Zhang Xinghai und Zhu Huarong konkurrieren um den Titel "Erster Mann der Automobilbranche in Chongqing".

Zhang Xinghai and his Seres have become the benchmark enterprise and figure in Chongqing. His aspiration to be the top figure in Chongqing's automobile industry faces a competitor: Zhu Huarong, the chairman of China Chang'an Automobile Group Co., Ltd.

In Chongqing, many locals are eager to "work on the assembly line" at Seres.

Even though the recruitment rate at Seres is low, and it's more difficult to become a full - time employee and get the five social insurances and one housing fund compared to its supporting factories, there are still large crowds of job - seekers on recruitment days. A labor recruitment agent joked that this might be the only company where workers are "tricked" into the factory but still thank the "unscrupulous agents."

The reason is simple. Workers at Seres can earn over 10,000 yuan a month during busy periods and 7,000 - 8,000 yuan on average. In Chongqing, where the per - capita disposable income was 39,700 yuan in 2024, working at Seres means a high salary. As for full - time employees, many received year - end bonuses equivalent to more than a dozen months' salary last year.

Behind the high salaries of workers is the rapid growth of Seres' performance. In 2024, its annual sales volume reached 426,800 vehicles, with an operating income of 145.176 billion yuan. From January to June 2025, the sales volume was 172,000 vehicles. Although the overall sales showed a significant decline, the Wenjie M9 and M8 dominated the mid - to large - sized SUV market, greatly increasing the profit margin. The estimated net profit in the first half of 2025 was between 2.7 billion and 3.2 billion yuan, a year - on - year increase of 66.2% - 96.98%.

Undoubtedly, Zhang Xinghai and his Seres have become the benchmark enterprise and figure in Chongqing. In March this year, the local official media, Chongqing Daily, titled an article "Chongqing People Have Their Own Lei Jun" and highly praised Zhang Xinghai.

However, Zhang Xinghai's aspiration to be the top figure in Chongqing's automobile industry faces a competitor: Zhu Huarong, the chairman of China Chang'an Automobile Group Co., Ltd.

On July 29, China Chang'an Automobile Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Chang'an Automobile) was officially established in Chongqing. It is the first time that the headquarters of a first - level central enterprise has settled in Chongqing. With a registered capital of 20 billion yuan, total assets of 308.7 billion yuan, 117 subsidiaries, and 110,000 employees, it has gathered significant strength.

Zhu Huarong, born in 1965, now shoulders the heavy responsibility for the future of the new Chang'an. According to his latest commitment, by 2030, Chang'an Automobile aims to produce and sell 5 million vehicles. In 2024, the old Chang'an had an annual sales volume of over 2.68 million vehicles. This surprisingly large target is also what Wang Chuanfu of BYD is striving for.

For Zhang Xinghai and Zhu Huarong, competing to be the top figure in Chongqing's automobile industry cannot fully represent their goals and ambitions. From a historical perspective, driven by technological innovation and global industrial upgrading, a new global path for contemporary Chinese manufacturing is being outlined. For example, Zhu Huarong stated that the goal of the new Chang'an is to account for more than 30% of the global market share by 2030 and become one of the world's top 10 automobile brands.

Among the central - state - owned Chang'an and the private - owned Seres, which one will be the global model for the rise of Chinese manufacturing?

Seres: Transforming from an ordinary to an outstanding one

In July, the temperature in Chongqing soared to 40°C. In Lijia, Liangjiang New Area, dozens of excavators and trucks were busy on a 103,000 - square - meter land, constructing a research and development center with a floor area of 329,000 square meters, shaped like the Apple Campus 2.

This is the Seres Global Automobile Park, with an investment of up to 3.2 billion yuan. For Seres, whose headquarters is located in Wuyun Lake, Tuzhu, Shapingba District, it has built several super - factories in Chongqing, including the Liangjiang Factory (Seres Factory 1) for producing the Wenjie M5, the Phoenix Factory (Seres Factory 2) for the Wenjie M7, and the Super Factory (Seres Factory 3) for the M8 and M9.

"Seres has given Chongqing a 'second Chang'an Automobile' and is the key to the revitalization of Chongqing's automobile industry," an observer said. Without Seres today, there would be no prosperous automobile industry in Chongqing today.

In 2024, Chongqing produced over 2.54 million vehicles, including 953,000 new - energy vehicles, a year - on - year increase of 90.5%. The production scale of complete vehicles ranked among the top three in provincial - level administrative regions in China. Seres, with 426,800 Wenjie vehicles sold, contributed 44.78% to the new - energy vehicle market.

Historically, Chongqing is a city on wheels. During the Anti - Japanese War, some armament factories were relocated to Chongqing. After 1949, six armament enterprises, including Chang'an, Jiangling, Jialing, Changjiang, Jianshe, and Wangjiang, became the mainstays of Chongqing's automobile industry. The most famous one, Chang'an Automobile, can trace its origin back to the Shanghai Foreign Cannon Bureau founded by Li Hongzhang in 1862.

Automobiles have since become the cornerstone of Chongqing's industrial development. China's first jeep was born here, and it was also a production base for heavy military vehicles... In the early 1990s, with the establishment of Qingling, the first Sino - Japanese joint - venture automobile production enterprise in China, and the founding of Changan Suzuki through a joint venture between the Ordnance Industry Corporation and Japan's Suzuki, the automobile industry became the economic pillar of Chongqing.

After Chongqing became a municipality directly under the Central Government in 1997, the automobile industry developed rapidly. In particular, after Chang'an's partnerships with Ford, Mazda, etc., its production and sales volume exceeded 1.42 million vehicles in 2010, making it the first Chinese automobile enterprise to achieve a production and sales volume of over one million.

Chang'an Automobile became the leader in Chongqing's automobile industry and drove the development of the entire industry. In 2009, there were over 20 complete - vehicle production enterprises in Chongqing. The predecessor of Seres, "Xiaokang Automobile," which mainly produced minivans, was one of them.

From 2014 to 2016, it was the golden age of Chongqing's automobile industry, with an annual production volume of over 3 million vehicles for three consecutive years, making it the undisputed number - one automobile city in China. However, behind the prosperity were hidden crises. Chongqing became the "Detroit of China" and suffered from the same problems - described as "big but not strong." Although there were many vehicle models and high production volumes, most were low - end models with low - price strategies and profit margins below the average level.

From 2018 to 2019, Chongqing's annual automobile production was halved, hitting rock bottom. Facing the trend of new - energy vehicles, a number of local automobile enterprises in Chongqing, such as Lifan, and their supporting factories went bankrupt, leading to a decline in fiscal revenue.

Actually, Chongqing's automobile industry targeted the new - energy field early. For example, as early as 2016, Zhang Xinghai invested over 6 billion yuan in the new - energy field. He sent his son Zhang Zhengping to establish SERES in Silicon Valley, the United States, and obtained the core "three - electric" technologies for new - energy vehicles. However, the sales of the main model, SF5, were a complete failure, and Xiaokang Co., Ltd. suffered huge losses for consecutive years.

The following story is well - known. At a critical moment, Zhang Xinghai accepted the olive branch from Yu Chengdong and reached an agreement with Huawei. With Huawei's full support, Xiaokang turned from a loss of 4 billion yuan to a profit of 4 billion yuan in just two years and officially changed its name to "Seres."

Today, the Wenjie M5, M7, M9, and M8 series, which are strongly associated with Huawei, support most of Seres' vehicle business. According to the Frost & Sullivan report, Seres has become the fourth new - energy vehicle enterprise in the world to achieve profitability, following Tesla, BYD, and Li Auto.

This has brought Zhang Xinghai great glory. He has "risen to prominence" and his status in the industry has soared. He frequently appears at important events and has received various honors. In June this year, he even became a special observer of the ecological environment.

"I've been in the automobile industry for 20 years... This is the first time I've participated in an event of this level," Zhang Xinghai said with a mix of emotions at the Annual Conference and Exhibition of the Society of Automotive Engineers of China last year.

In Chongqing, Zhang Xinghai and Seres are highly regarded by the local people. Praises such as "Seres has contributed significantly to Chongqing's GDP growth, which has far exceeded that of Guangzhou," "Seres has boosted Chongqing's GDP by nearly 3% on its own," "Seres has driven the development of Lijia," and "Without Seres, what can Chongqing compete with Chengdu?" are widely spread among the public.

The new Chang'an: New opportunities and challenges

It takes about half an hour's drive from the Seres headquarters to Building T2, Financial City 2, Jiangbeizui, Chongqing. In February last year, the Chang'an Automobile headquarters moved here from the Science and Technology Building, where it had been located for over 20 years.

It's a 20 - minute drive from the Chang'an Automobile headquarters to Yuzhou Hotel in Chongqing, the only "state guesthouse" in the city. On July 29, China Chang'an Automobile Group was grandly established here, and eight members of the new leadership team appeared together, indicating the local government's high - level attention.

After its joint ventures with Ford and Mazda, Chang'an Automobile changed from a "domestic champion" to a "loss - making enterprise" in just a few years. With intensifying market competition and slow product updates, its net profits in 2018, 2019, and 2020 were huge losses of 3.165 billion, 4.762 billion, and 3.25 billion yuan respectively. Compared with the profitable states of Geely and Great Wall during the same period, the lack of high - premium self - owned brand products was the main reason for the losses.

"Joint - venture brands are just a painkiller, while independent innovation is the hematopoietic stem cell," Zhu Huarong once metaphorically said.

Chang'an also benefited from this setback and was ahead of its peers in laying out the new - energy field, launching three new - energy brands: Deepal, Avita, and Qiyuan. In the first half of 2025, Chang'an Automobile's sales volume reached 1.355 million vehicles, a record high in the past eight years. Among them, new - energy vehicles contributed 450,000 vehicles, a year - on - year increase of 48.8%.

Behind Chang'an's counter - attack in the new - energy field is its closer cooperation with Huawei. For example, Avita is a brand jointly created by Chang'an Automobile, Huawei, and CATL.

Among them, Huawei is deeply involved in building Avita through the HI model. Yu Chengdong, Xu Zhijun, the rotating chairman of Huawei, etc., have all supported Avita.

Meanwhile, Avita is also the second - largest shareholder, along with Seres, holding a 10% stake in Yinwang, a subsidiary of Huawei in the automobile field. According to the latest disclosure by Chen Zhuo, the president of Avita Technology, nearly a thousand members of the joint team between Avita and Huawei have been stationed at the Avita headquarters in Chongqing, and the first jointly created product will be launched in the second half of next year. According to this news, the birth of a new force is imminent.

More eye - catching than the cooperation with Huawei is the 56 - day eventful journey from the separation and reorganization to Chang'an Automobile becoming an independent central enterprise.

Now, the official Weibo and WeChat accounts of China Chang'an Automobile Group have been quickly launched, and the Weibo avatars of Avita, Deepal, Changan Qiyuan, and various executives have all been changed to the red "new Chang'an" avatar. "The establishment of the new Chang'an is both an unprecedented opportunity and a severe challenge for Chang'an Automobile," said many observers.

In terms of opportunities, the most obvious changes brought about by the change of status are as follows. Firstly, the decision - making process has been significantly shortened. In the past, major strategies needed to be approved by the China South Industries Group Corporation, but now it is directly under the management of the State - owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. Chang'an can directly make decisions on projects worth billions of yuan, which will improve management efficiency and vitality