65%, an average of about 77%, while the average labor cost is about 9.4%.