Author: Rezz
On April 25th, the first car of the new smart brand, the Elf #1 was held online in Asia as scheduled, and the pre-sale price of 190,000-230,000 yuan was announced. It is expected that 150 direct stores will be opened nationwide this year, covering first-tier, new first-tier, and second-tier cities. I quickly paid a deposit of 500 yuan to occupy a spot, and then slowly started to research this car and couldn’t stop.
Although the smart Elf #1 was debuted globally in Berlin on April 8th, my attention to it really started from yesterday when the price was announced and was popularized on the Internet, and even my knowledge of the configuration was only after I placed the order. Why did it make me crazy? Is this car really so fascinating? How about the price and configuration? Let me explain:
The smart Elf #1 is based on the Geely Haohan SEA pure electric platform and is considered the younger brother of Zeekr 001. It is designed and developed by Mercedes-Benz headquarters in Germany, and produced in Geely’s factory in Xi’an. It is positioned as a pure electric compact SUV and is expected to be delivered in the fourth quarter of this year. The domestic production can reach 20,000 units this year, half of which will be delivered to the domestic market and the other half will be sold overseas.
No one has more say than smart on “how to create a sophisticated small car.”
Since the establishment of the brand, they have been researching this matter all the time. In the era of electrification, their car-making concept has not changed. The smart Elf #1 presents users with a compact but not low-end, personalized but not niche, high-quality pure electric vehicle. Its product positioning accurately meets the mainstream needs of the market. In today’s increasingly homogeneous market, this will become its biggest core competitiveness. The electrification technology resources from Geely also ensure that it will not fall behind in fierce competition. The positioning of this car at the press conference is “Tomorrow’s urban friend.”In terms of appearance, the design of smart EQ fortwo #1 seems to have drawn a clear line from the original smart model, turning from a mini car into a standard small SUV. Although the vehicle length is only 4,270mm, its wheelbase reaches 2,750mm, surpassing the wheelbase of most compact cars. The body width is even more astonishing, reaching 1,822mm, comparable to the medium-sized BMW 3 Series. To fully cater to the user’s individuality, there are 11 body colors and 4 interior styles to choose from.
The interior looks very simple overall, and the wrap-around center console retains the characteristics of the concept car. It is equipped with a 9.2-inch LCD instrument panel, a 12.8-inch floating central control screen, and a 10-inch HUD head-up display, enhancing the technological sense of the interior.
In terms of intelligence, the new car is equipped with up to 23 high-precision sensing hardware, front seat 6-way electric adjustment, intelligent driving assistance system, intelligent fragrance system, wireless charging for mobile phones, foot-kick electric tailgate, 3.3 kW reverse charging, etc. In addition, the new car provides 3 driving modes and 3 steering comfort options.
Looking at the configuration, it’s already a pretty good deal at this point in time. It should be noted that almost all electric and even fuel car brands have started to raise prices since March this year (including but not limited to Xpeng, BYD, Ora, XPeng, Tesla, NIO, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, etc.). Although the top configuration costs 230,000 yuan, compared with these price increases of its competitors, it still has a very good price-performance ratio. The configuration is also excellent in terms of power, endurance, driving assistance, and cabin materials and atmosphere. It should be noted that the same-sized Great Wall Ora Good Cat GT with fully-equipped options now costs more than 170,000 yuan.
I believe that Smart Elf #1’s direct competitor will be the domestically produced pure electric MINI from the joint venture company between Great Wall Motors and BMW, which is currently not yet on the market. The pricing of the domestically produced MINI electric vehicle will determine its competitiveness in the future.
An Overview of Small Electric Cars
There are many domestically produced or joint-venture small electric SUVs currently available, including:
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The BYD Yuan Plus, which was the sales champion in the pure electric small car category within half a year of its launch, and is equipped with the earliest domestically developed three-electric technology.
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The formidable ID.3 and ID.4 from the Volkswagen Group, which is the third-largest automotive manufacturer in the world.- Great Wall has specially created the Euler brand’s ultimate “cat” model, the Good Cat GT, to attract urban white-collar women.
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For the convenience of consumers, I have also included the XPeng P5, Tesla Model Y, and GAC AION Y for comparison.
The tone and positioning are aimed at the urban and youthful luxury class, with a size similar to the smart elf #1. It sells for 165,300-179,300 RMB.
From the known parameters, the smart elf #1 has a 102 horsepower advantage over the mainstream joint venture brand Volkswagen ID.3’s 170 horsepower front motor, an additional 100 kilometers of endurance, and a battery capacity nearly 10kWh larger than the ID.3’s 57.3kWh. It still maintains rear-wheel drive and rear-wheel disc brakes. Such performance parameters are quite competitive.
Looking at this comparison, the price of the smart elf #1 is still quite down-to-earth, making it challenging for the Volkswagen ID.3 to compete. However, if we compare it to the discounted price of the ID.4, it may be more fair. Like the ID.3, the ID.4 also uses drum brakes on the rear wheels, with a 0-100km/h acceleration of 8.4 seconds. Although the ID.3’s weight is lighter, it still requires 7.4 seconds. That is why I think the ID.4 is more suitable for consumers who focus on families and want to travel comfortably.
After meticulously searching for parameters and creating tables for over an hour, I highlighted the models that are more competitive in each category in red font.
As we can see, the Tesla Model Y ranks first in wheelbase width and space, and of course, its price of 316,900 RMB is also the highest among all the compared models.
If it is the lowest price of last year before the price hike, which was 275,500 RMB, I have sufficient reasons to explain why the Model Y can disrupt the domestic new energy vehicle market and even the gasoline vehicle market. In the first quarter of 2022, Tesla sold a total of 74,600 Model Y vehicles, surpassing the gasoline vehicle champion Great Wall Haval H6 and BYD Song, which have been the sales leaders for over 100 months. The reason for the good sales performance is simply that it is only slightly more expensive than the Tesla Model 3, but it has more space and is more suitable for family travel. Therefore, the Tesla Model 3, which is only suitable for individual driving, is relatively less cost-effective.
But with the price increase in April 2022, will the domestic consumers still be willing to pay over 300,000 RMB for the handicapped 2022 Model Y, which has weakened its acceleration performance?As the smart elf #1, which ranks among the top in terms of power, endurance, acceleration per hundred kilometers, and even configuration, will it be able to be delivered on schedule in the fourth quarter and catch up with the last crazy wave of new energy vehicle subsidies before they are reduced? The elder brother, Zeekry 001, also on Geely SEA platform, has been delivered for 6 months since the end of October last year. Even if we exclude the low season during the Chinese New Year in February and the low capacity, Geely’s Xi’an factory can withstand the pressure of the epidemic and the rise in raw material prices, and deliver smart elf #1 to us, who want to buy “electric sophisticated luxury small cars,” as early as possible. All we can do is to wait patiently with an optimistic attitude!
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.