Great Wall's chairman aims to outsell Jeep
Chinese billionaire Wei Jianjun has set a target for Great Wall Motor Co.'s Haval marque to surpass Chrysler Group's Jeep and become the world's best-selling SUV brand in three to four years.
As part of the plan, Great Wall's chairman has started construction of a research center the size of 35 soccer fields in the city of Baoding, about 160 kilometers from Beijing. He plans to increase the number of engineers by at least 40 percent to more than 10,000.
"We want Haval to have the highest value for money," Wei told reporters at the company's factory in northern Hebei province. "We want to surprise our customers by that instead of just satisfying them."
Wei is China's fifth-richest man with an estimated net worth of $6.6 billion (40.8 billion yuan), according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
His company posted record profits last year, helped by a 90 percent surge in SUV sales as increasing numbers of Chinese consumers sought more interior room than conventional sedans can offer.
'A bit optimistic'
To achieve Wei's goal, Haval will have to surpass Jeep, which sold more than twice as many SUVs last year.
"Great Wall's growth trajectory has been pretty impressive," said Ashvin Chotai, London-based managing director of Intelligence Automotive Asia. "That said, it looks a bit optimistic to want to be the biggest SUV brand in the world, especially since [Great Wall] doesn't have a presence in the U.S., which is one of the biggest SUV markets in the world."
Great Wall sells its SUVs mainly in emerging markets and would need to step up its presence in Europe and the United States in order to achieve the goal, Chotai said.
In China, competition in the country's fastest-growing vehicle segment also will increase as Jeep and Land Rover start production in the country, allowing them to avoid paying a 25 percent tariff.
SUV demand
Strong SUV demand helped Great Wall boost net income last year 66 percent and more than double its share price.
The automaker boosted its SUV sales to 279,956 units, according to its annual report. That compares with the 316,000 SUVs sold by Land Rover in the financial year ended in March, and Jeep's sales of 701,626 vehicles.
Great Wall, which counts Russia as its largest overseas market and Iraq as its fastest-growing, has said it plans to spend 5 billion yuan ($808 million) in the five years ending 2015 to strengthen product development and technology research.
Great Wall wants to develop its own technology so that it can own the patents and have the final say on its product strategy, Wei said at the event showcasing the automaker's technology.
"A lot of leading automakers in the world are based in small cities or in the countryside," he said. "Baoding is a small city, but we believe that we become an excellent company."
"We want Haval to have the highest value for money," Wei told reporters at the company's factory in northern Hebei province. "We want to surprise our customers by that instead of just satisfying them."
Wei is China's fifth-richest man with an estimated net worth of $6.6 billion (40.8 billion yuan), according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
His company posted record profits last year, helped by a 90 percent surge in SUV sales as increasing numbers of Chinese consumers sought more interior room than conventional sedans can offer.
'A bit optimistic'
To achieve Wei's goal, Haval will have to surpass Jeep, which sold more than twice as many SUVs last year.
"Great Wall's growth trajectory has been pretty impressive," said Ashvin Chotai, London-based managing director of Intelligence Automotive Asia. "That said, it looks a bit optimistic to want to be the biggest SUV brand in the world, especially since [Great Wall] doesn't have a presence in the U.S., which is one of the biggest SUV markets in the world."
Great Wall sells its SUVs mainly in emerging markets and would need to step up its presence in Europe and the United States in order to achieve the goal, Chotai said.
In China, competition in the country's fastest-growing vehicle segment also will increase as Jeep and Land Rover start production in the country, allowing them to avoid paying a 25 percent tariff.
SUV demand
Strong SUV demand helped Great Wall boost net income last year 66 percent and more than double its share price.
The automaker boosted its SUV sales to 279,956 units, according to its annual report. That compares with the 316,000 SUVs sold by Land Rover in the financial year ended in March, and Jeep's sales of 701,626 vehicles.
Great Wall, which counts Russia as its largest overseas market and Iraq as its fastest-growing, has said it plans to spend 5 billion yuan ($808 million) in the five years ending 2015 to strengthen product development and technology research.
Great Wall wants to develop its own technology so that it can own the patents and have the final say on its product strategy, Wei said at the event showcasing the automaker's technology.
"A lot of leading automakers in the world are based in small cities or in the countryside," he said. "Baoding is a small city, but we believe that we become an excellent company."
