????由于中國(guó)區(qū)銷(xiāo)量不佳，特斯拉CEO埃隆?穆斯克已經(jīng)揚(yáng)言說(shuō)要炒掉中國(guó)團(tuán)隊(duì)的核心高管,。月初,，特斯拉大中華區(qū)市場(chǎng)總監(jiān)遞交了辭呈。盡管很多媒體報(bào)道了這場(chǎng)管理層地震,，但這些報(bào)道忽略了一個(gè)重要背景：中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)正在釋放重大利好,。經(jīng)歷了多年的平淡增長(zhǎng)之后，全球第二大經(jīng)濟(jì)體的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量已經(jīng)開(kāi)始呈現(xiàn)井噴之勢(shì)——但特斯拉反而被甩在了后面,。這表明,，中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)行業(yè)正在發(fā)生引人注目的變化，它很可能也是讓穆斯克如此驚慌的一個(gè)關(guān)鍵原因,。

????經(jīng)歷了漫長(zhǎng)的等待,，中國(guó)電動(dòng)汽車(chē)行業(yè)終于開(kāi)始迅速成長(zhǎng)。早在新世紀(jì)伊始,，中國(guó)就制定了一項(xiàng)雄偉的目標(biāo)：率先成為電動(dòng)汽車(chē)領(lǐng)域的全球領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者,，從而在汽車(chē)技術(shù)方面一舉超越西方。中國(guó)政府曾宣稱(chēng),，到2011年,，中國(guó)的道路上將出現(xiàn)50萬(wàn)輛電動(dòng)汽車(chē)。這一幕并未出現(xiàn),。實(shí)際上,，中國(guó)在2011年只售出了不到6000輛電動(dòng)汽車(chē)。隨著美國(guó)和日本的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量開(kāi)始井噴,，中國(guó)在汽車(chē)技術(shù)領(lǐng)域超越美國(guó)的努力隨之宣告失敗,。

????直到最近，中國(guó)相對(duì)落后的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)業(yè)與汽車(chē)行業(yè)整體形成了鮮明對(duì)比,。從2000-2014年,，中國(guó)的汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)一直在以驚人的速度增長(zhǎng),。根據(jù)國(guó)際汽車(chē)制造商組織的數(shù)據(jù)，2000年,，中國(guó)生產(chǎn)的乘用車(chē)數(shù)量還不如西班牙,，大約只有200萬(wàn)輛。但據(jù)中國(guó)汽車(chē)工業(yè)協(xié)會(huì)上月發(fā)布的數(shù)據(jù),，2014年中國(guó)的汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量已超過(guò)2300萬(wàn)輛,，一躍成為全球最大的汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)。據(jù)世界銀行2011年估算,，中國(guó)的人均汽車(chē)保有量約為每千人69輛,，而美國(guó)則為每千人800輛，所以中國(guó)仍有龐大的增長(zhǎng)空間,。

????中國(guó)汽車(chē)行業(yè)的崛起離不開(kāi)外國(guó)的投資,、石油和技術(shù)，另一方面,，汽車(chē)也給這個(gè)國(guó)家的城市帶來(lái)了令人窒息的霧霾，迫使中國(guó)的富豪和在華外國(guó)人紛紛逃離,。中國(guó)科技部長(zhǎng)萬(wàn)鋼一直想利用國(guó)內(nèi)的資源取代外國(guó)能源,、資本和技術(shù)。萬(wàn)鋼曾是奧迪公司的一名工程師,，十幾年來(lái),，他的目標(biāo)一直是推動(dòng)中國(guó)由內(nèi)燃機(jī)引擎時(shí)代過(guò)渡到電動(dòng)汽車(chē)時(shí)代，在汽車(chē)技術(shù)領(lǐng)域超越西方,，從而為中國(guó)主宰價(jià)值2萬(wàn)億美元的全球汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)掃平道路,。同時(shí)萬(wàn)鋼還認(rèn)為，電動(dòng)汽車(chē)是解決中國(guó)空氣污染問(wèn)題的解決方案之一,。

????在《大競(jìng)賽：未來(lái)汽車(chē)的全球爭(zhēng)霸賽》一書(shū)中,，我講述了這個(gè)雄心勃勃的項(xiàng)目就在不久前是如何遭遇一連串失敗的。直到2014年1月,，中國(guó)每月只能賣(mài)出約600輛電動(dòng)汽車(chē)——同一個(gè)月份,，美國(guó)能賣(mài)出6000多輛。

????但就在2014年的最后4個(gè)月,，中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量開(kāi)始突飛猛進(jìn),。單單是去年12月，乘用和商用電動(dòng)汽車(chē)的銷(xiāo)量就達(dá)到了2.7萬(wàn)輛,。根據(jù)中國(guó)汽車(chē)技術(shù)研究中心和美國(guó)能源部阿貢國(guó)家實(shí)驗(yàn)室的數(shù)據(jù),，中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量首次超過(guò)美國(guó)。事實(shí)上,，中國(guó)2014年12月的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量幾乎達(dá)到2014年1月的30倍,。

????許多分析師表示,，2014年的最后四個(gè)月將被當(dāng)作中國(guó)電動(dòng)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)的里程碑載入史冊(cè)。如果這種增長(zhǎng)繼續(xù)下去,，中國(guó)可能將在2015年超過(guò)美國(guó),，成為全球最大的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)。

????同時(shí),，這種迅猛的增勢(shì)也引發(fā)了一系列問(wèn)題：首先,，這些銷(xiāo)售數(shù)據(jù)是否真實(shí)可信？中國(guó)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)的統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)據(jù)經(jīng)常是摻了水分的,，但作為負(fù)責(zé)中國(guó)汽車(chē)方方面面事務(wù)的大型科研機(jī)構(gòu),，中國(guó)汽車(chē)技術(shù)研究中心既從事碰撞試驗(yàn)、又制定汽車(chē)電池標(biāo)準(zhǔn),，因此它的數(shù)據(jù)應(yīng)該是準(zhǔn)確的,。有些人說(shuō)他們是中國(guó)汽車(chē)數(shù)據(jù)的“黃金標(biāo)準(zhǔn)”。汽車(chē)網(wǎng)站EV-sales.blogspot.com基本上肯定了中國(guó)2014年的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量,，并附上了各款車(chē)型的銷(xiāo)售數(shù)據(jù)作為支撐,。同時(shí)該網(wǎng)站還指出，在中國(guó)有五家國(guó)內(nèi)廠商的銷(xiāo)量均超過(guò)了特斯拉,，他們分別是：比亞迪,、康迪、奇瑞,、眾泰和北汽,。

????然后是第二個(gè)問(wèn)題：中國(guó)電動(dòng)車(chē)市場(chǎng)的銷(xiāo)量為何飆升？中國(guó)汽車(chē)技術(shù)研究中心的一位分析師認(rèn)為,，這主要?dú)w功于中國(guó)取消了電動(dòng)汽車(chē)購(gòu)置稅（在2014年9月之前,，購(gòu)置稅達(dá)到了車(chē)輛購(gòu)買(mǎi)價(jià)格的10%）。但單憑減去一筆10%的購(gòu)置稅,，是否就能促進(jìn)銷(xiāo)量大幅上升,？或許吧。政策引導(dǎo)的價(jià)格調(diào)整有時(shí)會(huì)給中國(guó)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)帶來(lái)重大影響,。比如2001年加入世貿(mào)組織時(shí),，中國(guó)降低了進(jìn)口汽車(chē)的進(jìn)口稅。同年,，中國(guó)的汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)增長(zhǎng)了37%,，因?yàn)橛行﹪?guó)產(chǎn)廠商被迫降低價(jià)格以保持競(jìng)爭(zhēng)力。另一份針對(duì)中國(guó)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)的研究顯示,，天津一汽公司曾將一款車(chē)型的定價(jià)調(diào)低20%,，結(jié)果銷(xiāo)量飆升了900%。

????從2008年2月開(kāi)始，中國(guó)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)也和全球其他國(guó)家一樣遇冷,。為了刺激銷(xiāo)量并鼓勵(lì)國(guó)民購(gòu)買(mǎi)更環(huán)保的汽車(chē),，中國(guó)政府降低了對(duì)小排量汽車(chē)的征稅。2008年3月,，中央政府將小排量汽車(chē)的購(gòu)置稅由10%降低至5%,。同年四月，汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量上升了22%,，到2009年,，汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量同比上漲了49%。也就是那一年,，中國(guó)正式成為全球最大的汽車(chē)市場(chǎng),。

????我們現(xiàn)在遠(yuǎn)未搞清楚到底是什么因素促使中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)銷(xiāo)量出現(xiàn)了這樣大幅度的飆升——以及為什么特斯拉被落在了后頭。有一種可能是年終的政府采購(gòu)導(dǎo)致12月出現(xiàn)了不同尋常的強(qiáng)勢(shì)指標(biāo),。另一種可能是中國(guó)對(duì)電動(dòng)汽車(chē)的扶植政策終于達(dá)到了臨界點(diǎn),。例如在中國(guó)的很多大型城市，為了應(yīng)對(duì)交通堵塞,，包括北京在內(nèi)的很多地方政府通過(guò)搖號(hào)限制新車(chē)上牌,。然而在北京，電動(dòng)汽車(chē)可以免除搖號(hào)之苦,。中國(guó)政府還制定了一系列新政策,，鼓勵(lì)國(guó)內(nèi)廠商相互競(jìng)爭(zhēng)——而在中國(guó)開(kāi)展電動(dòng)汽車(chē)項(xiàng)目的早些年，中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)行業(yè)嚴(yán)重缺乏競(jìng)爭(zhēng)壓力,。國(guó)產(chǎn)汽車(chē)或許終于達(dá)到了一個(gè)質(zhì)量閾值，開(kāi)始對(duì)中國(guó)消費(fèi)者產(chǎn)生吸引力,。

????不管原因是什么,，隨著中國(guó)電動(dòng)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)開(kāi)始起飛，特斯拉開(kāi)始在國(guó)內(nèi)外同時(shí)面臨新的競(jìng)爭(zhēng)挑戰(zhàn),。寶馬,、大眾、通用等傳統(tǒng)廠商都在研發(fā)更快,、更便宜,、續(xù)航更長(zhǎng)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)。就在2014年10月,，大眾汽車(chē)集團(tuán)CEO海茲曼還聲稱(chēng),，大眾汽車(chē)正在為中國(guó)市場(chǎng)研發(fā)超過(guò)20款電動(dòng)汽車(chē)。另外特斯拉還面臨著來(lái)自科技巨頭蘋(píng)果等市場(chǎng)新進(jìn)者的壓力——蘋(píng)果近日重金挖走了特斯拉的工程師,，而且據(jù)說(shuō)目前正在開(kāi)發(fā)自家的電動(dòng)汽車(chē),。而與此同時(shí)，就在中國(guó)這個(gè)關(guān)鍵的新興市場(chǎng)上已經(jīng)進(jìn)入重要的拐點(diǎn)時(shí)，特斯拉還沒(méi)有充分在中國(guó)建立起它的品牌,，這真是一個(gè)大問(wèn)題,。

????或許這就解釋了為什么穆斯克面對(duì)疲軟的中國(guó)區(qū)銷(xiāo)量而無(wú)法冷靜。直到最近,，中國(guó)的電動(dòng)汽車(chē)市場(chǎng)一直表現(xiàn)不佳,，而特斯拉則是一家在電動(dòng)汽車(chē)領(lǐng)域獲得了重大成就的公司。突然之間,，這種平衡就被翻了個(gè)個(gè)兒,。（財(cái)富中文網(wǎng)）

????本文作者Levi Tillemann是新美國(guó)基金會(huì)研究員，也是《大競(jìng)賽：未來(lái)汽車(chē)的全球爭(zhēng)霸賽》一書(shū)的作者,。這本書(shū)描述了電動(dòng)汽車(chē)的興起,，以及中國(guó)試圖在汽車(chē)技術(shù)領(lǐng)域通過(guò)跨越式超越西方的失敗努力。他曾被美國(guó)總統(tǒng)任命為美國(guó)能源部的國(guó)內(nèi)外政策顧問(wèn),，任期兩年,。

????譯者：樸成奎

????審校：任文科

????Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk has threatened to fire key executives from his China team after weak sales of the automaker’s luxury electric cars. And last week, the company’s chief marketing officer in China resigned. Although the media widely covered the management shakeup, the press has largely ignored the context: a massive boom in China’s market for electric cars. For after years of lackluster growth, electric vehicle sales in the world’s second largest economy are surging – and they are leaving Tesla TSLA -1.56% behind. This represents a striking change of pace for China’s electric vehicle industry, and is likely a key reason that Musk is flustered.

????Growth in China’s electric vehicle industry has been a long time coming. Starting in the early 2000s, China made a lofty goal to leapfrog the West in automotive technology by becoming a world leader in electric cars. The government declared it would have around 500,000 electric vehicles on the road by 2011. That didn’t happen. In fact, China sold fewer than 6,000 that year. Even as electric vehicle sales have swelled in America and Japan, China’s attempt to surpass the U.S. in automotive technology has sputtered.

????Until recently, China’s lagging electric vehicle industry stood in sharp contrast to its overall auto industry. From 2000 through 2014, China’s auto market expanded at an astonishing rate. In 2000, the country produced fewer passenger cars than Spain – about 2 million, according to statistics from the International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers. However, China’s Association of Automobile Manufacturers reported last month that 2014 automotive sales surpassed 23 million – making China by far the largest auto market in the world. In 2011, the World Bank estimated per capita vehicle ownership in China at only 69 per thousand people, compared to about 800 per thousand people in the U.S. So China’s industry has significant room for growth.

????The rise of China’s auto industry has been fueled by foreign investment, oil and technology – and it has brought with it a suffocating smog epidemic in China’s largest cities that is driving away wealthy Chinese and foreign expats. China’s Minister of Science and Technology Wan Gang has long been working on a plan to replace foreign energy, innovation and capital with domestic resources. He is a former Audi engineer and over more than a decade, his goal has been to overtake the West in automotive technology by pushing China past the era of internal combustion engines and toward electric vehicles – thus setting the stage for China to dominate the $2 trillion-plus global auto market. Wan Gang also sees electric vehicles as one partial solution to China’s sooty air.

????My book, The Great Race: The Global Quest for the Car of the Future, tells how up until recently that project has been a series of ambitious failures. As late as January 2014, China was selling only about 600 electric cars per month – that same month the U.S. sold over 6,000.

????But during the last four months of 2014, China’s electric vehicle sales skyrocketed. In December alone, monthly sales of passenger and commercial electric vehicles hit 27,000. According to data from the China Automotive Technology Research Center and the Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory, sales of electric cars in China surpassed sales of electric cars in the U.S. for the first time. In fact, China’s electric vehicle sales in December 2014 were almost 30 times higher than January 2014 sales.

????Many analysts say that the last four months of 2014 will be remembered as the stretch when China’s electric vehicle market finally turned a corner. If this growth continues, China may surpass the U.S. as the world’s largest market for electric vehicles in 2015.

????All this raises a number of questions: First, are these sales figures reliable? Statistics on China’s automotive market are often vague and unreliable. But statistics from the China Automotive Technology Research Center – a massive technical body responsible for everything from crash testing to vehicle battery standards — tend to be good. Some would say they are the gold standard in Chinese automotive data. The website EV-sales.blogspot.com essentially confirmed the 2014 numbers – supported by sales numbers for individual models. EV-salesblogspot.com reported that Tesla was outsold by five domestic manufacturers in China: BYD, Kandi, Chery Zotye and BAIC.

????That leads to a second question: why are sales booming? An analyst from the China Automotive Technology Research Center attributed the jump to the elimination of the vehicle tax on Chinese electric vehicles (until September 2014, buyers were taxed at 10% of the purchase price). But is it really possible that lifting a 10% tax could cause such a massive surge in sales? Perhaps. Policy-led price adjustments have sometimes had spectacular results in China’s auto market. For instance, when the country joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, it lowered import tariffs on foreign automobiles. That year, China’s auto market grew by 37%, as some domestic producers were forced to lower prices to remain competitive. When Chinese automaker First Automotive Works Tianjin reduced its sticker price for one model by 20%, sales shot up 900%, according to one study on the Chinese auto market.

????More recently, when China’s auto market started to slow in February 2008 – together with the rest of the world – the country sought to stimulate automotive sales and encourage its citizens to buy cleaner cars by cutting taxes on small displacement gasoline engines. In March, 2008 the central government cut taxes on these small cars to 5% from 10%. Auto sales jumped by 22% in April, and grew by 49% annually in 2009. Thatwas the year China became the largest auto market in the world.

????It’s still far from clear what factors are driving China’s recent electric vehicle boom – and why Tesla was left out. It’s possible that year-end government procurement led to unusually strong numbers in December. Another possibility is that China’s policies to promote electric vehicles have finally reached a tipping point. For instance, to deal with traffic congestion in major Chinese cities, many municipal governments – including Beijing – have limited the number of new vehicle registrations. In Beijing, electric vehicles are exempt from this quota system.The central government has also instituted a new set of policies to encourage competition among domestic manufacturers — competitive pressure that was woefully lacking during the early years of China’s electric vehicle program. Perhaps locally produced vehicles have finally reached a quality threshold that make them attractive to Chinese buyers.

????Whatever the reason, just as China’s electric vehicle market is taking off, Tesla is facing new competitive challenges at home and abroad. Traditional automakers like BMW, Volkswagen VOW3 and General Motors GM 0.16% are developing electric vehicles that are faster, cheaper, and boast better range than before. In fact, in October 2014, Volkswagen’s CEO Jochem Heizmann announced the company was developing more than 20 electric vehicles for the Chinese market. Then there is also the prospect of competition from newcomers like tech giant Apple AAPL -0.68% – which is hiring away Tesla’s engineers for princely sums and is rumored to be developing its own electric car. At the same time, Tesla is struggling to establish its brand in the world’s key emerging market at what may be a critical inflection point. That is a huge problem.

????Perhaps that explains why Musk is losing his cool over weak China sales. Up until recently, China has been an underperforming electric vehicle market, and Tesla has been an over-achieving electric vehicle company. Suddenly, that equation has flipped.

????Levi Tillemann is the Jeff and Cal Leonard Fellow at the New America Foundation and author of The Great Race: The Global Quest for the Car of the Future, which chronicles the rise of electric cars and China’s messy attempt to leapfrog the West in automotive technology. Previously, he served a two-year presidential appointment advising the U.S. Department of Energy on domestic and international policy.