Search Results (23)

Online consumer reviews provide an important source of information for automobile purchase decisions, yet relatively little is known about the informational value of cumulative electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) ratings that reflect long-term online reputation. This study examines whether cumulative eWOM ratings are associated with subsequent automobile sales and explores their relationship with subsequent changes in monthly ratings and rating entropy. We combine monthly automobile sales data from Chezhu Zhijia with more than one million individual consumer reviews collected from Autohome between January 2013 and December 2025. Review-level data are aggregated to the automobile model-month level to construct cumulative eWOM measures, and the hypotheses are examined using two-way fixed-effects models. The results show that cumulative eWOM ratings are positively associated with subsequent automobile sales. Higher cumulative ratings are also associated with more favorable changes in subsequent monthly ratings and lower rating entropy. The positive association between cumulative eWOM ratings and automobile sales becomes stronger as product age increases and varies with cumulative rating entropy. These findings remain qualitatively unchanged across a broad set of robustness and additional analyses. This study highlights the informational value of cumulative online reputation for high-involvement durable goods and provides new evidence on the conditions under which accumulated consumer evaluations are associated with market outcomes. Full article

To adopt the blockchain-based automobile traceability system (BCATS) and increase the transparency of the Chinese auto market, this study constructs a tripartite evolutionary game model of manufacturers, regulators, and consumers, discusses the evolutionary stabilization strategy (ESS) under different cases, and analyzes the influencing factors on the tripartite ESS through numerical simulation. The study finds that there exists an ESS of blockchain adoption and tripartite cooperation, and it is influenced by different factors including blockchain construction cost, traceability service price, and government subsidy. Lowering the blockchain construction cost, and increasing the traceability service price and government subsidy can all have a positive impact on accomplishing the ideal ESS, but the latter two can also have a negative impact when they are beyond the scope of effectiveness. The study results provide practical recommendations for adopting blockchain in the auto traceability, which can help to promote blockchain in the Chinese auto market. Full article

The dual-credit policy promotes green transition in automobile companies. This paper investigates the dual-credit policy framework in the Chinese automotive industry, with a focus on the phenomenon of free riding. This occurs when traditional vehicle manufacturers within an alliance benefit from the excess credits generated by a transitioning vehicle company without fully committing to their own green transitioning. The focus of this study lies on an alliance constituted by a transitioning vehicle company in partnership with two traditional vehicle manufacturers, all interconnected via equity ties. Utilizing an agent-based system dynamics model, this study explores the strategic behaviors emerging from such credit collaborations and their consequent effects on operational efficiency and financial performance. The findings reveal that 1. free riding negatively impacts the transitioning company’s revenue but benefits the alliance by easing transition pressures and boosting collective performance; 2. stricter policies increase intra-alliance credit transfers and performance, while lower credit prices reduce transfer value and harm the transitioning company’s earnings. This study implies that transitioning vehicle companies with equity-linked partners can benefit from a nuanced understanding of how policy mechanisms interact with alliance dynamics under free riding. By adjusting credit transfer strategies in line with market conditions and policy trends, they can better navigate the dual-credit policy landscape, balancing individual profitability with the needs of the broader alliance and long-term sustainability goals. Full article

The optimization of the spatial structure of the city network is conducive to the scientific spatial distribution of industries and the promotion of coordinated regional development. This study selected the top 100 automobile enterprises in the Chinese stock market that belong to China’s pillar industry, a total of 1455 headquarters and branches, to establish an enterprise matrix. Based on the ownership linkage model, the evolution characteristics of city networks in China from 2000 to 2020 are revealed, and the influential factors of city networks are discussed using the negative binomial regression model. The findings are as follows: (1) there are significant differences in the status of automobile cities, forming a “pyramid network” hierarchy. (2) The agglomeration area of automobile cities has formed the development region of “4 + 4 + 1”. (3) The city network with hierarchical connections has formed a spatial structure of a “cross–cobweb” in the middle and “trapezoid–diamond” in the periphery. (4) Urban transportation conditions, the scientific research environment, the enterprise agglomeration economy, GDP per capita, and technological proximity positively impact the formation of a city network, but the total export–import volume has a negative impact. Overall, the government can use this study’s results to formulate policies for the automotive industry and urban development. Full article

This article discusses the problems that arise and must be resolved in order to ensure the efficiency and sustainability of Chinese-brand automobile assembly in Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan is shown as a model of an oil-driven economy seeking industrial modernization and the most dynamic car assembly case in Central Asia in the past 5 years. Since the automotive industry development strategies in different countries have various specific characteristics and provide an overview of the main global and regional trends in the development of the automotive industry, the problems of industry development also leverage the accumulated experiences of different countries where government initiatives have fostered the growth of their domestic automotive industry. Although we use standard and well-proven methods of analysis, planning, and forecasting, the novelty of the approach lies in the fact that any new company entering the market and opening a new production facility should focus on maintaining the sustainability of the country’s automotive industry within the framework of the adopted industry development strategy. We have developed such an algorithm for planning a strategy. The blend of traditional methodologies and their adaptation makes the suggested methodology new. We also considered the fact that, due to a lack of knowledge, there are significant challenges when determining whether localizing automobile components is feasible. An assessment of the prospects for the automotive industry in Kazakhstan based on data from open sourcesmade it possible to develop options for possible strategies from which the most appropriate one can be selected. The conclusion chapter presents findings, limitations of the study, and directions for future research. The use of this approach allows for considering the interplay of the factors at the stage of an industry development strategy emerging and establishing long-term plans that take into account the specific characteristics of Kazakhstan’s development. Full article

Dual credit policy (DCP) is a market-based mechanism introduced by the Chinese government to promote the new energy vehicle (NEV) industry and improve energy savings in China. To offer sufficient impetus for the NEV industry while providing sufficient transitional buffer time for automobile manufacturers (AMs), the government needs to scientifically design how to gradually increase its dual credit requirement for AMs year by year. To assist the multi-year DCP design, this paper proposes a generalized Nash equilibrium model to predict AMs’ short-term decisions (i.e., vehicle production and credit trading) and long-term decisions (i.e., investment in production capacity expansion and research and development) under any DCP, considering the interactions among AMs’ decisions, vehicle prices, and credit price. Based on the equilibrium model, we then develop a bi-level programming problem to optimize the multi-year DCP. With numerical experiments, we show that implementing the optimal DCP can effectively enhance the market share of NEVs. In the context of the optimal multi-year DCP, the credit requirements set by the government should maintain a relatively low threshold during the initial years, but rise rapidly after that. Such optimal DCP offers AMs sufficient transition time while compelling a quick shift in their developmental strategies. Full article

This work attempts to develop a novel framework to reveal the preferences of Chinese car users from online user-generated content (UGC) and guides automotive companies to allocate resources reasonably for sustainable design and improve existing product or service attributes. Specifically, a novel unsupervised word-boundary-identified algorithm for the Chinese language is used to extract domain professional feature words, and a set of sentiment scoring rules is constructed. By matching feature-sentiment word pairs, we calculate car users’ satisfaction with different attributes based on the rules and weigh the importance of attributes using the TF-IDF method, thus constructing an importance-satisfaction gap analysis (ISGA) model. Finally, a case study is used to realize the framework evaluation and analysis of the twenty top-mentioned attributes of a small-sized sedan, and the dynamic ISGA-time model is constructed to analyze the changing trend of the importance of user demand and satisfaction. The results show the priority of resource allocation/adjustment. Fuel consumption and driving experience urgently need resource input and management. Full article

The intelligent innovation of child safety seats has brought new impacts and challenges to the Chinese market. Researchers in the car seat industry have been focusing on industry regulations and the abuse of car seats, but there is a lack of consumer-centered research. This study is the first to combine two theories of consumer subject-specific innovation (DSI) and the theory of consumption value (TCV). This study explores how consumer innovations influence consumers’ purchase of innovative child safety seats through perceived value. The proposed research model was evaluated using a partial least squares structural equation model, and data analysis revealed that the model had good model fit, reliability, and validity. Consumer product innovation has a significantly better impact on willingness to buy than consumer information innovation. In this study, in the relationship between consumers of information innovation and purchase intention in the automobile seat industry, a new kind of parallel multi-mediating relationship between the social value, hedonic value, and novelty value of perceived products was proposed. The study’s results address the need for more consumer research in the intelligent seating industry, as well as how to give researchers and marketing firms solutions and suggestions based on facts. Full article

The primary purpose of this paper is to discuss whether NEV enterprises can achieve synchronous effects with the whole Chinese automobile industry in terms of growth mode. In this paper, we study the development of new energy vehicles from the perspective of ecosystem. Growth mechanisms and synchronization effects also exist in new energy enterprise populations, just like biological populations in natural ecosystems. Here, we propose a moving logistic model to analyze the growth mechanism of new energy vehicle enterprises and obtain serial data of intrinsic growth rate, internal inhibition coefficient, and theoretical maximum sales volume. The intrinsic growth rate and theoretical maximum sales volume show an initial trend of decline followed by recovery. The evaluation results of coupling degree and synchronization of the new energy vehicle population were obtained through the measurement of the Kuramoto model and its derivative model. The coupling degree of the new energy vehicle population is not high, and the synchronization effect fluctuates and oscillates. The change trend of synchronization effect is similar to that of intrinsic growth rate and theoretical maximum sales volume. This phenomenon shows that the new energy vehicle population has been significantly affected by changes in the external market environment. The analysis method of enterprise growth mechanism based on the moving logistic model and the measurement method of coupling degree and synchronization effect based on the Kuramoto model and its derivative models proposed in this paper effectively achieve the research objectives of this paper. Full article

Enterprises in socio-economic ecosystems, like organisms in natural ecosystems, have life cycles. Since the enterprise life cycle theory was proposed, how to measure the enterprise life cycle has been a hot research topic. In order to assess the life cycle of an enterprise, a two-stage logistic model was proposed in this research, based on ecological theory and a population dynamics model. The first-stage logistic model measures the internal inhibition coefficient, intrinsic growth rate, and theoretical upper limit of enterprise development scale. The second-stage logistic model deals with the theoretical upper limit of enterprise development scale in the declining period, and measures the intrinsic growth rate, internal inhibition coefficient, and the theoretical upper limit of enterprise development scale in the declining period. In this study, an empirical analysis is conducted with Chinese automobile enterprises, which shows that an enterprise should withdraw from the market by insolvency liquidation or restructuring when both the intrinsic growth rate and internal inhibition coefficient are less than zero. Finally, this paper proposes the evaluation matrix of intrinsic growth and market potential. This matrix can intuitively give the evaluation method of the enterprise life cycle. Full article

Due to the unique market context and consumer differences, Porter’s generic competitive strategy has often failed in China. This study examined the impacts of managerial factors on performance by using the company brand as an indicator of performance; furthermore, we discuss the management issues of Chang’an when adopting a differentiated competitive strategy. This research used a quantitative method to form a consumer cognition map and compared product brands with competitors. It also investigated the managerial factors of the case company that affected the implementation of a differentiated competitive strategy. Interviews of the managers from the case company were also conducted to provide an in-depth understanding of management issues. The results show that the case company, Chang’an, as a large state-owned automobile manufacturer, failed to generate satisfactory outcomes by implementing a differentiation strategy. The reasons for the unfavorable enterprise performance include unclear departmental role positioning, a lack of communication mechanisms, and missing evaluation mechanisms. This research offers an in-depth investigation of the application of Porter’s differentiated competitive strategy in a Chinese state-owned company (there has been little academic attention on this). Since many state-owned companies use similar management structures, the results of this research can help managers find management problems and fix them. Full article

As energy shortages and environmental pollution intensify, innovation in new energy vehicles is considered a major priority. They present an important opportunity to change the direction of China’s automobile industry while reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Following various launches of new energy vehicles, the problem of product homogenization is emerging, and automobile companies are contemplating how to increase their market share. This study investigates a few questions that have been left unanswered in previous research, which are mainly focused on the value and price of new energy vehicles. We focus on the effect of new energy vehicle companies’ innovative behaviors on consumers’ purchasing intention in the Chinese market. Innovative behaviors are defined here as the rationalization or modernization choices firms make with respect to products, marketing, service, technological, and cultural factors. The study verified the structural equation model constructed using survey data. Our study of 479 surveyed customers shows that consumers’ perceived value is positively (+) correlated with a higher degree of innovation by a firm. In general, the relationship between innovation behavior and consumers’ perceived risk shows negative results, however, the relationship in this research showed contradictory results. The only negative (−) effects on product purchase were observed in marketing and technological innovation; these factors increase perceived risk by increasing the tendency of consumers to choose to purchase a new energy vehicle despite feeling uneasy about the innovation despite uncertainties about the innovation of new energy vehicles. Our results present the relationship between innovative behaviors of new energy vehicle firms, consumers’ perceived value, consumers’ perceived risk, consumers’ innovative affinities and characteristics, and finally, purchase intention to explore the influence of innovation factors on consumers’ purchase intention of new energy vehicles. These findings should assist new vehicle firms in understanding Chinese consumers’ purchase intentions. Full article

There is a development trend for fuel vehicles to adopt low-carbon emission engines. The sales of cars with low-carbon three-cylinder engines in the Chinese market have declined. Is the life cycle of automotive products with three-cylinder engines entering a recession stage? In order to achieve this research objective, which is to investigate whether assembling a three-cylinder engine affects the life cycle of an automotive product, this paper constructs an ecological theory-based approach to measuring the life cycle of automotive products. First, the logistic model is used to measure the intrinsic growth rate, internal inhibition coefficient, and theoretical upper limit of product sales scale before and after the automotive products are equipped with three-cylinder engines. In the second stage, the Lotka–Volterra model is used to calculate the intrinsic growth rate, internal inhibition coefficient, theoretical upper limit, and symbiosis coefficient of the sales scale of the products before and after the three-cylinder engine, taking the Chinese automobile manufacturing enterprises as an example for empirical analysis. The research results show that the selection of three- cylinder engine for automotive products will not lead to the product life cycle entering the recession period ahead of time. Full article

It is particularly important to measure the growth prospects of new energy vehicles, especially electric vehicles, as they can effectively reduce the negative effects of the greenhouse effect. The population dynamics analysis model provides a method to comprehensively evaluate the growth mechanism, mode, and development prospects of new energy vehicles. In this research, the sales data of 20 automobile manufacturing enterprises were counted from the website database of the China Automobile Industry Association, and their development mechanism, development mode, and development trend were analyzed in order to help researchers understand the development prospects of China’s new energy vehicle enterprises. The conclusion is that the analysis results of the single population logistic model show that the intrinsic growth rate of Chinese new energy vehicle enterprises is generally relatively low. The intrinsic growth rate of China’s new energy automobile enterprises is lower than that of other mature traditional automobile manufacturing enterprises in China. The level of intrinsic growth rate of new energy vehicle enterprises is similar to that of declining enterprises with significantly declining sales. The Lotka–Volterra model provides the analysis results of the growth mechanism driven by market demand of automobile manufacturing sample enterprises. The market driven mode of China’s new energy vehicle enterprises is not obvious. It is difficult for the current development mechanism of China’s new energy vehicle enterprises to achieve the sustainability of growth. The optimization results of the MCGP model show that China’s new energy vehicle enterprises should transform to a market-driven development model. Full article

With the development of the Internet and big data, more and more consumer behavior data are used in different forecasting problems, which greatly improve the performance of prediction. As the main travel tool, the sales of automobiles will change with the variations of the market and the external environment. Accurate prediction of automobile sales can not only help the dealers adjust their marketing plans dynamically but can also help the economy and the transportation sector make policy decisions. The automobile is a product with high value and high involvement, and its purchase decision can be affected by its own attributes, economy, policy and other factors. Furthermore, the sample data have the characteristics of various sources, great complexity and large volatility. Therefore, this paper uses the Support Vector Regression (SVR) model, which has global optimization, a simple structure, and strong generalization abilities and is suitable for multi-dimensional, small sample data to predict the monthly sales of automobiles. In addition, the parameters are optimized by the Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) algorithm to improve the prediction accuracy. First, the grey correlation analysis method is used to analyze and determine the factors that affect automobile sales. Second, it is used to build the GWO-SVR automobile sales prediction model. Third, the experimental analysis is carried out by using the data from Suteng and Kaluola in the Chinese car segment, and the proposed model is compared with the other four commonly used methods. The results show that the GWO-SVR model has the best performance of mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) and root mean square error (RMSE). Finally, some management implications are put forward for reference. Full article