Bad News for China Sales??

[Lotustoronto]

Thoughts? 2,200 Lotus' were sold last year in china, how many do we think were Emira vs Eletre? OR were they all Eletre?

Geely-Owned Luxury Carmaker Lotus’ China Revival Falls Short

www.yicaiglobal.com

 

[dgrace]

66 Eletres in the first 4 weeks of 2024! I don't quite see how that scales to the 50000/yr target.

 

[DerTheDer]

-pulls out calculator- by my math, and adding a few extra a month....im getting 1200 lotus vehicles sold a year....lol. ouch. and keep in mind these vehicles have also been for sale in CY23. This could mean some REALLY bad news for Lotus. Not the money machine they had hoped for.

Also lost all credibility after "a UK luxury carmaker"

Also x2, the Emeya is already for sale in China?!??!

 

[Lotustoronto]

1 Billion Dollar factory in china is getting out sold by 100M factory in Hethel! (ok maybe not, since we did not see Eletre sales worldwide)

Terrible news for Lotus' IPO and the business. You know when the Emira is your bread and butter vs an SUV, something is wrong....

 

[Pegasi]

They need a lower cost option IMO. Can't have a fleet of Halo cars right out the box.

 

[DerTheDer]

1 Billion Dollar factory in china is getting out sold by 100M factory in Hethel!

Terrible news for Lotus' IPO and the business. You know when the Emira is your bread and butter vs an SUV, something is wrong....

Would also be interesting to see what people are actually buying over there. Possibly more practical SUV's? Also, USA has a HUGE "luxury" SUV trend going on the past few years and currently, such as the Lambo/Ferrari/Maserati's that ARE selling for top dollar. Media has alot to do with that as I see them in rap videos as well as million dollar homes garages.

 

[DerTheDer]

They need a lower cost option IMO. Can't have a fleet of Halo cars right out the box.

Very true, 3 halo cars for 3 different types of people...Sports car, SUV, and Electric Sedan.

 

[Lotustoronto]

Would also be interesting to see what people are actually buying over there. Possibly more practical SUV's? Also, USA has a HUGE "luxury" SUV trend going on the past few years and currently, such as the Lambo/Ferrari/Maserati's that ARE selling for top dollar. Media has alot to do with that as I see them in rap videos as well as million dollar homes garages.

I'm pretty sure China is in the top 5 as far as luxury purchases. If not top 2 or 3. I think even for Porsche they sell more Macan and Cayenne in China than any other country. 96 Cars in 4 weeks in China is shockingly bad numbers. I have actually been looking for Lotus' sales numbers for 2023 and could not find them anywhere. Almost every other manufacturer has announced them. Now I know why. Whatever the number, it will be the single largest year of sales in Lotus' history for sure, but will be well below what they forecasted.

My guess is 10-12K total sales in 2023 for Emira & Eletre. Brutal.

 

[DerTheDer]

I'm pretty sure China is in the top 5 as far as luxury purchases. If not top 2 or 3. I think even for Porsche they sell more Macan and Cayenne in China than any other country. 96 Cars in 4 weeks in China is shockingly bad numbers. I have actually been looking for Lotus' sales numbers for 2023 and could not find them anywhere. Almost every other manufacturer has announced them. Now I know why. Whatever the number, it will be the single largest year of sales in Lotus' history for sure, but will be well below what they forecasted.

My guess is 10-12K total sales in 2023 for Emira & Eletre. Brutal.

Well we know they sold ZERO in the NA market, and probably less than 1,000 globally in 2023?

Edit- Was the Eletre for sale in CY23?

 

[Lotustoronto]

Well we know they sold ZERO in the NA market, and probably less than 1,000 globally in 2023?

Edit- Was the Eletre for sale in CY23?

Yes, in the article it stated 2,200 EV sales in China last year. I figure another 2,500 in UK/EU/ROW sales in Q4/3 2023. And the rest was Emira. Another 5K for the year. 10K total? Compared to Porsche at over 300K annual sales. It's not even in the same discussion. Perhaps a bit unfair, these cars just launched and nobody knows about them apart from car enthusiasts.

 

[lynchy73]

It’s a tough time for car sales in China. Competition is really tough for EV’s with loads of good options out there and big discounts. You can get a really nice EV for a very reasonable price in China, the Electre/Emeya are very expensive in comparison.

It seems many that would previously purchase an expensive ICE car are now choosing a cheaper EV instead and often from a Chinese manufacturer. I heard porsche sales are well down.

Additionally, the housing market is not doing well, prices are down and nothing is selling. These days, most people are biding their time and not spending.

 

[Lotustoronto]

It’s a tough time for car sales in China. Competition is really tough for EV’s with loads of good options out there and big discounts. You can get a really nice EV for a very reasonable price in China, the Electre/Emeya are very expensive in comparison.

It seems many that would previously purchase an expensive ICE car are now choosing a cheaper EV instead and often from a Chinese manufacturer. I heard porsche sales are well down.

Additionally, the housing market is not doing well, prices are down and nothing is selling. These days, most people are biding their time and not spending.

I fear it is not just china at the moment... perhaps not as bad over here, but everyone is feeling the pinch.

 

[lynchy73]

I did hear that Electre deliveries were slow initially. With people waiting many months to receive cars.

 

[Nova]

China's economy is in the toilet. Rich people are feeling it in their crashed stock and real estate holdings. I am 1 degree removed from several people who have suffered over 50 percent loss in their net worth. The worst one was 90 percent. They have few options since China strictly controls capital outflows. Many people are feeling trapped and hopeless. In this environment, even those who are doing relatively well are taking a more cautious path. Having the Eletre made in China was a terrible mistake. They should have built it elsewhere so that they can have more ready access to international markets, the most important of which is the US. They should have given much more support to the Emira, speed up the different models to market. The timing and strategy of Lotus is just about the worst possible combination. They also bought into the EV-only mantra. Again, a terrible decision.

 

[Hethel Merman]

Are they still pumping out the Evija? There must be a healthy margin on that. Are there many of them in the USA?

 

[JClem]

Bad time to launch new EVs and “rebrand” Lotus particularly in China. There are plenty of Eletres listed on the Lotus UK website for immediate collection as well.

The EV market has cratered generally though. Volvo have pulled the plug on Polestar who now have to stand on their own two feet. Thats going to be difficult as they need $1.3 billion in external funding just to break even in 2025! Porsche can’t shift Taycans for love nor money. My boss has a 718 GT4 and is regularly called by dealers offering a discounted Taycan. Not very Porsche at all! And their new Macan EV looks, IMO, horrific.

 

[Speedy Emira]

Well for the sake of having a company to provide backup and warranty, the last thing we want is Lotus going bust, but they seem to be the masters of nearly going bust and hanging on for decades.

 

[Porter]

Porsche can’t shift Taycans for love nor money. My boss has a 718 GT4 and is regularly called by dealers offering a discounted Taycan. Not very Porsche at all! And their new Macan EV looks, IMO, horrific.

Maybe they shouldn't have been such snooty a-holes to people about 911 allocations, when it's absolutely not a limited production car. Turns off people that would have been their core premium EV (Taycan, etc) customers too.

 

[DerTheDer]

Can someone link me to the briefings where they quoted the target of 50k vehicles?

EDIT- Found it https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1841024/000110465923008575/tm234838d1_ex99-2.htm?TrucksFoT

 

[Rudolph]

* * * * *
From the German Lotus Forum...........

Revival? When was Lotus ever supposed to have been represented in China?

Geely tried more of a restart. With a brand that had an image in Western markets as a sports car manufacturer with, let's say, special features, but was never established as a luxury brand there. In contrast to the Western premium brands, it was largely unknown in China and other communist dictatorships. Now Geely wanted to jazz it up to become a luxury brand, but without taking the long path that all other brands in the segment have taken: offering consistently innovative, high-quality products over a long period of time in a customer-friendly environment.

Geely thinks that they start with a high price, an impersonal sales model via the Internet, without clear promises for delivery dates or local contacts, but with a strategy that differs in no way from that of other manufacturers and, on top of that, with tradition the brand breaks: only electric drives.

E-mobility is not particularly innovative, the conventional technologies are varied (synchronous / asynchronous / 400 or 800 volts, etc.) and the storage technology, especially temperature control, but also the packaging of the battery cells is continuously optimized, but without major leaps and bounds. The architecture of the vehicles is almost always the same, with a layer of batteries below, the structure above, one, two or three motors, driving the rear axle with one and all four wheels with several motors. All vehicles are very heavy, which ultimately limits the options for chassis tuning, even if this is always adaptive.

All of this means that electric cars do not differ significantly from one another in terms of their properties, especially driving behavior, at least not within the same price segment.

The vehicle that has made the most of the current technical possibilities of e-mobility once again came from one of the usual suspects when it comes to the most innovative concept and the best quality implementation, it is probably the Taycan from Porsche. Nothing happens for a long time after that. Nothing at all.

Where is the space now for a brand that wants to establish itself in the luxury segment but cannot score points with products that significantly stand out from the competition? I don't see that, and in China people don't seem to think that differently. If you want luxury and prestige, buy from the usual suspects, otherwise where the price matches the performance offered.

Which in turn leads to the question of whether Lotus will really stay with Geely in the long term, because many investors have already swallowed Lotus. Geely also has a few other construction sites (Polestar, clear your throat...), perhaps they will lose interest in the brand if there is no sustained success.

If the realization then matures that e-mobility can only cover part of mobility needs and there must also be room for other technologies, there might be a small chance for a new Elise moment.

Of course that's not foreseeable at the moment, but you can still dream...