This month, in Changzhou of China's Jiangsu province, Volkswagen (China), FAW Group, Star Charge and JAC Motors announced the establishment of CAMS New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., jointly financed by the four companies.

The shareholding ratios of Volkswagen (China), FAW Group, Star Charge and JAC Motors are 30%, 30%, 30% and 10% respectively. Star Charge will provide important technological support in the company's early stage. TMTPOST has also been informed that in the new firm's following stages, CAMS is not ruling out the possibility of going public.

CAMS supplies customized charging products and one-stop solutions. It also develops smart wall boxes for private charging, rapid networks for public charging and cutting-edge products such as wireless charging and smart robotic-based charging products.

Unlike Tesla, Volkswagen will make its charging points available not just to owners of its own cars, but to those of all automobiles manufactured by Volkswagen's partners.

Weiming Soh, the soul of the company

This year, the Volkswagen Group has undergone a global transformation by releasing its decarbonization plan, in which China is set to play a central role.

Weiming Soh is the soul of the Group and the key figure responsible for carrying out the process of electrification of vehicles in China, and the company's exploration into other new approaches.

Weiming Soh at the CAMS founding ceremony on 11 July

Weiming Soh, Global VP of Volkswagen, the only ethnic Chinese in the company's global executive team (he is of Singaporean nationality), has helped to pull the group out of its quagmire and boost sales. A true power figure for the automobile giant in China, he has been hailed a 'reformer'.

The challenges that Volkswagen now faces in China are not simply limited to car sales, but include other domestic emerging businesses with local characteristics, including those from within the fields of the internet of vehicles, shared mobility, autonomous driving and more.

Volkswagen faces competition not only from those in the automobile industry, but from a host of other ambitious and powerful Chinese internet tech firms.

Riding this 'internet+automobile' wave, Weiming Soh has once again taken up the role of initiating changes in the Group. In May 2018, Volkswagen established a fully owned subsidiary in China, Mobility Asia, with Weiming Soh assigned as both board member and CEO.

At the time Mobility Asia was founded, Weiming Soh stated that its focus would be concentrated on five specific modules: the internet of vehicles, mobility as a service, an infrastructure ecosystem, big data application and intelligent driving. These five modules and their ecological development would be the pillars to support the grand framework of Volkswagen's electrification layout in China, the ultimate goal being to drive sales of electric vehicles into the future and locate new points of profit growth.

Under the leadership of Weiming Soh, Volkswagen's electrification ecosystem in China is gradually accelerating. The company is continuing with its former strategy of localized cooperation with old partners, including SAIC Motors, FAW Group, JAC Motors and others, while emphasizing the power of the 'Volkswagen' brand.

Shared mobility, big data application and the internet of vehicles are some of the areas in which Volkswagen landed its first projects in China.

As early as November 2017, Volkswagen China invested 143 million RMB in the time-sharing project of Beijing's Shouqi Group, 'Gofun Travel', gaining a 20% shareholding. In 2018, Volkswagen introduced its internet-of-vehicles sub-brand 'Zhong Xing Jia' to the Chinese market. Then, in May of this year, SAIC Volkswagen, FAW Volkswagen and Volkswagen Group joined hands with companies including Shouqi and Gofun to found a joint venture firm with plans to open up the closed loop of the travel industry. In the meantime, it has been reported that ride-hailing giant DiDi Chuxing is also planning a joint venture with Volkswagen.

This time, Weiming Soh has once again been appointed as the chairman of CAMS for the development of its infrastructure network.

At the inauguration ceremony, Weiming Soh stated that CAMS' founding purpose is to aid the Chinese automobile industry in its at-scale development of electrification and provide new-energy car owners with intelligent, high-quality charging services. "Through our efforts, our goals are to assist in the interconnected charging infrastructure development through actual improvement in users' charging experience and lower carbon emissions in order to reinvigorate the Chinese automobile industry and create a better future for later generations."

Independent operation and new approaches

According to some industry insiders, CAMS was founded following three years of operation, negotiations and publicity. Since as early as May of this year, relevant business registration documents of the joint venture have gradually been made public up until the present moment of its official launch.

An outcome of the joint effort of three major OEMs – Volkswagen China, FAW Group and JAC Motors - CAMS was born "with a silver spoon in its mouth", due to it already possessing large amounts of user demand and vehicle data. However, the other partner in the new organization, namely, Star Charge, is set to play an even more significant role.

In China, four large enterprises - Star Charge, the State Grid Corporation of China, Teld and Potevio New Energy – account for almost 90% of the entire charging station market share. Weiming Soh also revealed that at the time when the option of a charging station joint venture was proposed to Volkswagen, a partner had to be chosen from the above-mentioned four companies. Following consideration of various factors, Volkswagen ultimately decided to cooperate with Star Charge.

Star Charge will play a significant role in the early days of CAMS. The company will provide strong technological and operational support in terms of operational costs and speed of development. "We three OEMs will learn from Star Charge," Weiming Soh said during a short and exclusive interview at the news conference.

However, CAMS' future will not depend solely on Star Charge. The joint venture will establish its own production, sales and channel systems, and may even engage to a certain degree in business competition against Star Charge. Nevertheless, Weiming Soh believes that the market is large enough and that CAMS is just at its beginning. He says there are many potential ways to engage in successful cooperation with Star Charge.

In response to the absence of SAIC Motor, Weiming Soh explained that the company has its own charging subsidiary, Anyo, making a joint venture not feasible. However, he also said that CAMS is not ruling out other forms of cooperation with SAIC Motor.

The current shareholding ratios of Volkswagen China, FAW Group, Star Charge and JAC Motors are 30%, 30%, 30% and 10%, respectively. So who, in fact, of the three major OEMs and one giant of the charging industry, is the leading shareholder and key decision maker. In his response to this question, Weiming Soh told TMTPOST that CAMS' position has been clear since the very beginning – the management operate independently and do not represent any shareholder. Nevertheless, at the same time, it does not rule out the future appointment of any capable managerial staff from its shareholder companies into the CAMS management team.

"I'm the first CEO. My mission is to establish the company. In the future, a new CEO rotation model may be adopted.'

Weiming Soh says that CAMS has only just been established and the main tasks over the following months will be to recruit the teams and build a complete management system. "I don't see any grand goals for this year. There may be more specific objectives released at the second meeting of the Board of Directors at the end of the year."

CAMS was established in order to develop a robust and successful ecosystem for the future, so in the short term, Weiming Soh has not set a profit target. "I am totally opposed to cash burning. Volkswagen will not tolerate it. However, this does not mean we demand immediate profit. Immediate profitability is difficult," he said. "At the same time, charging stations are part of the infrastructure and so, without them, any discussion of electric car sales becomes pointless. Understanding the concept of ecosystem here is very important."

Weiming Soh also has a clearer understanding when it comes to a transformation in business thinking. "As an OEM, our operational mode has to change in an era of electrification. We are presently in an imaginary stage, with a number of different operational modes slowly developing. In particular, the electric car operational system requires different planning in different locations, while requirements in different regions or municipalities may also differ. We are taking all these into consideration."

Once Volkswagen completes its charging station module, the company's eco-play strategy in China will become clearer. Following the Group's planning and integration with new technologies, including the internet of vehicles, shared mobility and charging stations, what will be its next step?

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This article was edited by Dido Pang. The original Chinese version was written by Zhao Yuhang.

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