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Tesla might be the most known name in the field of electric cars. When it got into the Chinese market in April 2014， the grand scene was quite impressive and definitely a sight to behold.
However， Tesla， like some other international giants， seems to have met the problem of continuing its initial glorious moment in China. It missed the catalogue of tax-free new energy cars fixed by the Chinese government. It broke up with Tmall， China’s largest B2C website. All these are telling people that Tesla is having a tough time in China.
There are rumors that Tesla is the“catfish” that Elon Musk let in the electric car market of China. With its fame and strength， it successfully stirred up and invigorated this market. Even though what happened later looks like Tesla is not well integrated into the Chinese market， the truth behind this is the struggle between foreign enterprises and Chinese enterprises， as well as the battle between enterprises and local governments.
Tesla needs to do a lot more to have its glories taken and continued in China.
The Pain of Catalogues
The autumn is usually a season of harvest. But for Musk， what he reaped in China was really a disappointment.
On October 20， Tesla announced that it would join hands with Tmall in the Double 11 – the said online shopping festival in China. This news excited and shocked many people. However， the excitement or shock only lasted ten days as the U.S. headquarters was reported to call off Tesla’s cooperation with Tmall.
Compared with the eventful cooperation with the ecommerce platform， what’s worrying Musk more is that Tesla could not find its way to get into the list of tax-free and subsidy-favored new energy cars in China.
The Chinese government has issued two copies of Catalogue of New Energy Cars Exempt from Vehicle Purchase Tax. The second copy was issued at the end of October 2014， two months after the first one. However， the contents were almost the same as Chinese local manufacturers of electric cars took most of the slots in the list. In the latest Catalogue， there were 28 models of passenger cars chosen. Apart from Horki from the joint venture DongfengKia and Brilliance BMW’s Joy IE， the others were all domestic brands.
For this result， a governmental official from the Economic Operation Bureau of National Development and Reform Commission， says that the government choose the models of cars in the Catalogue based on their applications and conditions. There is no inclination involved. “Presently， there are no foreign imported cars in the list， but this does not mean that there will be no in the third or fourth copy of the Catalogue. Actually， in our recommendation list， you can find the hybrid cars of Ferrari and so on，” says the aforementioned governmental official.
The words could not ease the pain of Tesla. Getting into the Catalogue means unparalleled benefits for Tesla. Presently， the Chinese government imposed 8.5% of the vehicle purchase tax over the new energy cars. That means an electric car priced at 200 thousand yuan or so can have its purchase cost reduced by 17 thousand yuan if it is in the Catalogue. For Tesla with over onemillion-yuan price tag， the cost could go down by 100 thousand yuan.
Tesla’s absencefrom the Catalogue shows the intense competition between foreign and Chinese carmakers in the new energy car field which is full of potential.
In the Beijing Auto Show 2014， there were 118 new car models displayed， 79， and two thirds of them are new energy cars. Apart from Tang of BYD， L3NEV of Lotus and Zotye E20， the show of Denza of BYD-Benz joint venture and BMW i3 further promoted the commercialization of the electric vehicle in China.
However， the Chinese auto market is no longer what it was 30 years ago. The direct investment is not the primary appeal of foreign carmakers and the era of “exchanging the market with technologies” is hard to repeat. Along with them is the end of policies inclined towards foreign carmakers in China. The Chinese government is now thinking of swapping technologies between Chinese and foreign automobile manufacturers. They want， and are taking measures， to put the Chinese and foreign carmakers in the same starting line.
Yet the foreign carmakers have spontaneous advantages with their capital reserves and technological accumulation. Su Bo， China’s Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technologies， once said： “The Chinese domestic new energy cars are less developed at present， rendering the domestic brands vulnerable. Therefore， the governmental subsidies mainly target the domestic enterprises while Tesla and other foreign companies are out of the list for a while.”
The Net of Charger Stations
The subsidies are important， but the speed of promoting a product lies with the basic facilities.
Tesla apparently knows that the best way to neutralize the impact of its absence from the Catalogue is to“weave” a net of charger stations in China as quickly as possible. From last year， the company spread its chargers all over China in only year， which was largely attributed to the “Recharging at Destinations” project it spared no efforts promoting. The project was initiated in June 2014 and in less than half a year， Tesla reached coopration with Yintai Group， Wangjing Soho， China Unicom and Minsheng Bank. The progress is evangelical for Tesla which was always haunted by the problems of chargers in China. However， the general idea is that it is better for Tesla to cooperate with State Grid of China for the in-depth and clinging development in China.
Tesla has been sticking to be isolated from the national standards of chargers in China so far and this is widely believed to be the reason for Tesla’s absence from the Catalogue. An anonymous director of State Grid said： “We still hope that Tesla is able to comply with the standards of chargers in China. It is not an overstated requirement if they want to develop in China.”
Presently， most of the Tesla cars sold in China adopt the connectors to chargers following the U.S. standards. Therefore， they cannot get connected to the chargers State Grid set up along the expressways in China. For Tesla’s plan of “weaving the network”， an insider from State Grid says that State Grid and the Chinese government could tolerate and even encourage Tesla’s effort in building chargers inside cities， since it is what everyone is doing now. However， building chargers between cities， namely along the inter-city expressways， is too costly for Tesla. Technologically， it is hard for Tesla to realize this alone.”
Li Xianjun， director of the Automobile Development Research Center at Tsinghua University， held a different opinion with the insider of State. In his opinion， if the Chinese government and enterprises are still building chargers like building gas stations in their conventional ways， it might cost them dearly to establish a functional charger system with an easy access. Actually， this conventional pattern has already deterred the construction of charging facilities. In comparison， the pattern used by Tesla is based on the resources and core technologies of the enterprises to build regional or national charging facilities， which could reduce the dependence on the social resources and save a lot of cost.
The director of the new energy car project at Beijing Auto says that only 30%-40% of the 1000 or so customers submitting orders of electric cars are qualified to have chargers at their home. For this， Beijing Auto has a special team to provide solutions of charging for different groups of customers.
“We made an investigation into 2000 users who have been driving our Qin model for at least three months and found that they usually charge their cars at home or in the company. This thing is worthy studying，” says Li Yunfei， Vice GM of BYD’s sales arm. This is going to be the major orientation of BYD to build chargers in the future. This is also what Tesla is now being committed to. “Presently， we built most of the chargers at home， and there is no plan concerning the inner-city expressways，” says an insider from Tesla， which is now recommending in-house chargers since it is the most economical， convenient and suitable way for owners of Tesla.
Regional Breakthroughs
Apart from speeding up in weaving a network， Tesla is trying other methods to reduce the influence of missing the Catalogue again. Therefore， it did not slow down its expansion in China.
One week after the publishing of the second version of the Catalogue， Tesla posted in its microblog， saying：“we have received good news from Guangzhou as an owner of Tesla cars got the first license of new energy cars in Guangzhou.” Thus， Guangzhou has become the third Chinese city where Tesla has got the new license of new energy car after Shanghai and Hang- zhou.
For those consumers that have bought Tesla cars， this news offered some excitement after the disappointment of Tesla’s absence from the Catalogue. “Most of the Tesla owners in China now have the temporary licenses. They are all waiting for reduction or cancellation of purchase tax.”
Since its arrival in China， Tesla has been getting along well with both the central government and local governments. The Chinese governmental officials that have talked to Musk and other senior executives of Tesla all speak highly of this company. For any foreign companies in China， good relations with the government are an important factor for the good development in this country.
What the government is thinking of Tesla could be encapsulated in the words from Shen Xiaoming， CPC Chief of Pudong District， Shanghai to Tesla China’s president Wu Bixuan. “We do not care about the tax too much. We want the ‘catfish effect’ as we expect you to invigorate the new energy car market in Shanghai. We want to increase the size of this market.”
Shanghai， undoubtedly， is the Mecca for Tesla. It was the last destination of Musk’s journey in Shanghai this April. Apart from delivering cars to the buyers of Shanghai， Musk also chaired the ceremony of superchargers of Tesla in Jinqiao Development Zone of Shanghai. Soon after this， the Shanghai government announced that the owners of Tesla cars can get the license of new energy cars without any expenses.
Though there are analysts believing that this is the agreement between Tesla and Shanghai government， it also reflects local governments’ efforts in contending for the new energy car projects. The industry of new energy car has been sharing a common sense for a long while： the new energy car manu- facturer must invest and even set up the plants in a local market if it wants to sell its products there. It is not hard to understand： since you have a plant in a certain city， you could be considered a local there. No one wants to give the subsidies to a non-local company.
“Someone calls it the protectionism， but in my opinion， the new energy car market is not fully formed. So， what can we protect with the Catalogue or other measures，” says Lin Yi， second chief engineer of BAIC Group.
In the 12th Five-Year Plan of China， the new energy car is established as an emerging industry. According to the Development Plan for Energy-Saving and New Energy Automobiles （2012-2020）， the output and sales volume of electric cars and plug-in hybrid cars are expected to reach 500 thousand units by 2015 and 5 million units by 2020.
The unprecedented importance the central government is attaching to the new energy cars raised the hot wave of investment in this sector. That could explain the rise of protectionism， which leads to the establishment of projects worth billions or even multi-billions in the cities without the bases of auto industry. As a result， there are a lot of doubts about the repeated construction and waste of resources in this field.
Driven by the Market
In spite of the inconveniences and difficulties， Tesla is still relentlessly developing this market. In the first three quarters of 2014， Tesla moved 3500 units into China， but it only sold 1000 of them. How to lower the cost and improve the competitiveness is undoubtedly the primary concern of Tesla’s team in China.
For Tesla， which could only sell 35 thousand units worldwide， is in great need of expanding its output. The stubbornly high manufacturing cost is a reason to restrain its production. “In my opinion， Tesla is very likely to have its own plants in China. The demand here is huge and setting up a plant is the most effective way to rein in the cost，”says Azizi Tucker， former president of supply chain of Tesla Asia. However， how to set up the joint venture in China is still a problem for this company.
On November 4， 2014， the National Development and Reform Commission issued the Guiding Catalogue for Foreign Investment in Industries （Guiding Catalogue）， in which the manufacturing of finished vehicles is categorized in the sector with limitations over foreign investment. That means there might be restrictions and challenges for Tesla if it wants to set up a joint venture in China.
Fortunately， what Tesla has met in China is not limited to bad news. In spite of challenges from governmental policies and measures， it won great popularity in the market.
Wang Xin， 29， is the boss of a newly-established IT company. In order to blend in the heat of Tesla in China’s IT industry， she ordered a Model S in Tesla’s official website at the price of 648 thousand yuan. “If the clients found that your are driving a Tesla car， your chance of reaching the agreement will increase a lot，” she says.
Whether it is a “big toy” for rich men or a “face-lifting thing” for businessmen， Tesla’s ultimate goal in China is still to get to the core market. This goal is also the common objective of all players in the Chinese electric car market.
However， Tesla， like some other international giants， seems to have met the problem of continuing its initial glorious moment in China. It missed the catalogue of tax-free new energy cars fixed by the Chinese government. It broke up with Tmall， China’s largest B2C website. All these are telling people that Tesla is having a tough time in China.
There are rumors that Tesla is the“catfish” that Elon Musk let in the electric car market of China. With its fame and strength， it successfully stirred up and invigorated this market. Even though what happened later looks like Tesla is not well integrated into the Chinese market， the truth behind this is the struggle between foreign enterprises and Chinese enterprises， as well as the battle between enterprises and local governments.
Tesla needs to do a lot more to have its glories taken and continued in China.
The Pain of Catalogues
The autumn is usually a season of harvest. But for Musk， what he reaped in China was really a disappointment.
On October 20， Tesla announced that it would join hands with Tmall in the Double 11 – the said online shopping festival in China. This news excited and shocked many people. However， the excitement or shock only lasted ten days as the U.S. headquarters was reported to call off Tesla’s cooperation with Tmall.
Compared with the eventful cooperation with the ecommerce platform， what’s worrying Musk more is that Tesla could not find its way to get into the list of tax-free and subsidy-favored new energy cars in China.
The Chinese government has issued two copies of Catalogue of New Energy Cars Exempt from Vehicle Purchase Tax. The second copy was issued at the end of October 2014， two months after the first one. However， the contents were almost the same as Chinese local manufacturers of electric cars took most of the slots in the list. In the latest Catalogue， there were 28 models of passenger cars chosen. Apart from Horki from the joint venture DongfengKia and Brilliance BMW’s Joy IE， the others were all domestic brands.
For this result， a governmental official from the Economic Operation Bureau of National Development and Reform Commission， says that the government choose the models of cars in the Catalogue based on their applications and conditions. There is no inclination involved. “Presently， there are no foreign imported cars in the list， but this does not mean that there will be no in the third or fourth copy of the Catalogue. Actually， in our recommendation list， you can find the hybrid cars of Ferrari and so on，” says the aforementioned governmental official.
The words could not ease the pain of Tesla. Getting into the Catalogue means unparalleled benefits for Tesla. Presently， the Chinese government imposed 8.5% of the vehicle purchase tax over the new energy cars. That means an electric car priced at 200 thousand yuan or so can have its purchase cost reduced by 17 thousand yuan if it is in the Catalogue. For Tesla with over onemillion-yuan price tag， the cost could go down by 100 thousand yuan.
Tesla’s absencefrom the Catalogue shows the intense competition between foreign and Chinese carmakers in the new energy car field which is full of potential.
In the Beijing Auto Show 2014， there were 118 new car models displayed， 79， and two thirds of them are new energy cars. Apart from Tang of BYD， L3NEV of Lotus and Zotye E20， the show of Denza of BYD-Benz joint venture and BMW i3 further promoted the commercialization of the electric vehicle in China.
However， the Chinese auto market is no longer what it was 30 years ago. The direct investment is not the primary appeal of foreign carmakers and the era of “exchanging the market with technologies” is hard to repeat. Along with them is the end of policies inclined towards foreign carmakers in China. The Chinese government is now thinking of swapping technologies between Chinese and foreign automobile manufacturers. They want， and are taking measures， to put the Chinese and foreign carmakers in the same starting line.
Yet the foreign carmakers have spontaneous advantages with their capital reserves and technological accumulation. Su Bo， China’s Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technologies， once said： “The Chinese domestic new energy cars are less developed at present， rendering the domestic brands vulnerable. Therefore， the governmental subsidies mainly target the domestic enterprises while Tesla and other foreign companies are out of the list for a while.”
The Net of Charger Stations
The subsidies are important， but the speed of promoting a product lies with the basic facilities.
Tesla apparently knows that the best way to neutralize the impact of its absence from the Catalogue is to“weave” a net of charger stations in China as quickly as possible. From last year， the company spread its chargers all over China in only year， which was largely attributed to the “Recharging at Destinations” project it spared no efforts promoting. The project was initiated in June 2014 and in less than half a year， Tesla reached coopration with Yintai Group， Wangjing Soho， China Unicom and Minsheng Bank. The progress is evangelical for Tesla which was always haunted by the problems of chargers in China. However， the general idea is that it is better for Tesla to cooperate with State Grid of China for the in-depth and clinging development in China.
Tesla has been sticking to be isolated from the national standards of chargers in China so far and this is widely believed to be the reason for Tesla’s absence from the Catalogue. An anonymous director of State Grid said： “We still hope that Tesla is able to comply with the standards of chargers in China. It is not an overstated requirement if they want to develop in China.”
Presently， most of the Tesla cars sold in China adopt the connectors to chargers following the U.S. standards. Therefore， they cannot get connected to the chargers State Grid set up along the expressways in China. For Tesla’s plan of “weaving the network”， an insider from State Grid says that State Grid and the Chinese government could tolerate and even encourage Tesla’s effort in building chargers inside cities， since it is what everyone is doing now. However， building chargers between cities， namely along the inter-city expressways， is too costly for Tesla. Technologically， it is hard for Tesla to realize this alone.”
Li Xianjun， director of the Automobile Development Research Center at Tsinghua University， held a different opinion with the insider of State. In his opinion， if the Chinese government and enterprises are still building chargers like building gas stations in their conventional ways， it might cost them dearly to establish a functional charger system with an easy access. Actually， this conventional pattern has already deterred the construction of charging facilities. In comparison， the pattern used by Tesla is based on the resources and core technologies of the enterprises to build regional or national charging facilities， which could reduce the dependence on the social resources and save a lot of cost.
The director of the new energy car project at Beijing Auto says that only 30%-40% of the 1000 or so customers submitting orders of electric cars are qualified to have chargers at their home. For this， Beijing Auto has a special team to provide solutions of charging for different groups of customers.
“We made an investigation into 2000 users who have been driving our Qin model for at least three months and found that they usually charge their cars at home or in the company. This thing is worthy studying，” says Li Yunfei， Vice GM of BYD’s sales arm. This is going to be the major orientation of BYD to build chargers in the future. This is also what Tesla is now being committed to. “Presently， we built most of the chargers at home， and there is no plan concerning the inner-city expressways，” says an insider from Tesla， which is now recommending in-house chargers since it is the most economical， convenient and suitable way for owners of Tesla.
Regional Breakthroughs
Apart from speeding up in weaving a network， Tesla is trying other methods to reduce the influence of missing the Catalogue again. Therefore， it did not slow down its expansion in China.
One week after the publishing of the second version of the Catalogue， Tesla posted in its microblog， saying：“we have received good news from Guangzhou as an owner of Tesla cars got the first license of new energy cars in Guangzhou.” Thus， Guangzhou has become the third Chinese city where Tesla has got the new license of new energy car after Shanghai and Hang- zhou.
For those consumers that have bought Tesla cars， this news offered some excitement after the disappointment of Tesla’s absence from the Catalogue. “Most of the Tesla owners in China now have the temporary licenses. They are all waiting for reduction or cancellation of purchase tax.”
Since its arrival in China， Tesla has been getting along well with both the central government and local governments. The Chinese governmental officials that have talked to Musk and other senior executives of Tesla all speak highly of this company. For any foreign companies in China， good relations with the government are an important factor for the good development in this country.
What the government is thinking of Tesla could be encapsulated in the words from Shen Xiaoming， CPC Chief of Pudong District， Shanghai to Tesla China’s president Wu Bixuan. “We do not care about the tax too much. We want the ‘catfish effect’ as we expect you to invigorate the new energy car market in Shanghai. We want to increase the size of this market.”
Shanghai， undoubtedly， is the Mecca for Tesla. It was the last destination of Musk’s journey in Shanghai this April. Apart from delivering cars to the buyers of Shanghai， Musk also chaired the ceremony of superchargers of Tesla in Jinqiao Development Zone of Shanghai. Soon after this， the Shanghai government announced that the owners of Tesla cars can get the license of new energy cars without any expenses.
Though there are analysts believing that this is the agreement between Tesla and Shanghai government， it also reflects local governments’ efforts in contending for the new energy car projects. The industry of new energy car has been sharing a common sense for a long while： the new energy car manu- facturer must invest and even set up the plants in a local market if it wants to sell its products there. It is not hard to understand： since you have a plant in a certain city， you could be considered a local there. No one wants to give the subsidies to a non-local company.
“Someone calls it the protectionism， but in my opinion， the new energy car market is not fully formed. So， what can we protect with the Catalogue or other measures，” says Lin Yi， second chief engineer of BAIC Group.
In the 12th Five-Year Plan of China， the new energy car is established as an emerging industry. According to the Development Plan for Energy-Saving and New Energy Automobiles （2012-2020）， the output and sales volume of electric cars and plug-in hybrid cars are expected to reach 500 thousand units by 2015 and 5 million units by 2020.
The unprecedented importance the central government is attaching to the new energy cars raised the hot wave of investment in this sector. That could explain the rise of protectionism， which leads to the establishment of projects worth billions or even multi-billions in the cities without the bases of auto industry. As a result， there are a lot of doubts about the repeated construction and waste of resources in this field.
Driven by the Market
In spite of the inconveniences and difficulties， Tesla is still relentlessly developing this market. In the first three quarters of 2014， Tesla moved 3500 units into China， but it only sold 1000 of them. How to lower the cost and improve the competitiveness is undoubtedly the primary concern of Tesla’s team in China.
For Tesla， which could only sell 35 thousand units worldwide， is in great need of expanding its output. The stubbornly high manufacturing cost is a reason to restrain its production. “In my opinion， Tesla is very likely to have its own plants in China. The demand here is huge and setting up a plant is the most effective way to rein in the cost，”says Azizi Tucker， former president of supply chain of Tesla Asia. However， how to set up the joint venture in China is still a problem for this company.
On November 4， 2014， the National Development and Reform Commission issued the Guiding Catalogue for Foreign Investment in Industries （Guiding Catalogue）， in which the manufacturing of finished vehicles is categorized in the sector with limitations over foreign investment. That means there might be restrictions and challenges for Tesla if it wants to set up a joint venture in China.
Fortunately， what Tesla has met in China is not limited to bad news. In spite of challenges from governmental policies and measures， it won great popularity in the market.
Wang Xin， 29， is the boss of a newly-established IT company. In order to blend in the heat of Tesla in China’s IT industry， she ordered a Model S in Tesla’s official website at the price of 648 thousand yuan. “If the clients found that your are driving a Tesla car， your chance of reaching the agreement will increase a lot，” she says.
Whether it is a “big toy” for rich men or a “face-lifting thing” for businessmen， Tesla’s ultimate goal in China is still to get to the core market. This goal is also the common objective of all players in the Chinese electric car market.