Land Airbus is coming!
Geely's new brand LEVC L380 has officially been launched, with a total of 4 models, and the new car is positioned as a medium-to-large MPV. The price range is 379,900-479,900 yuan, and under the limited-time listing rights, the price range is 349,900-449,900 yuan.
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Although the name of LEVC Yizhen is unfamiliar, the lineup at the press conference can be said to be unprecedentedly powerful compared to previous ones.
At the press conference, in addition to LEVC Chairman Nan Shengliang, not only Li Shufu came to support it, but also brought a group of senior executives including An Conghui, Gan Jiayue, Lin Jie, Yang Xueliang, and even the founder of NetEase, Ding Lei, to support it.
It is rare for a car model launch conference to gather the whole family of Geely, which is enough to show how much importance Geely attaches to LEVC.
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Moreover, it is not difficult to see from the pricing that the L380 is clearly differentiated from the Geely Zeekr 009, which is also under the Geely system. The Zeekr 009 focuses on the high-end travel market above 500,000, while the LEVC L380 focuses on the market below 500,000.
A380 on land?
It is not difficult to see from its title of “Land Airbus” that it must be at least big.
And from the naming of L380, we can see that its name comes from the Airbus A380, the world's largest wide-body passenger aircraft manufactured by European Airbus.
The L380 provides the answer to the concept of “big” in two dimensions: size and space.
The length, width and height of L380 are 5316/1998/1940mm respectively, and the wheelbase is 3185mm. The body length is close to that of Ideal MEGA, but taller than MEGA, but the wheel size on the side is smaller, and the overall appearance looks larger than MEGA.
Another thing is the space inside the car. From the perspective of the vehicle structure, the L380 has a variety of layouts ranging from 3 to 8 seats to choose from, and the 8-seater version adopts a rare 2+2+2+2 layout.
Taking the most conventional six-seater version as an example, the space in the first row reaches 790mm, the space in the second row has 1000mm, and the space in the third row can reach 940mm. This is the origin of the title of L380 “Land Airbus”.
Moreover, unlike traditional MPVs where only the second row of seats in the passenger compartment adopts an independent design, the second and third row seats of the Yizhen L380 are both independent aviation seats, and the passenger compartment aisle width can reach 200mm.
The key to such a large space performance lies in the SOA architecture used by Geely on the L380.
The biggest advantage of SOA architecture over other pure electric platforms lies in the utilization of cabin space. It is a purely space-oriented pure electric architecture.
SOA placed the ODP integrated vehicle power management module between the power battery pack and the floor, which was previously arranged vertically, and changed it to a horizontal flat layout. In addition, SOA also placed the low-voltage battery in the middle and the steering gear in the front, freeing up more space in the front cabin.
In addition, the SOA architecture optimizes the direction of the vehicle body's longitudinal beams and the efficient flat design of the rear suspension, squeezing the interior space to the extreme. The space utilization rate of the entire vehicle under the SOA architecture can reach more than 75%.
Of course, as both belong to Geely, the SOA architecture and the SEA vast architecture are only one letter different, which makes the outside world curious about the relationship between the two.
Kent Bovellan, head of Geely Automotive Architecture, once said that although there are some shared parts between SOA and SEA platforms, the two are largely unrelated.
The SOA platform was jointly developed by teams from China, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Germany over a period of two and a half years. In terms of compatible vehicle models, it supports vehicle sizes of 4860mm-5995mm in length and 1945mm-1998mm in width, and the wheelbase can be expanded from 3000mm to 3800mm.
The SEA vast architecture, developed by domestic and European R&D centers, can cover vehicles with a wheelbase of 1800-3300mm and is suitable for all categories from A-class cars to large commercial vehicles.
It is not difficult to see that the SOA architecture is the same as the SEA architecture in terms of technical nature, but the models under the SOA architecture are obviously larger and are obviously more inclined towards the business market segment.
Smart and decent
However, the L380 does not blindly pursue large space and ignore other vehicle configurations.
Let’s first look at the appearance. The LEVC L380 is relatively rounded in design, and the proportion of its front end is relatively small, which is obviously a concession to the interior space.
The front face adopts a popular closed design, with a three-section LED light strip above the split headlights and a high and low beam light set below. In addition, a guide groove is designed below the headlights, and there is a silver decorative strip at the bottom of the front face.
The new car adopts all-black ABC pillars and roof, and a waistline-free design, giving it a solid look from the side.
The rear part of the car adopts a through-type taillight group. The taillight shape is interesting. The overall shape is an H shape with a thin middle and thick ends. The official calls it the “peacock spreading its tail” lighting effect. The English logo of the brand LEVC is dotted below the taillight, and the license plate area below is an inverted trapezoidal design.
In terms of power, LEVC L380 will be available in front-wheel drive and four-wheel drive versions. The single-motor version has a maximum power of 200kW and a maximum torque of 343N·m, while the four-wheel drive dual-motor version has a maximum power of 400kW and a maximum torque of 686N·m.
In terms of batteries, CATL Kirin batteries with capacities of 100kWh, 116kWh and 140kWh are provided, with a CLTC pure electric range of 675km and 805km. Thanks to CATL's CTP 3.0 battery technology, fast charging can increase the battery life from 10% to 80% in 30 minutes, and 200km of driving range can be replenished in 10 minutes.
It is also the world's second luxury pure electric MPV model equipped with this battery after Zeekr 009.
In terms of suspension design, the L380 adopts for the first time a double-ball joint McPherson air spring front suspension similar to that of BMW. Taking into account the center of gravity and load-bearing conditions of the vehicle body, the rear axle adopts a high-load multi-link suspension. With wide front and narrow rear tires, this 5-meter-long vehicle can achieve a moose test speed of 75.8km/h, which is not easy for an MPV.
In addition, in terms of intelligent configuration, since it is under Geely, the Flyme Auto car system is naturally indispensable. It is equipped with the Antola 1000 Pro computing platform of Ecarx Technology based on two 7nm automotive-grade high-performance “Dragon Eagle No. 1” SoCs, the BEV mode of all cabin seats and the “butler mode” of one-button car control, which can realize the comprehensive transfer of operating habits from mobile phones to car computers.
In addition, the SenseNova5.0 large model of SenseTime was introduced, which can detect and monitor multiple health indicators such as occupants' heart rate, respiratory rate and blood oxygen concentration.
In terms of intelligent driving, the LEVC L380 is only equipped with L2+ level driving assistance functions, which include active braking, lane departure warning, lane change assistance, lane keeping assistance, automatic lane change assistance and other conventional functions.
The second spring of a century-old car factory
At first glance, the LEVC brand may seem unfamiliar, but in fact it has a long history.
When it comes to Geely's global overseas M&A experience, most people know about its “snake swallowing an elephant” acquisition of Volvo Cars. But as early as 2006, Geely's first overseas car brand equity investment experience was LEVC.
If you have been to the UK or watched the action movie “Kingsman”, you will definitely remember the taxis driving on the streets of the UK and the Black Cab models in the movie.
This brand is the predecessor of LEVC – the London Taxi Company, whose history can be traced back to 1906. This brand has a history of 118 years and has gone through three generations. It is a genuine century-old automobile company.
In fact, the predecessor of LEVC was not called LTC, but Carbodies. However, Carbodies was not a car manufacturer, but a body manufacturer, because in the context of the time, there was a clear division of labor between the companies that produced the mechanical parts and the companies that produced the body, and it was not a complete machine factory like today.
Soon after its establishment, it won the favor of many brands and received a large number of orders to manufacture car bodies for MG and Rover.
The first turning point for the LEVC brand came in 1948, when Austin partnered with it to start manufacturing bodies for London's FX3 taxis, and completed the processing and delivery of complete vehicles, which were mainly shipped to London, becoming the icon of London taxis.
In 1971, Carbodies took over the manufacturing rights of London taxis from Austin. Two years later, it was acquired by Manganese Bronze Holdings. In 1992, the company was officially renamed London Taxi Company.
The second turning point for LEVC came in 2006. Geely, hoping to acquire relatively advanced technology by acquiring foreign car companies, started a “buy, buy, buy” mode, and the first thing it did was to invest in LEVC.
In 2006, Geely partnered with Manganese Bronze Holdings to establish a taxi manufacturing joint venture in China. It also acquired a stake in Manganese Bronze Holdings and subsequently established Shanghai Yinglun Dihua Company to produce London's classic black taxis and sell them in the Chinese market.
Geely has also started to launch new models in the Chinese market. The Geely England model that Geely once launched uses the LTC London Taxi Company logo.
Although this merger did not bring Geely any real money, it made Geely appear in the global vision for the first time.
In 2012, Manganese Bronze Holdings declared bankruptcy, and Geely took advantage of the opportunity to acquire LTC for 11 million pounds. In 2015, Geely announced an investment of 250,000 pounds to build a new London taxi factory in Coventry. A year later, Geely invested 300 million pounds in its research and production base in the West Midlands to develop the new generation of London taxis “TX5”.
Two years later, the factory in the UK was completed and Geely announced that the London Taxi Company was officially renamed London Electric Vehicle Company (LEVC). This is the current LEVC.
It was also at that time that LEVC began to show signs of transforming from a taxi manufacturer to a new energy manufacturer. For both parties, LEVC's transformation was also a key step in Geely's overseas expansion plan.
From LEVC’s slogan: “Let the world be filled with Geely”, we can see why Geely chose to acquire a taxi brand.
However, without looking overseas for now, judging from the feedback from the domestic market, pure electric MPVs do not seem to be favored by consumers compared to hybrid MPVs. Even the Ideal MEGA, which had a very high traffic at the time, has been met with a cold reception.
Moreover, the sales volume of the EV version of Denza D9, which currently ranks first in MPV sales on the market, is not even a fraction of that of the hybrid version. Among the top 10 MPVs in monthly sales, most of them are gasoline and hybrid models. Among the top 20, only one pure electric model, Xiaopeng X9, made the list.
Today, L380 only has a pure electric option. Even with a century-old history and Geely’s endorsement, what are its chances of success?