Industry perspectives on 2020 – NIO | Automotive Industry Interview

Hui Zhang, VP of NIO Europe

In these amazing instances, we have attained out to sections of the global auto marketplace for views on existing troubles and a consider on prospective clients for 2021. In distinct, we required to get a array of views and viewpoints. In this most recent in the collection we are publishing this month, we hear from Hui Zhang, VP of NIO Europe.

j-a: 2020 was a very memorable yr for absolutely everyone and for all sorts of good reasons. In your organization, what stand out as the greatest troubles you faced this yr?

HZ: For NIO, the disaster brought on the exact same troubles absolutely everyone experienced to confront, but our way of working with it was different. Of training course, just one of the greatest troubles was to keep promoting cars and satisfying our users’ needs. So, we promptly concentrated on two facets that condition our organization design: the cell web and our on line-to-offline gross sales channels. That served us appreciably to approach our consumers pretty immediately following the outbreak of Covid-19 and to convey them again to our position of gross sales: the NIO Residences and NIO Spaces.

So, we were being in a position to gain a substantial brand name recognition and gross sales force. And in normal, just one can say that the agility of our functions was important for our achievement. And this is reflected in our gross sales records we established month following month starting in April 2020.

In normal, I want to say, that this disaster has been just one of the most challenging ones throughout the world within just the previous one hundred a long time. So, for everybody who pushed by means of and will handle to overcome this disaster, all that is a good planning for the potential.

j-a: What did you master that you did not assume to master?

HZ: When working with the pandemic and its hefty effects, several troubles appeared which I experienced to confront. For illustration, it was a new expertise for me to discover out how to steer the team in Europe by means of the rough time period. That goes hand in hand with the point that equally teams in Munich and in Oxford commenced doing work from home which hasn’t been pretty popular for us at NIO. Nonetheless, as a global company, we have a global state of mind, so we satisfied the challenge to manage the regular high amount of performance. And we even managed to increase the performance to the future amount. All together we also managed to keep the team spirit high through the rough instances. So, I am pretty proud of the teams and want to thank everybody for their devotion, guidance and their 1st-course get the job done.

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

HZ: In fact, I am comprehensive of hope. When searching at the automotive marketplace, just one can see that the electrification of the industry acquired even more powerful through the pandemic than it has been just before. As an EV producer, we are pretty joyful to see that progress. The new conditions also forced us to rethink and further establish our gross sales and services models. At NIO, we strongly concentrated on our now stated on line-to-offline gross sales method which served us to get again on monitor pretty speedy. Our ES6, for illustration, is the best-promoting EV in China for thirteen consecutive months amongst all equivalent models. So, we managed to turn the disaster into a pretty productive yr.  For me that is proof that our teams at NIO are nicely outfitted to overcome these troubles and are ready to do almost everything that Is vital to get by means of the rough instances.

And another important aspect that will make me look to the potential with great hope and fills me with new electricity is our future entry into overseas marketplaces and the new possibilities that come along with it for NIO.

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

HZ: The new yr will commence with our NIO Working day, an annual particular event that is committed to our consumers. So, continually keep improving upon our consumer gratification is always our key objective, and with NIO Working day on January ninth we will just do that and commence into 2021 together with our consumers.

Of training course, we will keep investing in different organization spots at NIO. Initially, we will further develop our network in China regarding gross sales, services and electricity remedy. Next, we will keep investing in our core systems within just the subject of autonomous driving. And 3rd, we are doing work on our future platform to develop the future era of NIO cars.

2021 will also be a pretty important yr for our global organization due to the fact – as we now have discovered – we will come to European marketplaces. So, we will continue our committed get the job done to improve our brand name recognition in the European international locations.

j-a: Do you have a information for the audience?

HZ: When our founder William Li commenced NIO 6 a long time in the past, he experienced the vision of shaping a joyful lifestyle for the people today and managed to develop up a global enterprise that focuses just on placing that vision into motion. So, my information is: bear in mind the motive why you commenced your journey, why you are passionate about it, and then keep concentrating on that. If you do so, no matter how hefty the storm is, you will see your rainbow at the end.