The east wind is blowing for Changan, and the automobile enterprise aircraft carrier is sounding the whistle and setting sail. Who will be the next wave of automobile companies to be integrated?

At the beginning of 2025, the "east wind" blew in Changan.

On February 10, Dongfeng Motor and its related Dongfeng Technology, Dong'an Power and other stocks all hit their daily limit. Another large central enterprise, Changan Automobile, also closed with a big rise.

It is certainly not a coincidence that the stocks of the two major state-owned enterprises have skyrocketed simultaneously.

Previously, several listed companies under Dongfeng and Changan issued announcements, disclosing that the indirect controlling shareholders (Dongfeng Group and China North Industries Group Corporation) were planning a restructuring of the company.

The two centrally-owned automobile groups are both aircraft carrier-class entities in the industry. The integration of the two can be regarded as a giant aircraft carrier fleet sounding the whistle and setting sail.

But the question is, since both companies have considerable strength in the automotive industry, why do they still need to seek cooperation?

From a development perspective, in recent years, both large and small car companies have been busy transforming to electrification, and Changan and Dongfeng are no exception.

However, although Dongfeng has a firm goal, its speed and quality in electrification transformation have not been able to match the mainstream. Although Changan's product categories currently have a lot of overlap, it has done a good job in the layout of new energy and intelligent fields. Whether in terms of product categories or intelligent technologies, it has entered the leading position.

Therefore, if Dongfeng and Changan merge, they can complement each other to a certain extent. More importantly, China's automobile groups with central enterprise backgrounds are always prone to being "big but not strong", which is not a good thing for the country.

At the 2024 National People's Congress, Zhang Yuzhuo, director of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, mentioned: "In the field of new energy vehicles, state-owned automobile companies are not developing fast enough in this area, not as fast as Tesla and BYD. The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission will adjust its policies and conduct separate assessments of the new energy vehicle business of the three central automobile companies. The assessment items include technology, market share and future development of the company."

Obviously, from a national perspective, state-owned automobile companies must concentrate resources to break through core technology bottlenecks in order to cope with market changes.

The two groups cover a wide range of product areas and related businesses. Although there is overlap in the price range of some products, after the merger, through resource integration, optimization of some disadvantaged products and streamlining of some overlapping products, the competitiveness of the new group will undoubtedly be further enhanced.

As relevant sources said: "What is certain at present is that after the integration, some identical products or low-quality products will definitely be eliminated."

Of course, both groups have been deeply involved in the automotive industry for many years. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. The success of the merger depends on their mutual coordination.

Some people speculate that in the future, Changan Automobile and Dongfeng Company will most likely operate independently at first, but in terms of battery production and procurement, and intelligent driving modules, they are expected to first achieve commonality and coordination, and then develop in depth to achieve integration at the R&D and brand levels.

Nowadays, competition in electrification and intelligentization is accelerating, and it is obvious that fighting alone is no longer suitable for the current central enterprise automobile groups. At present, the Chinese automobile market is not short of powerful independent brands, but the country needs to build a giant automobile "aircraft carrier" with greater power, and the merger of Changan and Dongfeng is a new attempt.

Judging from this trend, the integration of Changan and Dongfeng will only be the beginning. In the future, more large automakers will move forward together, just like GM, Toyota, and Volkswagen. According to the mainstream view of the industry, it is more appropriate for the Chinese market to have three to five brands in the end. Now that there are nearly a hundred brands in the Chinese auto market, integration has become the only way for the Chinese auto industry. So, who will be the next wave of Chinese auto brands to be integrated?