SAIC Motor Corporation Limited (SAIC Motor for short) was honored as a “CCTV Top 10 Chinese Listed Company” at the 2018 CCTV Financial Forum and Chinese Listed Companies Summit held on Dec 12 in Beijing. This is the third consecutive year that the company has received such an honor, which fully demonstrates the remarkable achievements it has made in business development, corporate governance, social responsibility fulfillment and return on equity, etc., and also shows the recognition of investors on the value of SAIC Motor.

Maintaining robust sales and a leading market position

Faced with the new challenges of the era in 2018, such as the increasing downward market pressure, increasingly open industry and fiercer cross-disciplinary competition, SAIC Motor has firmly held the initiative in exploring the auto market and continued to improve its production and sales structure, realizing development for both its self-owned and joint venture brands, with the former achieving breakthroughs and the latter maintaining stable growth. From January to November, the company sold 6.392 million vehicles, up 3.15 percent year-on-year, which demonstrates the increase of its market advantages, the stable rise of its market share and the further consolidation of its leading role in the market.

SAIC Motor has an excellent performance in the vehicle business of its self-owned brands, which maintained a continuously rapid growth momentum. From January to November, its Roewe and MG realized a total sales volume of 632,100 units, up 35.33 percent from a year earlier and leading other domestic passenger vehicle manufacturers in sales growth. SAIC MAXUS, another self-owned brand of the company, saw a year-on-year increase of 16.71 percent in vehicle sales, at 112,900 units. Its creative business model of Customer to Business (C2B) mass customization, and the idea of facilitating intelligent customization, internet connection and autonomous driving of vehicles have been met with a positive response in the auto market.

SAIC Motor has also made progress in the vehicle business of its joint ventures while maintaining their stable growth. From January to November, SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC-GM and SAIC-GM-Wuling were among the top four domestic auto manufacturers in terms of vehicle sales. In particular, SAIC Volkswagen ranked the nation’s first in passenger vehicle sales.

This year, SAIC Motor leaped to 36th in the 2018 Fortune Global 500 companies list with consolidated sales revenue of $128.82 billion, the 14th time for it to make the list. Besides, it ranked 7th among global automobile companies on the list, and also enjoyed a high ranking among the domestic State-owned companies.

Innovation and transformation

In recent years, SAIC Motor has taken the initiative in China to promote its innovation strategy to support its new targets: Electrification, Intelligent Connectivity, Sharing and Globalization, and made it clear to transform itself into a “comprehensive provider of both vehicle products and services for customers”, so as to seize an advantageous position in the reconstruction of the auto industrial chain and value chain, and accelerate its business transformation and upgrading.

In terms of becoming more electrically-powered, SAIC Motor, as the sole auto maker in China that fully develops the electric vehicle, plug-in electric hybrid vehicle and fuel cell vehicle, has independently developed the core technologies in main auto parts such as the electric drive system, batteries, and the electric control system, and has launched over 20 new energy vehicles. In January 2018, SAIC Motor was awarded the 2nd prize in this year’s National Prize for Progress in Science and Technology, for its project of Key Technologies and Industrialization of Low-Power Plug-in Hybrid Electric Passenger Vehicles, which was the only auto project that won the prize this year. From January to November, SAIC Motor sold more than 120,000 new energy vehicles, up 137 percent year-on-year.

To become more internet-connected, SAIC Motor cooperated with Alibaba and pioneered the launch of a new internet-connected vehicle in the world. The new car has realized a sales volume of over 700,000 units since it was launched in July 2016. The internet-connected vehicle ecosystem has gradually taken shape. Meanwhile, SAIC Motor has so far finished developing two generations of self-driving vehicle platforms, with the total distance in self-driving car testing topping 78,000 kilometers; it has also obtained the first license in China to conduct open-road tests of vehicles and is also one of the first auto maker in Jiangsu province to have obtained a license for conducting road tests of self-driving cars, with the distance in car testing topping 5,200 kilometers. This year, its Roewe Marvel X, the world’s first mass-produced smart car went on market, which is equipped with the self-parking function and represents the world’s first application of intelligent driving technologies in mass-produced cars.

To become more sharing-based, SAIC Motor has been dedicated to developing comprehensive mobility services. Its Chexiangjia auto service platform has set up thousands of stores across China; its Global Car Sharing and Rental Co has become the world’s largest company specializing in new-energy-vehicle car sharing and rental businesses, providing services for 63 cities across the country, with 42,000 licensed cars operating in 13,000 outlets, and more than 4 million members. There is one order handled every second on average; SAIC Motor has launched the Xiangdao Chuxing mobility service platform to explore the online car-hailing market, and integrated time-share car rental and other car rental businesses, trying to build a smart mobility platform. This year, the company has also established the first AI lab in the auto industry, facilitating its innovative businesses such as the provision of smart mobility services.

For becoming more internationally-focused, SAIC Motor has set up three overseas vehicle manufacturing bases in Thailand, Indonesia and India, respectively, 11 marketing service centers in places such as Europe, North America, South America, Africa, Middle East, Austria and New Zealand, as well as nearly 500 marketing service outlets overseas. To speed up the technology spillover from China to foreign countries, SAIC Motor launched MG ZS in Thailand, the first internet-connected vehicle it has launched overseas. The car was quite popular among the country’s young consumers and became the highest monthly selling vehicle in Thailand after four months of its launch in the country’s auto market. From January to November, SAIC Motor saw 252,600 of its cars be exported or sold overseas, up 70 percent year-on-year, and maintaining the first position nationwide.

Corporate social responsibility

SAIC Motor has long been attaching great importance to the harmonious development of economy, society and environment, endeavoring to fulfill its social responsibility and actively demonstrating its image of a “responsible, reliable and innovative” corporate citizen.

In terms of energy saving and emission reduction, SAIC Motor only consumed 0.0261 ton of standard coal for generating 10,000 yuan ($1,450) of output in 2017 in Shanghai, claiming a leading position in the manufacturing industry in energy saving. In the year, the company’s newly-operated distributed generation project, covering Wuhan, Jinqiao town in Shanghai, Ningbo and Qingdao, with a capacity of nearly 70 MW, has helped generate 150 million kWh of electricity and reduce 111,000 tons of CO₂, together with the “Golden Sun” solar photovoltaic generation project that has already entered operation previously. In addition, thanks to its time-share new-energy-vehicle rental business in recent years to explore the car-sharing market, SAIC Motor has so far reduced the emission of a total 68,000 tons of greenhouse gas.

As for the social charity work, SAIC Motor has been vigorously supporting the nation’s cultural and sports undertakings, conducting strategic cooperation with Chinese Football Association Super League and Shanghai SIPG Football Club, and becoming the title sponsors of the SAIC Shanghai Culture Square and SAIC International Circuit; it has been earnestly answering the call of the nation for targeted poverty alleviation and offered aids to the Fuping county of Hebei province and the Qujing city of Yunnan province; it has also donated vehicles to many places, with the value of donations over the five years reaching nearly 200 million yuan in total.

Notably, SAIC Motor has offered generous returns to its shareholders while achieving remarkable growth in operations. In 2018, the company offered cash dividends of 18.30 yuan (tax included) per 10 shares to all of its shareholders. It is the fifth consecutive year that the company has given such a large sum of cash dividend to its shareholders, and its annual dividend rate has been as high as 50 percent and above over the five years.

Looking into the future, SAIC Motor will stick to promoting its innovation strategy to support its new targets: Electrification, Intelligent Connectivity, Sharing and Globalization, and accelerate its transformation and upgrading, so as to turn itself into an innovative globally-recognized company that pioneers the automotive future, and generate long-term and stable returns for the shareholders.