Why has li auto adjusted its sales system three times in six months?

With the arrival of the Li Auto i8, Li Auto has entered a new round of comprehensive adjustment.

On one hand, from the consumer's perspective, the Li Auto i8 underwent a rapid product price adjustment on the seventh day after its launch. Previously, the Pro/Max/Ultra versions were uniformly adjusted to a standard version priced at 339,800 yuan, with the rear entertainment screen package available as an optional add-on for 10,000 yuan.

On the other hand, in areas where consumers are not highly perceptive,Li Auto itself is also making rapid adjustments across various dimensions of the enterprise, including supply, production, sales, and their corresponding personnel, organization, and departments.

The most recent adjustment by Li Auto involves the sales side.

On August 14th, according to multiple media reports, Li Auto announced in an internal meeting the adjustment of its sales and service system. The "five major war zones" established in March were abolished, and instead, the headquarters will directly manage 23 regions nationwide.

Furthermore, Han Xi, the head of the Central Region from the original five major regions, will serve as the head of sales operations for Li Auto and report to Li Auto's President, Ma Donghui.

Based on recent years' situation,Li Auto's new round of adjustments in the sales sector is certainly not an isolated action.To some extent, it is a necessary step for Li Auto in its further march towards the pure electric battlefield, and it also reflects Li Auto's continued advancement with "growth" as its core driving force.

The transformation of the sales system is centered around embracing pure electric vehicles.

Li Auto's reform of its sales system this time seems more like an external manifestation of its self-correction mechanism reacting quickly. The core logic lies in the fact that since 2025, Li Auto's sales system has undergone several changes.

Behind these changes lies an important context: the continued deepening of Li Auto's pure electric strategy.

In March 2025, Li Auto's "Sales and Service Group" underwent a major transformation and restructuring. This business segment includes retail, after-sales service, charging, quality operations, and overseas business, with the overall leader being Zou Liangjun, the then Senior Vice President of Sales and Service.

In this transformation and adjustment, Li Auto made significant changes to the retail sector by consolidating the original 26 battle zones into five major zones: East, West, South, North, and Central. Each zone is responsible for its own sales, profit, and NPS (Net Promoter Score).

The heads of the five major war zones all report to Zou Liangjun.

Notably, in this adjustment, Han Xi, who was previously the Vice President of Sales responsible for overall retail business, was appointed as the Head of Central Region Retail. In media reports, this change has been interpreted as a move to reduce management layers and strengthen competition.

For this adjustment,Li Auto responded at the time, stating that this move draws on the regional management experience of international companies such as Apple.Promote the regional organization upgrade of "regional deep service + headquarters capability empowerment"; moreover, by decentralizing decision-making to the five major regions, each region can quickly respond to the personalized needs of local users.

In external interpretations, some media and industry insiders claim that this move is partly to prepare for achieving the annual sales target, and partly to prepare for the launch of the all-electric SUV. After all, with the distinction between all-electric and range-extended products, the regional attributes of new energy vehicles have become more pronounced.

However, after three months, the situation underwent significant changes.

On June 27, Li Auto released an internal letter announcing that the original "Sales and Service Group" and "R&D and Supply Group" have been merged into the "Intelligent Vehicle Group." The person in charge is Li Auto President Ma Donghui, who reports to Chairman and CEO Li Xiang.

Notably, in this adjustment, the former Senior Vice President and Head of the Sales and Service Group, Zou Liangjun, has been reassigned as a company advisor.

According to Li Auto's official statement, the establishment of the "Intelligent Car Group" is aimed at better realizing user-oriented value creation, value delivery, and business closure through end-to-end operations and deep collaboration in research and development, supply, sales, and service.

An industry insider close to Li Auto analyzed this and stated,The recent restructuring by Li Auto is essentially aimed at further eliminating departmental barriers and better preparing the sales side for the launch of Li Auto's pure electric SUV.

From this perspective, the reform that Li Auto underwent in mid-August actually showed signs as early as June.

An industry insider mentioned that after Li Auto established five major sales regions, each region tended to operate independently in order to achieve their sales targets. This situation is actually not conducive to Li Auto making a concerted effort in sales and expanding its new customer base. Therefore, after more than three months of trial, Li Auto is already considering adjustments for its next steps.

Essentially,After the organizational restructuring in June, the adjustments on the sales side in August were actually foreseeable.

The industry insider stated, "The core logic here is that Li Auto hopes to see the market's feedback after the launch of its first all-electric SUV, the Li Auto i8. After the i8's launch event, Li Auto has realized that transformation on the sales front is imperative."

Cracking the challenge of "pure electric + extended range" dual-line operations.

For the current Li Auto, a key issue that the company must address is how to maintain its original sales momentum after its product lineup officially enters the "pure electric + range-extender" dual-track era.

Of course, the most crucial model for Li Auto at present is naturally its first pure electric SUV, the Li Auto i8.

At the end of July, the Li Auto i8 was officially launched with a price range of 321,800 to 369,800 yuan. This price not only presents a significant difference from the previous estimated price of 350,000 to 400,000 yuan, but also, with a starting price identical to that of the Li Auto L8, demonstrates Li Auto's determination to break into the pure electric SUV market.

However, soon after, the Li Auto i8 underwent a price adjustment one week after its release.

Based on market feedback from large-scale data, the Li Auto i8 standardizes its Max version as the standard model, setting the latest price of the Li Auto i8 at 339,800 yuan. Additionally, the "Rear Cabin Entertainment Suite" is offered as an optional package for 10,000 yuan, achieving a simplified update to the Li Auto i8 product lineup.

The purpose, naturally, is to better meet the needs of potential consumers.

For the price update of Li Auto's i8, an industry observer who has been following Li Auto for a long time told Time that this update was a very difficult decision, after all,From the perspective of product supply, this involves significant adjustments in the supply chain, including Sunwoda's battery supply and Horizon's intelligent driving chips, all of which require rapid negotiation and consensus in a short period of time.

This requires great courage and execution.

Certainly, from a sales perspective, the Ideal i8 has indeed reduced its explanation cost to consumers after the repricing.

An industry insider who has been engaged in car sales for a long time told Zhijian Time that the initial starting price of the Li Auto i8 was 321,800 yuan, which is on par with the starting price of the Li Auto L8, and indeed appears to be very sincere. However, from the perspective of sales, frontline sales personnel need to put in a lot of effort to explain to consumers whether to buy a pure electric or an extended-range vehicle for the same 321,800 yuan, which is rather difficult.

In other words,The same starting price actually increases the difficulty for frontline sales personnel in conveying value to consumers.

From this perspective, the Ideal i8 has been uniformly adjusted to start from 339,800 RMB, thus avoiding direct competition with the three versions of the Ideal L8. Furthermore, for 349,800 RMB, one can obtain the exact same configuration as the previous Ideal i8 Ultra version, which is a significant incentive for the owners.

"This is also good news for frontline sales," said the aforementioned automotive sales industry insider.

Certainly, for many frontline salespeople at Li Auto, as the Li Auto i8 begins to be sold alongside the Li Auto L series, the new product system of "pure electric + range extender" is something they have to readjust to.

The logic behind this is quite simple. In the product lineup with the addition of pure electric vehicles, when targeting new potential customer groups, they need to convey the inherent product advantages of the Ideal L series as an extended-range product to potential extended-range users. Simultaneously, they must also communicate the value of the pure electric Ideal i8 to users who are more concerned with pure electric vehicles. Moreover, there should be no conflict between these two narratives. This is why new requirements have been proposed by frontline sales.

Will the abolition of the five theater commands be beneficial to the sales increase of Li Auto's "pure electric + range extender" product system?

The aforementioned industry insider believes that,In the short term, there are still variables, but from a long-term perspective, it will definitely be beneficial.The reason is simple: for Li Auto, the core objective on the sales side should still be to maximize the acquisition of new customers. The five warzone model has been deemed unsuitable for the current situation—but the adjustment itself actually requires a process.

"It can be understood that the current adjustment is also in preparation for the upcoming Ideal i6."

The ideal path to pure electric also needs to go from 0 to 1.

In the transition to fully electric vehicles, Li Auto and its founder, Li Xiang, have continuously improved their capabilities through constant adjustments.

On March 21, 2024, following the unsuccessful launch of the Li Auto MEGA, Li Xiang, CEO of Li Auto, issued an internal letter to all employees. In his letter, he clearly stated that the company mistakenly treated the 0 to 1 phase (commercial validation period) of the Li Auto MEGA as the 1 to 10 phase (rapid development period) in their operations, which represents the company's misjudgment of the pace of their pure electric strategy.

Li Xiang also explicitly stated thatThe ideal MEGA and high-voltage pure electric must go through a stage from 0 to 1 with the ideal ONE and range-extended electric.

Hence, from the subsequent performance of the Ideal MEGA, Li Auto continues to firmly convey the utility value of the MEGA, gaining increasing recognition from target users. On the other hand, based on product issues from user feedback, they have launched the Ideal MEGA Home version on the original MEGA product foundation.

It can be said that, as of the current situation, after a series of adjustments, Li Auto MEGA has successfully made a comeback. One direct piece of evidence is that in June 2025, Li Auto MEGA's sales exceeded 2,300 units, achieving the top sales position for MPVs priced over 500,000 yuan.

Certainly, translate the above content into English and output the translation directly without any explanation.The turnaround of Li Auto MEGA does not mean that Li Auto's pure electric journey has completed the process from 0 to 1.

The reason is also obvious—after all, the Li Auto MEGA is positioned as a pure electric MPV model priced above 500,000 RMB, and the market space it targets is limited. Moreover, after the unsuccessful launch of MEGA in 2024, Li Auto has adjusted the pace and naming method of its pure electric SUVs, and MEGA has thus become a separate product lineup.

For Li Auto, the real test of its pure electric system capabilities and large-scale market impact naturally lies in the Li Auto i series, which is positioned as a pure electric SUV.

How do you evaluate the performance of the Li Auto i8 after its launch?

According to an automotive market analyst who has been following the industry for a long time, when comparing, if there are problems in the listing process of the Li Auto MEGA in 2024, they may be due to a misjudgment in timing caused by overconfidence.The launch process of the Li Auto i8 actually reflects that Li Auto has a full sense of reverence for pure electric vehicles, "perhaps even a bit overly cautious."

It is precisely because of this cautious attitude that Li Auto i8 is willing to sacrifice part of its profit margin by adopting the exact same starting price as the Li Auto L8 in its initial pricing strategy. The core logic is still to use this price to lower the transition cost for Li Auto L8 extended-range users to switch to pure electric vehicles, essentially "stabilizing its own base market."

The logic here isn't fundamentally flawed—the issue lies in its focus on price rather than the inherent product values that users care more about, such as "refrigerators, color TVs, and big sofas." The latter is what potential owners of the ideal i8 value more.

Therefore, during the subsequent price adjustment of the i8, Li Xiang stated, "We fell into a pattern of habitual thinking."

Fortunately, after a series of challenges, both Li Xiang himself and the entire company of Li Auto have fully understood that after the success of the range-extended series, the pure electric models, including Li MEGA and Li i8, present an even more challenging and intense battle—it will also be a protracted war.

The adjustment of the sales system in August is just one of Li Auto's actions in response to this protracted battle.

In retrospect, looking at the journey of Li Auto, it has indeed achieved considerable success, but it has also undeniably encountered many pitfalls and made some mistakes. Overall, the true competitive advantage of this company lies in its ability to quickly confront, make decisions, and adjust at the levels of awareness, decision-making, and execution across the organization once problems are exposed.

In a sense, this is also where Li Auto's fundamental competitiveness lies.

From this perspective, we can better understand the message Li Xiang pinned on his Weibo. In that post, he conveyed a key idea: the core driving force of Li Auto is encapsulated in two words - growth. Of course, growth is indeed a difficult term to concretize, but if Li Auto successfully completes the journey from 0 to 1 in pure electric vehicles, this process will be the best illustration of this abstract term.