Ruben Nieuwenhuis

"You aren't getting it," a friend who lives in China told me after I said the new Ferrari is ugly. "This is gonna sell well with China's new rich." But why is a story of changing attitudes amongst car buyers, particularly in China. In a world where everyone around you is driving a new electric car, which is true in many Chinese cities now, showing up with a loud gas car just doesn't fit in anymore. Imagine you are a new rich factory owner in Shanghai. Do you want to drive around in a loud Ferrari, like I dreamed about doing when I was a kid? No. Chinese culture is about fitting in, about caring what everyone else thinks. Worse, in China they are going electric so fast that you can see the writing on the wall for gas. Soon gas stations will disappear altogether in major cities. And cars that pollute and put fumes into the air are already being seen as artifacts of an age that needs to die quickly, particularly in cities with 40 million people. Ferrari's sales are way down in China. New car brands there like @Xiaomi, @XPENG_Global, @NIOGlobal, @BYDCompany, and @HongqiGlobal are taking share with vehicles that have much more innovation than even this new Ferrari has. What are my credentials to talk about Ferrari? Well, I've studied automotive innovation my whole life. Audi taught me to race. I had the first ride in the Fiat 500, the BMW i3, the Tesla Roadster, the first Mercedes AI car, and a few others. Have hung out with many billionaires who have Ferraris, went on a famous car rally with such last year to study buyers of super cars, and car collectors, among other things. And I did consumer research about attitudes toward new innovations, like autonomy, around the world. But it goes deeper than just China, which buys more cars that USA and Europe combined. Ferrari is run by people who love to drive and love to drive gas cars with loud, big, engines. In USA that makes sense. My friend Scott Jordan, who owns a clothing company in Sun Valley, Idaho, has one, and within a few minutes from his home he can be on some of the best driving roads in the world. We argue about cars all the time, and he probably never will buy a Tesla. Loves the sound the Ferrari makes. And the design of the hand stitched leather dash. He hates this new Ferrari. Could never see himself in one. But his counterpart in China? Will never get onto a pretty road. When I was last in Shanghai I drove for hours and never stopped seeing high rise buildings with stop and go traffic. Americans can't grok that. They don't want a dirty, gas, car, that makes a lot of noise in China. All traditional luxury brands (another way for saying $500,000 or more for a car) are seeing sales declines for this reason. They also get on race tracks far less frequently than we can here in America. Which is where you can really enjoy a Ferrari. In fact, the luxury brands are more of a club than buying a car. I once hung out with the Bugatti owners from around the world (one of the benefits of living within walking distance of the Half Moon Bay Ritz Carlton). They told me that it is a club and that Bugatti flies their cars around the world for a variety of driving experiences. Makes sense, the last thing a billionaire wants to hear while on vacation is a pitch for a new startup, or someone begging for money (same thing, really). So they have a club experience that keeps them separated from those kinds. The Chinese buyer cares more about innovation than those of us in USA do. You see this in their vehicles, which have big huge screens covering the dash, and seats that rub their backs, and even suspensions that "hop" over potholes, not to mention autonomy that drives them everywhere in stop and go traffic. It's one reason why China's government has kept Tesla from really turning on its autonomy, which is slightly ahead of the Chinese brands. As a Tesla investor I am watching that closely. Speaking of Tesla, its new Roadster that we should see "within months" according to @elonmusk and his main designer @woodhaus2, should capture the world's attention, and especially the new rich in China. But will it be allowed into China in a world where USA doesn't allow Chinese cars to be imported here? The answer to that question is way above my pay grade. But if it were, it'd be a massive competitor to this new Ferrari. Why? Well, Ferrari's innovation just isn't there for this new consumer. It doesn't self drive. Its screens are smaller than any of those new Chinese brands, many of which started out making smartphones and other consumer electronics. And that leads to this design that is rightfully getting derided. Ferrari doesn't like being pushed into this new world of electric, screens, and autonomy. If it could it'd go back to an all-analog car, which is what most of the buyers of Ferrari like, taking them back to their childhood. I can just imagine what Jony Ive had to do to come up with even the design he was able to ship here. Consumers used to like buttons. Old people, particularly billionaires, still do. Takes them back to familiarity and tactile senses. They still talk about how much they love the buttons and knobs in their old cars. But the new Chinese consumers grew up with smartphones and iPads you can touch. Many of them carry around @Huawei triple fold phones, that, when unfolded look like an iPad. We don't have those in America yet and Apple is rumored to be bringing a single fold device to America later this year. Such a consumer is more impressed by big screens and automation than loud engines and fast speeds. But the new rich want to stand out. Often they are running factories or tech companies where most of the engineers have Teslas or one of the new Chinese brands. How do they stand out? Roll up in one of these. And now you understand why the design of this car is so ugly. Ferrari doesn't want its traditional consumer to buy it. And didn't want a mind-blowing aggressive design that would make its traditional customer pissed that it was "going electric." It's all about trying to regain share in China.

Het grootste gevaar voor democratiën is dat burgers in ideologische informatiebubbels terechtkomen, waarmee ’de waarheid’ eigenlijk niet meer bestaat. Wie de democratie wilt versterken, is daarom juist actief op X (en andere mediaplatformen). volkskrant.nl/columns-opinie…

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