At the beginning of the year, personnel changes in auto companies seemed to be a trend.

　　From the "Century Defense Change" when Akio Toyoda announced his resignation as president of Toyota Motor, to Wang Fengying, the former general manager of Great Wall Motors, who took the post of president of Xiaopeng Motor, to Li Pengcheng, the former assistant chief executive of Xiaopeng, who took the post of vice president of Avita... The auto industry has entered an active period of executive turnover.

　　At present, this trend continues.

　　An era of SAIC-Volkswagen

　　Recently, it was reported on the internet that Chen Xianzhang of SAIC Volkswagen would step down as the general manager, and the replacement was Jia Jianxu, the former general manager of Yanfeng Automobile.

　　According to public data, Chen Xianzhang, born in 1964, has been working for Shanghai Volkswagen since 1988 and is a veteran of SAIC. Over the past 35 years, his main work has been in United Auto Electronics Co., Ltd. Chen Xianzhang spent a total of 20 years from the early preparation to the promotion to the vice chairman of Lianchuang Auto Electronics Co., Ltd.

　　In 2014, Chen Xianzhang took over the post of General Manager of SAIC Volkswagen. At that time, the annual sales volume of SAIC-Volkswagen reached 1.7 million vehicles, exceeding the sales target of 1.6 million vehicles that year.

　　Then in 2015, the total sales volume of SAIC-VW exceeded that of FAW-VW, becoming the sales champion of domestic automobile enterprises. After that, SAIC-VW has held the title of champion for four years. In 2018, when the automobile market went down, the delivery volume exceeded 2 million vehicles, with no difference at the moment.

　　However, with the arrival of the tide of electrification, traditional large factories are facing difficult times under the influence of the tide of this era.

　　The old car companies, led by Volkswagen and Toyota, lag behind China's new energy car companies by half in this movement and industry shock about electric vehicles. However, under the pressure of the spring tide, SAIC-Volkswagen is also in a weak position in the competition for the top sales in the domestic passenger car market.

　　On the Christmas Eve of 2019, China Insurance Research released the results of the crash evaluation of Passat. The folding and collapse of the A-pillar made Passat, the iconic model of Wolfsburg, a soft spot for Volkswagen. Under the "joint venture belief" that had collapsed for many years, the consumer's bad mood also broke out at this moment. This is also considered to be the fuse for the performance decline of SAIC-Volkswagen.

　　It is worth mentioning that before this storm, Passat had occupied the top of domestic intermediate car sales for a long time, and the situation has changed sharply since then. Even today, Passat is still paying for the collision on Christmas Eve.

　　However, despite the phenomenon, the performance of SAIC Volkswagen has declined. On the one hand, under the tide of electrification, the understanding of the Chinese market has deviated, and the performance of the new energy market has not been able to stand firm in time. On the other hand, it is the inevitable result of the joint efforts of the upsurge of independent brands and the sinking of joint ventures.

　　It was also in 2019 that SAIC-VW was overtaken by FAW-VW by a narrow margin and lost the title of the champion in China's passenger car sales market. Then in 2020, the sales volume of SAIC-Volkswagen Volkswagen brand continued to fall to 1.395 million vehicles. By 2021, this number had shrunk to 1.3428 million vehicles, during which the annual sales volume of more than 800000 vehicles had been lost.

　　Since then, the market share of SAIC Volkswagen has also been shrinking. In 2022, its share has decreased to 6.23%, 1.04 percentage points lower than the same period of the previous year.

　　SAIC Volkswagen's attempt

　　Of course, it is also biased to attribute the failure of SAIC-Volkswagen to its unfavorable development or Chen Xianzhang himself. Because during Chen's tenure, in addition to the rapid changes in the new energy market in China, there are also impacts caused by the impact of the epidemic and chip shortage.

　　On the contrary, during Chen's tenure, SAIC-Volkswagen experienced a period of rapid development. During this period, the sales volume of SAIC-Volkswagen exceeded 2 million in a row. At the same time, during the deep adjustment period of the automobile industry, Chen played an important role in promoting the strategic transformation of SAIC-Volkswagen. He led SAIC-Volkswagen to focus on the strategic deployment of both shareholders and promote the continuous in-depth development of all work.

　　In the past two years, driven by Chen's efforts, SAIC-Volkswagen has also tried to reach consumers through youth, sports and intelligence.

　　As we all know, SAIC Volkswagen has always been an important business segment and profit source of SAIC, and SAIC attaches great importance to it. The background of this personnel change of SAIC is that Chen Xianzhang, as a veteran, is about to complete his mission at SAIC Volkswagen. At the same time, let the management of SAIC-Volkswagen show a younger trend, so as to better strengthen the cooperation between China and Germany and cope with the transformation of the new track.

　　So who is the successor Jia Jianxu?

　　It is reported that Jia Jianxu was responsible for the development of the European market of the complete vehicle business of SAIC, laying a solid foundation for the rapid development of independent brands overseas. During his tenure as General Manager of Yanfeng Automobile, he led Yanfeng to achieve continuous sales performance breakthroughs.

　　Yanfeng Automobile, as an intelligent manufacturing enterprise aiming at "focusing on intelligent production, scientific research and development, and providing digital cockpit solutions", has achieved double-digit growth in sales revenue for three consecutive years under the leadership of Jia Jianxu.

　　In 2022, Yanfeng Motor was growing against the trend, and its consolidated sales revenue exceeded 100 billion yuan. In the 2022 list of the top 100 global auto parts suppliers, Yan Feng ranked 16th.

　　Therefore, the advantages of Jia Jianxu, the new general manager, lie in his broad international vision and keen innovation perspective, as well as his rich experience in the field of automobile manufacturing, as well as his overseas vehicle market resume and global vision. This is why he should better strengthen the cooperation between China and Germany to cope with the transformation of the new track.

　　From ranking the top sales of domestic auto companies for years, to the decline of performance starting with the Passat collision, from the cumulative sales of the ID. series to reaching consumers through youth, sports and intelligence, SAIC-Volkswagen has experienced ups and downs in enterprise development in recent years. Under the leadership of Chen Xianzhang, SAIC-Volkswagen is trying to break through the difficulties.

　　With the resignation of Chen Xianzhang, the new general manager Jia Jianxu will build what kind of SAIC Volkswagen, and whether he can lead SAIC Volkswagen out of the mire and back to the peak, the industry is paying attention and expecting.