Gree Philips launched a air -conditioning war, a siege from former employees and dealers?

Radar Finance Hongtu Products | Editor Li Yihui | Deep Sea

In the fiercely competitive white electricity market, there has always been no wonderful match. This time, Gree Electric and Philips started war on the air -conditioning business.

Recently, it is reported that in order to restrict dealers to sell Philips air conditioners at the same time, Gree sacrifice the "two -choice one" policy. Acting Gree air conditioner cannot represent Philips air conditioners, and one must be selected.

According to Times Finance, this is due to the promotion of the salesman from Gree to Philips, many Gree authorized stores are selling Philips air conditioning.

In fact, it is not just a dealer switching to competitors. There are also many Dong Mingzhu's "old ministry" in the middle and senior management of Philips Air Conditioning. For example, the media found that Huang Hui, the former president of Gree Electric, and former president assistant Hu Wenfeng, all appeared in the list of executives of Philips operation headquarters.

Even the investor of the Philips air conditioner was considered Xu Zi, a Hebei agent who was considered Gree Electric. These inextricable connections on both sides make this game more interesting. As of now, the two sides have not yet responded publicly.

From the perspective of the industry, Gree Electric's channel changes in recent years have profoundly influenced. On the one hand, after the center of gravity moves to the line, Gree's dependence on offline agents has weakened, and sales rebate has been greatly reduced; on the other hand, Gree vigorously promotes the new retail model, and channel choices are more diversified and flexible. The interests of traditional channel vendors are inevitable Emphasized.

As a result, some employees who left Gree and the dealers who were seeing a change joined the Philips air conditioner to rush Gree's rice bowl.

Philips investor is suspected to be Gree agent

Gree Electric's major shareholder Gao Yan Capital's transaction last year inadvertently brought a competitor to Gree Air Conditioning Business.

Data show that Philips, founded in 1891, is a Dutch electrical appliance giant and started with production and sales of lighting equipment. But in fact, many consumers are familiar with Philips because of their home appliances, including fully automatic concentrated coffee machines, air purifiers, and vacuum vacuum cleaners. In 2020, the sales of Feipan's related businesses were 2.2 billion euros.

However, in recent years, the home appliance business income of Blink has grown rarely. According to the financial report, the operating income of Philips home appliances business in 2016-2019 was 2.4 billion, 2.3 billion, 2.2 billion, and 2.3 billion euros, respectively, and it was already in a state of stagnation.

If the performance is unsatisfactory, Philips has a plan to sell home appliances. Due to many years in Europe, North America, and Asia -Pacific's major markets, the brand reputation, market share and channel resources accumulated by Philips quickly attracted a group of competitors.

In March 2021, Gao Yan Capital stood out from the competition from Dinghui Investment, TCL and Jiuyang, with 4.4 billion euros, equivalent to nearly RMB nearly 3.4 billion yuan. The transaction was completed in the third quarter of that year.

Some media speculated that the Philips household appliances business won by Gaozhu Capital does not include air -conditioning business.

It is reported that Philips Air Conditioning Business was introduced to the Chinese market in 2018 and officially debuted in 2019. Chen Liping, the former head of Jinxing Air Conditioning, served as the CEO of Philips Air Conditioning China Operation Headquarters.

Since then, Yu Fangwen, the founder of Meibo Air Conditioning, took over the Philips Air Conditioning China Operation Headquarters in 2020. According to the First Finance and Economics, there are veterans in the electrical industry, and in mid -2021, Yu Fangwen changed his hand again, and Shanghai Feili Technology Development Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Shanghai Feili") undertaked the main business of the Philips Air Conditioning China market, and it was by its it. 49%of Nanjing Zhipu Supply Chain Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Nanjing Zhipu") is responsible for operation.

Tianyancha shows that Nanjing Zhipu's shareholders are Shanghai Feili and Yu Fangwen Anhui Meibo Group, as well as Natural person Hu Wenfeng and Huang Hui, and the shareholding ratio has not been made public.

It is reported that the "cost -effective" Meibo air conditioner has a history of more than 10 years. Earlier, Philips Air Conditioning was an OEMEMEMP and responsible for operations. The operating model is a similar model. It mainly obtains customers through cost -effective products.

The actual controller behind Shanghai Feili is not Ma Xueli in the registration of industrial and commercial registration, but Xu Zifa, who is considered Gree air -conditioned original Hebei sales agent and former director of Gree Electric.

On February 24 this year, the Development and Reform Commission of Nanxun District, Luzhou City approved a project with an annual output of 5 million smart home appliances. The total investment of the project was 10 billion, of which the total investment of the first phase of the investment was 3.5 billion yuan and the fixed investment was 2.8 billion yuan. Self -raising, used to purchase production equipment and environmental protection equipment such as air -conditioning automated production line, high -speed punch, test platform, air -conditioning laboratory, and checked vacuum box.

Among them, Construction Fang Anhui Zhipu Supply Chain Management Co., Ltd. is now renamed Anhui Zhipu Xinda Electric Co., Ltd., which is 100%held by Nanjing Zhipu.

Based on the 3 billion annual sales targets that came out at the end of last year, it is obvious that Philips Air Conditioning has grabbed more market share in the Chinese market.

"Gree Man" gathered in Philips

Except for the investors of Gree's agent, many trader of Philips Air Conditioning now are Dong Mingzhu's "old subordinates".

The most well -known "No. 2 figure" Huang Hui, the most well -known Mohel. As early as February 19, 2021, Huang Hui applied to the board of directors and executive presidents to the board of directors of the company to the board of directors of Gree Electric for personal reasons. As the second figure of the original Gree, the market was once regarded as the successor of Dong Mingzhu.

Before leaving, Huang Hui has been working in Gree for nearly 30 years. He assisted Zhu Jianghong and Dong Mingzhu, two chairmen, and also served as chief engineers of Gree Electric, becoming Gree's internal technology "leader". But after resigning, Huang Hui no longer holds any position of Gree Electric. Hu Wenfeng, a former assistant to Gree Electric President, was previously the chairman of Jinghong refrigerator company. Jinghong refrigerator was hatched at the Gree dealer system first, and was later acquired by Gree Electric to enter the listed company.

It is reported that Huang Hui currently holds not only in Nanjing Zhipu, the main body of the Philips China air -conditioning business, but also the chairman of the Chinese operation headquarters; Hu Wenfeng also holds Nanjing Zhipu's shares and serves as the president of Philips Air Conditioning.

In addition, Li Peng, former director of Gree E -commerce Administration, joined the Philips Air Conditioning China Operation Headquarters Ren Ren. The former secretary of Dong Mingzhu Liu Yirong served as the Minister of Marketing of the Philips Air Conditioning Marketing Department.

Some media reported in November last year that more than 170 members of the China Operations Headquarters of Philips Air Conditioning China, about 80 % of them worked at Gree Electric.

At that time, there was a voice that this was the intention to arrange the team to go to the Philips air conditioner to avoid difficulty developing and growing on Gree Electric, but also formed with Gree Electric in the air conditioning market. When the in vitro incubation is waiting for the time to mature, the Gree system is incorporated into the Gree system.

But in the current situation, it is difficult for Gree's external incubation.

Netease Finance Fengli article said that Gree Electric's dealer said that Li Gangfei, assistant to Gree Electric President Li Gangfei recently, from Zhuhai to ask Gree Electric's dealers in various provinces in the country. The proxy of the Philips air conditioner. "If you don't, you will not let the agent Gree Electric."

Times Finance mentioned in the aforementioned report that a Gree county -level agent said that some salesmen who have worked for Gree had changed jobs to Philips air conditioners and became municipal agents. Although Gree can restrain its own agent, it is difficult to prevent employees who have jumped off in Gree dealers and expand offline channels for Philips air -conditioning.

Objectively speaking, these employees who left Gree have pointed at the old family, and it is easy to dig people from Gree, or absorb dealers who run from Gree Electric.

The same group of people sell similar products, which makes Gree have to be afraid, so it is not difficult to understand the big move to sacrifice the "two choices".

Gree's "Channel Change"

It is not difficult to find out that Xu Zifa's willingness to "start another stove" is that its original interests in Gree Electric have been affected.

In 2020, due to the impact of the epidemic, offline sales channels were stopped, and live broadcasts rose. In 2020, Dong Mingzhu began to live broadcast on platforms such as Douyin, Kuaishou, JD.com, and a total of 47.62 billion yuan in total sales of 13 live broadcasts throughout the year.

That is, at the end of 2019 at almost the same time, Gree channel changes began, hoping to compress the sales link of Gree air -conditioning. In the case of weak air conditioning market, the efficiency of the sales chain and the cost of compressed intermediate links will be improved to allow consumers of retail terminals.

According to the summary of Tianfeng Securities, this change has three obvious characteristics.

The first is to greatly reduce the secondary agent, promote the flat development of channels, and solve the problem of excessive price increases and high terminal prices due to layer distribution system.

The second is that the headquarters reduces past sales rebate, but allows terminal dealers to obtain their own major profits through price difference sales. It is reflected in the sales expenses, Gree Electric's sales expenses in 2014 were 28.89 billion yuan, and the sales expenses in 2021 were only 11.582 billion yuan, a scale of more than 17 billion yuan.

The third is to vigorously promote the new retail model, and the channels are more diversified. In addition to the establishment of the "Gree Dong Mingzhu Store", it has also opened up cooperation with Tmall and JD to promote the new retail model. Gree air -conditioning online sales increased from 10.87%in 2019 to more than 17%in 2021.

In this process, some of the damaged Gree dealers left and cast to competitors.

In August 2020, Miao Peiyuan, the former sales director of Shandong Gree, established a high -profile sales company in Shandong Shengmei Excellence Electrical Electric, which was sold out of the air conditioner. Three months later, some of the main force of Henan Sales Company also switched to the beauty of the opponent.

In addition, Gree Electric's former Shandong Company's Castline Duan Xiufeng is also a former Gree Electric Supervisor. Now it has represented Midea, Oaks and other brands.

In addition to business unbundling, these offline agents are also gradually loosen with Gree in interests. An important signal is that on June 24th, Gree's second largest shareholder Tokyo Sea Connection passed the community transaction, which reduced the holdings of Gree Electric's 110 million shares and cash about 3.5 billion yuan.

It is understood that Jinghai Interconnection is composed of a number of Gree Electric Agents. Xu Zifa is a director in it. He indirectly holds 6.74%of the shares, while Xu Wei, who ultimately benefits the shares of the shares, is reported to be Xu Zifa's son.

Industry insiders who are close to Gree Electric speculated that among the funds obtained by the equity of Gree Electric's equity of Gree Electric, Xu Zifu's affiliated enterprise can be used for the investment of the Philips air -conditioning Luzhou base.

Some brokerage research reports that Gree's channel reform has certain effects.The research report of CICC on June 27 held that due to the impact of the traditional dealer system, the reform of Gree channels was very difficult, and the reform progress was slow, but it still achieved a certain effect in three years.However, if combined with the changes in domestic home appliance channel structures, Gree's new retail model is still gapdly from the average level of the industry.

Guo Made, president of Ovi Cloud (AVC), gave a speech at the TOP summit at 2022 China (Chongqing) channel businessmen on June 25 that the structure of the home appliance channel was divided again. From January to May 2022, the e-commerce platform (including the sinking channels (including the sinking channels) It accounts for about 50%.

From this perspective, Gree's online sales proportion still needs to be increased.

- END -