Can JD.com's 50 million members save the "nationally beloved car" from its sluggish sales fate?
Recently, JD.com suddenly announced a major move. During this year's "Double 11" event, it will collaborate with GAC and CATL to launch a "national good car". Different from Xiaomi's approach of building its own factory and Huawei's way of providing technological empowerment, JD.com will focus on sales and user insights in this cooperation, and leave the automotive hardware part entirely to GAC and CATL.
To put it simply, JD.com won't "build cars"; it will only participate in the sales segment of the automotive industry chain.
As market attention rises, the veil of this "national good car" is quietly being lifted. On the reservation page of the new car, the official has already released the first batch of core information, using parameters and designs such as "load-bearing capacity > 7 tons", "18% improvement in body impact resistance", "semi-hidden safety door handles", and "elk test speed above 75 km/h" to showcase its safety capabilities.
Screenshot: JD APP
The semi-hidden safety door handles will surely win the favor of many users. However, in the view of Electric Vehicle Connect, the same integrated thermoformed double door ring as Tesla Cybertruck is also worth noting. This design only requires one set of stamping tools and one stamping operation. Compared with the traditional multi-part spot-welding design, it reduces costs, improves production efficiency, and can effectively reduce the body weight while ensuring body strength and safety.
It's quite obvious by now: For this "national good car", JD.com hopes to make safety its core selling point.
But for a "national good car", this is obviously not enough. Which group of people can this new car attract? What user needs can it precisely address? Can it truly become a well-deserved "national good car"? To answer these questions, we need to place it in the current automotive market and compare it with models in the same price range and with the same positioning.
Two pieces of evidence lock it in! Is this JD's first car?
The official has not directly revealed what specific model this car is. However, based on the exposed data and released information, Electric Vehicle Connect speculates that JD's first car is very likely to be the GAC Aion UT battery-swapping version.
Image source: Ministry of Industry and Information Technology
You know, JD.com is the "main character" of this new car launch. From an industry perspective, as the "supporting roles", it's unlikely that GAC and CATL will create a brand-new product specifically for JD.com. A more realistic approach is to make "exclusive modifications" to an existing mature product.
This speculation is not groundless. The core evidence lies in the aforementioned integrated thermoformed double door ring. Currently, among global mass-produced models, only two models adopt this design: one is the Tesla Cybertruck, and the other is the GAC Aion UT. This almost directly indicates that the foundation of JD's "national good car" is most likely the GAC Aion UT.
Adding another key piece of information, the new car is confirmed to use CATL's "Chocolate Battery Swapping" technology. As early as April this year, Times Electric Service, a subsidiary of CATL dedicated to battery-swapping business, clearly stated that GAC Group is the first automaker to fully cooperate with the Chocolate Battery Swapping ecosystem, applying the battery-swapping technology to models such as the Aion UT, Aion RT, and Aion V Tyrannosaurus.
Image source: Chocolate Battery Swapping official website
Connecting these two pieces of information, the prediction that "JD's first car is the GAC Aion UT battery-swapping version" is almost certain.
According to the "Twenty-second Batch of Catalogs for Exemption from Vehicle Purchase Tax" released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the range parameters of the GAC Aion UT battery-swapping version have been exposed. The declared model is equipped with a 54.036 kWh battery pack, and the pure-electric range of the whole vehicle is 500 km, 80 km higher than the maximum range of the current Aion UT.
The current GAC Aion UT is priced between 69,800 and 101,800 yuan. Even for the battery-swapping version, the final price of the Aion UT battery-swapping version should not deviate too far from this range. Considering that it is equipped with battery-swapping technology and has a higher pure-electric range, it is estimated that the high - end version of the Aion UT battery-swapping version may be priced at around 120,000 yuan.
The market for 100,000 - yuan pure - electric small cars is indeed one of the hottest segments in the domestic automotive market. The monthly sales of models such as Geely Xingyuan, BYD Seagull/Dolphin, ARCFOX T1, and Wuling Bingo are quite impressive. However, the GAC Aion UT only sold 5,337 units in the just - past September, with a significant gap from the first - tier in terms of sales.
"Battery swapping" is one of the important selling points of the GAC Aion UT battery - swapping version. The official says that the vehicle can achieve "99 - second battery swapping", and plans to build 1,000 battery - swapping stations this year and a cumulative total of 2,500 stations next year, trying to attract users with the convenience of energy replenishment.
But the reality is that the current pattern of the battery - swapping market is clear. Except for NIO, which has accumulated a group of users through its mature system, it's still difficult for the battery - swapping technologies of other enterprises to form sufficient attractiveness. GAC obviously realizes this, which is why it chose to cooperate with JD.com, hoping to leverage JD.com's traffic, user resources, and the popularity of this "Double 11" event to gain more attention for the Aion UT series and make up for the shortcoming of the incomplete battery - swapping system.
Can JD's hundreds of millions of users really boost the sales of the new car?
When JD.com first announced that it would launch a new car, many negative voices emerged: "Now any enterprise dares to cross - border into car - building?" "What's an e - commerce company doing in the automotive circle?"
But actually, most of these complaints stem from a misunderstanding of JD.com's role. After people realize that JD.com is not "getting involved in car - building" but only responsible for sales and user insights, and the core hardware is still controlled by GAC and CATL, the doubts about "an outsider making a random cross - border move" will naturally dissipate.
In contrast, Electric Vehicle Connect is more worried about another practical problem: Even if the positioning is clarified, will users really be willing to buy a car just by clicking a few times on their mobile phones?
You know, cars are high - value consumer goods. Details such as test - driving experience and after - sales service, which cannot be felt through the screen, are always an unavoidable hurdle for online car - buying.
Electric Vehicle Connect noticed that there are already mature cases of online car - buying. During this year's National Day holiday, Wuling Motors dominated the Douyin group - buying list nationwide. It not only attracted 23,000 users to place orders for reservations but also finally completed 2,500 transactions, with a total transaction amount reaching 280 million yuan. This is sufficient to show that the online channel is no longer a niche track where cars can't be sold.
It's not just Wuling. Now many automakers are actively allocating resources to online sales. Changan signed a strategic cooperation agreement with JD Group, fully connecting its brands with JD.com. During this year's "618" event, BYD reached a cooperation with JD.com. Moreover, if you look through the video accounts of many automakers, they will also allocate resources to car - selling channels during non - new - car - launch publicity periods.
Screenshot: Video account
Undoubtedly, JD.com holds two key "aces" when entering the automotive sales field.
One is a huge traffic base. JD.com has hundreds of millions of users, and the scale of its PLUS members alone exceeds 50 million. It can quickly bring initial attention and potential customer groups to the new car, saving the cost of accumulating users from scratch.
The other is a mature automotive ecosystem. JD.com has long been involved in the automotive field. After the establishment of its automotive division in 2023, it has gradually built a complete service closed - loop of "buying, equipping, maintaining, using, and replacing". From online car - selection and ordering to offline test - driving and car - picking - up, and then to subsequent maintenance and battery - swapping, each link has corresponding service support, not just simply "selling cars without caring about after - sales".
With these two major advantages, the success rate of JD.com's first car launch will naturally be a bit higher.
But Electric Vehicle Connect noticed a detail: Although many automakers are focusing on online sales, only a few, such as Wuling, have generously announced the specific sales volume of online car - buying. Other automakers rarely disclose the actual transaction results of their online channels, mostly only mentioning "traffic - attracting effects" and "user consultation volume". The specific number of cars sold remains a vague figure.
As for the real online sales volume behind these "vague figures", it's not hard to guess: It's basically certain that the volume is not high enough to be publicly shown.
Consumers are willing to buy models under brands like Wuling mainly because Wuling's "high - cost - performance" positioning has long been deeply rooted in people's minds. The users who place orders are more price - sensitive and more accepting of "online low prices". Even if they miss out on some offline experiences, they are willing to compromise for a cost - effective price.
Image source: Weibo @JD.com
However, most other models are generally priced higher, lacking the "national - level" price attractiveness. And they don't have absolute dominance in their respective market segments, so users make decisions more cautiously.
Back to the GAC Aion UT battery - swapping version itself, in the pure - electric small - car market, the Aion UT has far less influence than the Wuling Hongguang MINIEV in the pure - electric micro - car market. The latter can be said to be a synonym for "pure - electric micro - cars", with extremely high user recognition and purchase intention. However, the Aion UT has not reached this "benchmark - level" height. When facing competition from models such as Geely Xingyuan and BYD Seagull, its offline sales are not outstanding, and the difficulty of online conversion is naturally much higher than that of the Wuling Hongguang MINIEV.
The inherent disadvantages of online car - buying are still an unavoidable problem for JD.com and all online car - selling players.
Automakers should avoid falling into the dilemma of "high traffic, low sales"
In the short term, relying on JD.com's traffic dividend and user base during the "Double 11" event, as well as the automotive ecosystem that is difficult to match by ordinary e - commerce car - selling models, and combined with selling points such as "safety" and "battery swapping", GAC Group can quickly accumulate initial attention for the new car and may even achieve a wave of sales breakthroughs during the event.
But in the long run, the shortcomings of the Aion UT are particularly obvious. On the one hand, its offline sales foundation is not stable. The monthly sales of 5,337 units indicate that it has not entered the first - tier. And online conversion depends on users' trust in the brand. It's naturally more difficult for a model with a weak foundation to achieve high online conversion.
On the other hand, many details of a car need to be perceived through offline experiences. Before the Aion UT establishes itself as a "national small car" in users' minds, even if JD.com can bring high traffic, it may fall into the embarrassing situation of "many viewers, few order - placers".
This also explains why the curse of "it's difficult for online car - selling to become mainstream" still hangs over most automakers. If they only rely on traffic gimmicks to attract attention without strengthening offline experiences and building brand recognition, they will most likely only achieve "short - term popularity" and won't be able to support long - term growth.
This article is from "Electric Vehicle Connect" and is published by 36Kr with permission.