BAIC Unveils All-New BEIJING Brand

On the evening of October 15, BAIC’s new brand strategy release conference was grandly held at the China Millennium Monument, at which BAIC officially released its self-developed passenger vehicle brand “BEIJING” and the slogan “From BEIJING to the World and the Future”. As the core brand of BAIC by integrating the products and technical resources of BAIC New Energy and BAIC Motor, “BEIJING” represents the new products mentioned in BAIC’s strategy of “providing high-tech, new and special products”, and, with new energy and new technologies at the core, will advance the comprehensive and innovative development of BAIC’s self-developed passenger vehicle business and open a new chapter for the independent development of the group.

In his speech delivered at the conference, Xu Heyi, Secretary of the Party Committee and Board Chairman of BAIC, said, “Built on our experience in vehicle making over the last six decades and independent development over the past decade, we integrate traditional technologies with industry-leading electricity driving, battery and electricity controlling technologies for new energy vehicles, and officially release our self-developed passenger vehicle brand—BEIJING.” In Beijing, where the ceremony in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China just wrapped up and the festive atmosphere remains strong, the release conference for the all-new “BEIJING” brand, which combined both tech and cultural elements, presented an amazing viewing and listening feast to over 1,000 participants including guests from all circles as well as representatives from industrial partners and authoritative media. Bai Yansong, Shui Junyi, Lu Jian and Gang Qiang, as witnesses to the “BEIJING” brand, went onto the stage to promote the brand through talk shows and drew applause from the audience.

BAIC Spends a Decade Fostering the BEIJING Brand

As one of the main force of China's auto industry, BAIC remains true to its original aspiration of fostering self-developed passenger vehicle brands and serving the country through manufacturing.

From 1958 when Beijing Automobile Manufacturing Factory produced the first “JINGGANGSHAN” sedan that drove into Zhongnanhai to the first off-road vehicle “BEIJING 212” became popular across the country in 1966, from the “Warrior” military car that debuted at Zhurihe as the car for the Chinese President in the military parade to Beijing BJ80 that led the formations in the parade in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, BAIC has gone through a glorious course that's also filled with hardships over the past six decades. Accumulation of car-making technologies and technical progress in the last six decades lay a solid foundation for the launch of the new brand.

In 2009, with a strategic and forward-looking vision, BAIC began to make deployment in two sections, i.e. self-developed passenger vehicles and new energy vehicles. In the same year, it acquired the SAAB technology to build a self-developed passenger vehicle brand, and started entrepreneurship the second time. Also in 2009, it set up the first new energy vehicle joint-stock company in China and began R&D of electric vehicles. After a decade of development, it has sold over one million sets of self-developed passenger vehicles on a cumulative basis, with the new energy vehicles standing at the top by sales volume for six years in a row national wide and leading the pure electric vehicle market. Today, it embarks on a new journey, embracing a milestone that marks the qualitative change of its self-developed vehicle business.

At the conference, Xu Heyi said, the “BEIJING” brand is created at a time when the auto industry sees tremendous changes and faces unprecedented challenges. The brand will uphold the mission of “becoming the leader of electrification, connectivity and sharing of automobiles and guarding the beautiful dream of humans about traveling” and be dedicated to creating better-than-expected auto products for the youth with reliable and excellent quality and smart and thoughtful humanistic care.

Based on two world-class innovation platforms known as the National New Energy Vehicle Technology Innovation Center and BAIC New Energy Test Center, as well as the powerful R&D strength of over 5,000 engineers in seven cities of five countries, the “BEIJING” brand will intensify independent development and advance technical progress to support the constant replacement of products. As the most important self-developed passenger vehicle platform of BAIC in the future, the “BEIJING” brand will firmly implement the strategy of combining new energy with intelligent networking, create a product line that covers traditional fuel vehicles and new energy vehicles, promote the constant upgrading of products and comprehensively advance the empowering of vehicles with intelligent driving and intelligent networking.

Xu Heyi said, “The ‘BEIJING’ brand belongs to Beijing and also to the world. She’s a brand with good quality, caring character and ambitious dream. With the focus on international development, it will work to develop into a name card of Chinese automobiles with a global reputation.” BAIC aims to build “BEIJING” into a world-class brand which representing green and smart traveling and tech innovation, as well as a “golden signboard” of Beijing and a new landmark of the capital city.

BEIJING Brand Releases Two Types to Demonstrate Its Powerful Strength

At the conference, based on the product lines of BAIC Motor and BAIC New Energy, two listed companies of BAIC Group that cover traditional fuel vehicles and new energy vehicles along with powerful technical strength, BAIC unveiled the first pure electric vehicle EU7 and the first concept vehicle Illuminate under the “BEIJING” brand.

   In the past decade, BAIC took the lead in entering the new energy field and launched the “Dolphin +” intelligent networking strategy and the “Darwin” intelligent cockpit system, shifting to a service-oriented producer and making outstanding achievements in electrification, intelligence, connectivity and sharing. Yu Liguo, Deputy General Manager of BAIC New Energy, said at the conference, “BAIC has never stopped in technical evolution. We're not only persistent in the exploration of technologies, but also hope the technologies have a temperature and products have a soul.” In the future, the “BEIJING” brand will achieve comprehensive breakthroughs in safety, health and comfort. Leading technologies, such as intelligent driver assistance, distance detection decision-making and warning, flower room-like 3D air protection technology, vehicle-mounted biological sensors and active obstacle avoidance CDC technology, will be applied in an all-round way to build the core competence of the new brand.

At the conference, BAIC’s Design Director Lowie introduced the design philosophy for the two types. Positioned to be a medium-level pure electric vehicle, BEIJING EU7 is equipped with the latest achievements of the Darwin technology, targeted at the pure electric business vehicle market and characteristic by big space, a long period of endurance, strong power, smartness and exquisite manufacturing. BEIJING EU7 has been sold online, with the post-subsidy sales price between RMB159,900 and RMB175,900.

Lowie added, EU7 is a special model that connects the past with the present. Besides inheritance of BAIC’s gene in electric technologies, we also introduced many new things in the design. The concept car Illuminate, which was debuted the first time, represents the product design philosophy of the “BEIJING” brand summarized as “pursuing metropolitan beauty” and the design style of the all-new SUV of the brand, with the front face lines expected to become the new DNA in the front face design of the “BEIJING” brand.

Lowie stressed, “confident”, “pure”, “caring” and “smart” are the key words in the design of the “BEIJING” brand. Based on the philosophy of “pursuing metropolitan beauty”, the design features we’ve created and are creating will become elements used to identify the follow-up types of the “BEIJING” brand. We chose the word “Illuminate” as it will promise and illuminate a brand-new future filled with the pure enjoy.

At the conference, Yu Liguo revealed the “BEIJING” brand planning. He said, in the future, the brand will use the latest Internet technologies, such as 5G-based high concurrency vehicle connectivity handling mechanism, C-V2X panoramic recognition system and technologies to make autonomous driving, making intelligent cockpits and human-vehicle-cloud synergetic platform accessible and become real scenarios. In the coming five years, BAIC will input RMB20 billion in the R&D to build two new platforms, which include the BMFA hybrid product platform characterized by deep integration, extreme engineering, flexible expansion and intelligent manufacturing, and the BE22 high-end pure electric product platform characterized by pure electricity, iterative evolution, advanced comfort and module expansion. In the future, more than six high-end pure electric vehicle models of the “BEIJING” brand will be created on the platform. 

Comprehensively Innovating in the Marketing System to Help the Brand Go Farther and Steadier

The marketing team of the “BEIJING” brand made their debut at the release conference. It’s learned that the brand has integrated the marketing system at the preliminary stage. Li Yixiu, Director of BAIC’s Marketing Committee, said, the new brand will achieve the smooth integration of BAIC’s self-developed brands by developing One channel, One brand and One team. The “BEIJING” brand will take innovation step to develop service platform, and provide users with all-weather and one-stop guiding, charging, traveling and social networking services based on “Zhihui Guanjia” APP. Meanwhile, it will reform the mode of channels, to achieve the “in the future, the 4S showrooms will not only sell cars, but also a post-house that integrate leasing, financing, traveling, replacement and battery charging and swapping”. As for the innovation of the business mode, the brand will carry out open and cross-sectoral cooperation to meet future scenarios. From the strategic investment in dealers and travelling enterprises to cooperation with Suning, JD.com and State Grid on new retail, the “BEIJING” brand will also expand the modes of trading , such as “BAIC Leasing” and “separation between vehicles and batteries”, and make its way into emerging markets like taxi, driver training vehicles and echelon use of batteries.

“We aim to make ‘BEIJING’ integrated into the mainstream with a more anticipated brand, denser distribution of channels, richer product matrix, better after-sales services, more extensive customer resources and a stronger sales team,” said Li Yixiu, the new head of the “BEIJING” brand, feeling confident about fostering a powerful new brand.

At the end of the release conference, the atmosphere reached a climax amid the chorus of “My People, My Country” by the employees. A column of light that represents the “light of BEIJING” shot straight into the sky over the China Millennium Monument. It is the light of innovation, inheriting the achievements in the past six decades, will light the dream of BAIC. Standing in the brand-new phase of the world’s century-old auto industry and at the critical moment for China’s auto industry to upgrade, the “BEIJING” brand will write a new chapter in the history of China’s auto brands by carrying forward past traditions and forging ahead into the future. From BEIJING, to the world and the future!