This year, most luxury vehicle enterprises are entering a “platform period”. Industrial polarization has appeared and only few of them can obtain a two-digit growth.

 

Polarized sales performance

During January to November, only Mercedes-Benz in the ABB camp (Audi, BMW and Benz), which accounts for 80% of total sales, maintains a 32.1% increase compared with the same period of last year. BMW has a slight increase of 3% and Audi has a slight decrease of 0.16%.

 

Competition from the second tier is more polarized. Apart from Porsche and Infiniti, which obtain a 34% and 34.6% increase respectively with the previous period, JLR has a decrease larger than 20% and it’s predicted Lexus also has a two-digit decrease. Because of the narrow gap of sales volume, competition becomes fiercer in the second tier.

 

IHS Automotive once predicted that, annual sales volume growth rate of Chinese luxury vehicle market will decrease from 30% in the last decade to 5% in 2018. The performance of luxury brands in the previous four months in 2015 seems to confirm the fact in advance. The previous estimation of the market growth “converging to GDP growth” is growing to be an unattainable dream. As for the reasons, apart from the slow growth of overall passenger car market, more anti-corruption measures taken by the Chinese government, increasing products being put into the market and strained relationsbetween enterprises and the dealerships also contribute to the phenomenon.

 

Striving to growth

Under such condition, the luxury vehicle enterprises are striving to rescue the market. Even those companies, which have maintained a good momentum in the previous 11 eleven months, are taking efforts to maintain the current advantages.

 

As for the detailed products, mainstream luxury vehicle enterprises have arranged layouts in the hot compact vehicle sub-market in 2015, bringing consequent price drop in the market. Besides, a group of luxury vehicle enterprises, represented by Audi, are turning to another hot market- alternative energy vehicle market.

 

Along with production adjustments, luxury vehicle enterprises are also optimizing their relationship with the dealership and promoting more marketing plans. Another measureadopted to lift the sales volume is to accelerate the localizationprocess. For example, Infiniti has achieved production in local companies last year.

 

Different from other sub-markets, a large degree of price drop has not appeared in the luxury vehicle market. The adjustments are more frequently taking place in enterprises rather than in the market. In this way, the price war still exists in the terminal marketing channel, which has not spread to the company level. Some experts said, “Under the current conditions, luxury vehicle companies should be rational, avoiding any radical behaviors.”