Source: TechWeb

Tonight,$XIAOMI-W (01810.HK)$The first model of the car, the SU7, will soon be launched. At that time, the specific configuration information and price of the new car will be announced. Judging from the information that has been released so far, the Xiaomi SU7 is undoubtedly a very competitive product. Currently, the only suspense is the price, which is also everyone's biggest concern.

“It's not 99,000 yuan, it's not 149,000 yuan, it's not 199,000 yuan,” and “the price will indeed be a bit expensive.” This is almost all the information that Lei Jun has released about the price so far.

How much does the Xiaomi SU7 actually cost

In fact, the price of Xiaomi cars has always attracted attention. Maybe everyone's expectations for Xiaomi are too high, and they all hope that Lei Jun will launch a price as shocking as the “1999 yuan” of the first Xiaomi phone.

Therefore, starting in the second half of last year, all kinds of gossip about the pricing of Xiaomi cars appeared on the Internet. Some of the revelations even had the effect of being fake, so much so that the Xiaomi government had to refute the rumor before the first technical communication meeting with Xiaomi cars.
Lei Jun has also said on several occasions that we have not made a final decision on pricing, but the Xiaomi SU7 is indeed a bit expensive.

Recently, Lei Jun once again mentioned the price of a Xiaomi car in the first episode of “Lei Jun Answers Netizens' Questions”. He said that the Xiaomi SU7 is a C-class luxury car with a very powerful configuration, and the price may be a bit expensive.

But at the same time, Lei Jun also emphasized, “I believe that after watching the press conference, everyone will definitely find it a great value for money.”

Prior to that, Lei Jun had already secretly hinted at the price range of the Xiaomi SU7 when talking about Tesla's price increase. Lei Jun said, “Many people are particularly concerned about the pricing of the Xiaomi SU7, so I'll explain it by the way. The standard version of the Xiaomi SU7 has far surpassed the Model 3. The materials are solid. Moreover, in the early stages of the product launch, the procurement cost was also very high. There's really some pressure on pricing, and I hope everyone understands that.”

In other words, the Xiaomi SU7 will target the Tesla Model 3, so of course it won't be at the 100,000 yuan level; at least it's a model that sells for 200,000 yuan or more.

Lei Jun even compared the Xiaomi SU7 to BMW: “The Xiaomi SU7 is a C-class luxury sedan. The car is 5 meters long. It has more leg space in the second row than the Model S, and it is also larger than the standard BMW 5, so don't worry.”

According to media reports, the price of the Xiaomi SU7 has been reduced by 30,000 to 50,000 yuan compared to the previous year, but Lei Jun still wants to sell it for more than 250,000 yuan.

So how much does the Xiaomi SU7 actually cost, we might as well make a bold guess.

Although the Xiaomi SU7 is the benchmark for the Tesla Model 3, according to Xiaomi's previous pricing strategy, even though the configuration of its products is higher than that of competitors, the price is lower. Currently, the starting price of the Tesla Model 3 is 245,900 yuan, so the standard version of the Xiaomi SU7 is likely to be lower than this price.

At present, Xiaomi has announced three model configurations, including the standard version and MAX version announced at the Xiaomi Auto Technical Conference at the end of last year. Among them, the standard version uses a 400V platform and is equipped with a 73.6 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery provided by BYD; the MAX version uses an 800V platform and is equipped with a 101 kWh Ningde Era Kirin battery.

In addition, Xiaomi recently declared a new model at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. It uses a single motor drive and a lithium iron phosphate battery as the battery. The supplier is Ningde Era. Although no specific battery capacity has been announced, judging from the increased maintenance quality, the battery capacity is higher than 73.6 kWh, or it is a 95 kWh Shenxing super rechargeable battery in the Ningde era. An 800V platform was used.

Considering the current competitive situation in the NEV market and the price of competing models, we boldly speculate that the price of the standard version of the Xiaomi SU7 may be around 209-219,000 yuan. However, if Xiaomi wants to raise the starting price at the beginning of the launch, it may treat the newly declared 800V platform model as an entry model, and suspend the listing of the standard version of the 400V platform, then the starting price will probably reach close to 250,000 yuan.

As for the top MAX version, considering that it almost uses the top configuration at present, and Xiaomi's official positioning of the SU7 “C-Class High-Performance Technology Ecological Sedan,” the price is likely to be close to 350,000 yuan.

The Xiaomi SU7 must be “a bit expensive”

Judging from Lei Jun's various statements, Xiaomi doesn't want to get involved in a fiercely competitive price war, but in fact, Xiaomi has this capital.

According to the financial report released by Xiaomi, the total revenue of the Xiaomi Group in 2023 was 271 billion yuan, net profit of 19.3 billion yuan, and cash reserves reached 136.3 billion yuan. Compared with new car builders such as “Wei Xiaoli,” Xiaomi's capital is certainly quite sufficient. Judging from the 2023 financial report just released by BYD, its cash reserves are 169.725 billion yuan. It can be said that even compared to BYD, Xiaomi is not at all weak.

So why can't Xiaomi directly surprise you with the pricing and make friends with everyone.

People familiar with the mobile phone industry may know that although Xiaomi initially relied on the price of 1999 yuan to break out in the market, it was extremely difficult for Xiaomi to hit the high-end. Even now, high-end models of Xiaomi phones are still being crushed by brands such as Apple and Huawei.

Therefore, of course, Xiaomi hopes to go one step further and position the Xiaomi car as a high-end brand, which is more conducive to the layout of other models in the future. In fact, from the name of the Xiaomi SU7, we know that in the future, Xiaomi may have more models such as the SU5 and SU3. If the SU7, which is positioned as a C-class sedan, sells for 200,000 yuan, then the next model will be difficult to price; it will only continue to be lowered, thus giving the image of an external Xiaomi car as a low-end position.

You need to know that once a brand is first recognized by the outside world as a low-end brand, then it is difficult to move forward.

In the automobile market, everyone also basically positions their brand first and then develops downward. For example, NIO's first mass-produced model was the high-end ES8, then more models were launched; the first model in the Ideal L series was also the L9, which was priced at 400,000 yuan, then the L8, L7, and the ideal L6, which is about to be launched at a price of 200,000 yuan.

Finally, let's also look forward to the final pricing of the Xiaomi SU7. The last time “thousands of people were waiting” for a product to be priced, I don't know when.

editor/tolk