Industry perspectives on 2020 – NIO | Automotive Industry Interview

Hui Zhang, VP of NIO Europe

In these incredible moments, we have arrived at out to areas of the world-wide auto industry for views on present-day problems and a get on prospective clients for 2021. In unique, we wished to get a range of views and viewpoints. In this hottest in the collection we are publishing this month, we listen to from Hui Zhang, VP of NIO Europe.

j-a: 2020 was a fairly memorable year for anyone and for all types of causes. In your organization, what stand out as the most important problems you confronted this year?

HZ: For NIO, the crisis brought on the very same problems anyone experienced to experience, but our way of working with it was unique. Of program, one particular of the most important problems was to hold selling automobiles and fulfilling our users’ requires. So, we promptly focused on two areas that form our organization product: the mobile net and our on the web-to-offline sales channels. That served us substantially to method our end users pretty swiftly immediately after the outbreak of Covid-19 and to carry them again to our point of sales: the NIO Houses and NIO Spaces.

So, we have been ready to attain a sizeable manufacturer awareness and sales push. And in basic, one particular can say that the agility of our operations was essential for our accomplishment. And this is mirrored in our sales documents we set month immediately after month beginning in April 2020.

In basic, I want to say, that this crisis has been one particular of the most difficult ones worldwide within just the last 100 many years. So, for everybody who pushed by means of and will control to defeat this crisis, all that is a great preparation for the long run.

j-a: What did you study that you did not anticipate to study?

HZ: When working with the pandemic and its weighty influence, many problems appeared which I experienced to experience. For example, it was a new practical experience for me to obtain out how to steer the team in Europe by means of the rough period. That goes hand in hand with the fact that the two groups in Munich and in Oxford commenced doing the job from residence which has not been pretty typical for us at NIO. Nevertheless, as a world-wide corporation, we have a world-wide mentality, so we fulfilled the challenge to sustain the typical higher degree of effectiveness. And we even managed to elevate the effectiveness to the following degree. All with each other we also managed to hold the team spirit higher in the course of the rough moments. So, I am pretty proud of the groups and want to thank everybody for their dedication, assist and their to start with-class do the job.

 j-a: And as we come to the end of the year and searching again on it, can you summarise how you experience?

HZ: Basically, I am comprehensive of hope. When searching at the automotive industry, one particular can see that the electrification of the current market bought even more robust in the course of the pandemic than it has been right before. As an EV company, we are pretty pleased to see that development. The new situations also pressured us to rethink and more create our sales and provider styles. At NIO, we strongly focused on our by now stated on the web-to-offline sales strategy which served us to get again on keep track of pretty quick. Our ES6, for example, is the best-selling EV in China for 13 consecutive months between all comparable styles. So, we managed to turn the crisis into a pretty profitable year.  For me that is proof that our groups at NIO are effectively geared up to defeat these problems and are inclined to do everything that Is needed to get by means of the rough moments.

And an additional critical aspect that makes me glimpse to the long run with wonderful hope and fills me with new strength is our future entry into abroad markets and the new possibilities that come along with it for NIO.

j-a: Precisely on prospective clients for 2021. It is obviously an strange time in the context of the uncertainties in advance for all of us, but can you say a thing about how you are approaching the new year?

HZ: The new year will start out with our NIO Day, an annual distinctive event that is focused to our end users. So, continuously hold enhancing our person satisfaction is often our key aim, and with NIO Day on January 9th we will specifically do that and start out into 2021 with each other with our end users.

Of program, we will hold investing in unique organization spots at NIO. Very first, we will more broaden our community in China pertaining to sales, provider and ability resolution. Second, we will hold investing in our main technologies within just the discipline of autonomous driving. And third, we are doing the job on our following system to establish the following generation of NIO automobiles.

2021 will also be a pretty critical year for our world-wide organization since – as we by now have uncovered – we will come to European markets. So, we will proceed our focused do the job to improve our manufacturer awareness in the European nations around the world.

j-a: Do you have a message for the visitors?

HZ: When our founder William Li commenced NIO six many years in the past, he experienced the eyesight of shaping a joyful way of living for the men and women and managed to establish up a world-wide company that focuses specifically on placing that eyesight into motion. So, my message is: don’t forget the reason why you commenced your journey, why you are passionate about it, and then hold concentrating on that. If you do so, no matter how weighty the storm is, you will see your rainbow at the end.