Chinese media today reported that automaker SAIC is laying off more than 70% of employees at its subsidiary Rising Auto amid weak sales and internal competition with models of another subsidiary — IM Motors.
SAIC has not yet officially confirmed the closure of Rising Auto, but several insiders quoted by Chinese media (in particular CnEVPost) report that everything is heading that way. Rising Auto (or Feifan in its romanized Chinese) was founded in 2021, growing out of the branded electric vehicle R sub-brand originally created by SAIC as an offshoot of the Roewe (formerly British Rover) brand. The current Rising product line consists of only two co-platform models — the Rising R7 crossover (entered the market in 2022) and the Rising F7 liftback (sold since last year).
Rising R7
Rising R7 and Rising F7 are quite large and well-equipped electric trains; during their development, the main focus was on an advanced autonomous driving system and replaceable batteries. Autopilots at Level 3 and above are still not allowed in China, and Rising's own battery-swap network is still in its infancy, its development hampered by weak sales.
Rising R7
Last year, the Rising brand sold about 14,000 cars in China. In January-February of this year, according to CAAM, sales of Rising amounted to 2,164 cars, which is already 200% more than in January-February 2023, but this, firstly, is the result of discount and gift promotions, and secondly, these are still too small volumes that do not allow Rising Auto to earn enough money at least for its own survival.
Rising F7
Weak sales are a consequence of the global slowdown in demand for electric vehicles and the price war between their manufacturers, but there is another reason: SAIC also controls the IM Motors company with almost the same positioning as Rising Auto. In the SAIC hierarchy, the Rising brand is one step below IM, but in general they produce electric trains that are quite similar in price and equipment, that is, they compete with each other.
Rising F7
IM Motors (aka Zhiji Motors) is not a 100% subsidiary of SAIC, this company was launched in 2020 as a joint venture of SAIC, IT giant Alibaba Group and the Zhangjiang Hi-Tech technology park in Shanghai, but SAIC owns a controlling stake shares The letters IM stand for Intelligence in Motion, which can be translated into Russian as “intelligence in motion.” In the first two months of this year, sales of IM Motors in China amounted to 6,613 cars, that is, this brand was more noticeably successful than Rising.
The choice in favor of IM Motors, apparently, was made not this week, but earlier, because in February the IM brand was officially launched on the European market — the premiere took place at the Geneva Motor Show. There were also Rising electric cars at the same exhibition, but with MG logos. In China, it is likely that the Rising models will also be renamed MG or returned under the wing of Roewe, and IM will remain the main and only flagship brand of SAIC.
We add that Chinese companies easily create new brands and also they close easily. Some new brands are archived before they even hit the market. This was the case, for example, with the Salon brand: it was invented by the Great Wall Motor company to produce prestigious passenger models, but was never launched, and now a new attempt is being made to create a cool passenger brand — at the moment it is known as the ZX brand.