Autohome Stock

Autohome Inc. operates as an online destination for automobile consumers in China (the People’s Republic of China, excluding Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan).

The company, through its three websites, autohome.com.cn, che168.com and ttpai.cn, accessible mainly through PCs, mobile devices, its mobile applications and mini apps, it delivers comprehensive, independent and interactive content and tools to automobile consumers, as well as a full suite of services to automakers and dealers across the auto value chain.

The company began in 2008 as a content-led vertical media company focusing on media services (1.0 Media). In 2016, the company launched its 4+1 strategic transformation initiative (2.0 Platform), building a platform that covers auto contents, auto transactions, auto financing and auto lifestyle to transform and upgrade from a content-led vertical company to a data and technology-driven automotive platform. The company focuses on developing a full suite of intelligent products and solutions with artificial intelligence (AI), big data and cloud technologies (collectively, ABC) to build an integrated ecosystem that connects all participants in the auto industry by providing end-to-end data-driven products and solutions across the value chain (3.0 Intelligence). The company has been leveraging its software as a service (SaaS) capabilities together with its core AI, big data, and cloud technologies (4.0 ABC + SaaS) to both expand its product and service categories and refine its existing ones, and has upgraded its strategies to further develop the ecosystem around its offerings since 2021 to better serve stakeholders across the auto value chain, including consumers, automakers, dealers and other related eco-partners.

The company generates revenues from media services, leads generation services and online marketplace and others.

Media Services: Through its media services, the company provides automakers with targeted-marketing solutions in connection with brand promotion, new model release and sales promotion. The company’s large and engaged user base of automobile consumers provides a broad reach for automakers’ marketing messages.

Leads Generation Services: The company’s leads generation services enable its dealer subscribers to create their own online stores, list pricing and promotional information, provide dealer contact information, place advertisements and manage customer relationships to help them reach a broad set of potential customers and effectively market their automobiles to consumers online and ultimately generate sales leads. The company’s leads generation services also include used car listing services, which provide a user interface that allows potential used car buyers to identify suitable listings and contact the relevant sellers.

Online Marketplace and Others: While the company continues to strengthen its media and leads generation services, it are also further developing its online marketplace and other businesses. These businesses focus on providing facilitation services for new and used vehicles transactions and other platform-based services for new and used car buyers and sellers. Through its auto financing business, the company provides services to its cooperative financial institutions that involve facilitating the sale of their loans and insurance products to consumers and used automobile sellers. From the end of 2017, the company began offering data products, which leverage its intelligent big data analytics capabilities and massive pool of accumulated user data to provide end-to-end data-driven products and solutions for automakers and dealers across different stages of the value chain. The breadth and depth of these products and solutions on the company’s platform will allow it to build a robust and technology-driven automotive ecosystem that covers all aspects of the automobile ownership life cycle. The company also provides comprehensive auto-related services to its users by integrating TTP’s offline vehicle examination, ownership transfer services and other ancillary services with its online services.

Delivery of Content

The company delivers its auto-related content to users mainly through its websites, mobile applications and mini apps, and its interactive online community, all of which are powered by its data and technology capability, as well as the extensive accumulated user data. The company has access to valuable data of users’ needs, behaviors and patterns in their automotive ownership life cycles, which allows its to accurately and effectively customize content and commercial offerings. The company’s accurate and comprehensive user profiling enables it to continuously enhance user experience and improve its ability to attract and retain customers.

Websites

The company’s user-centric approach has successfully attracted a growing user base with a steady increase of daily active users to its websites. The company’s autohome.com.cn website targets a wide spectrum of automobile consumers with a focus on new automobiles and its che168.com and ttpai.cn websites focus on used automobiles.

Most of the content on its websites is tagged by vehicle models to facilitate easy user access. The company has developed and are continuing to improve its user intelligence engine to analyze user browsing behavior and preferences and prioritize the content that the user is likely to find relevant and interesting. A user who searches for or navigates to a page for a specific vehicle model will be provided with links to relevant content, such as vehicle specifications, photos and video clips, reviews, competing vehicle models, and listing and promotional information from local dealers. Users can easily compare competing vehicle models and brands for price and specifications to make informed purchase decisions. In addition, these user behavior data are summarized and analyzed on a regular basis to improve user experience and provides consumer intelligence to its customers.

To provide a superior experience to its users, the company labels sponsored content as advertisement to maintain objectivity.

Mobile Websites and Applications

For mobile users, the company’s content can be accessed mainly on its websites, on its mobile applications and on its mini apps. The company has made significant efforts in recent years to optimize the mobile version of its websites to display its content and develop and enhance the functions of its mobile applications to capture a greater number of users that access its services through mobile devices. For example, according to QuestMobile, the company’s mobile daily active users amounted to 54.4 million in December 2022. The company is among the earliest in its industry in mainland China to introduce both iOS- and Android-based applications to allow users to easily access its content. Users can conveniently enjoy features available on the company’s mobile websites and applications from their mobile devices, such as reading articles, checking vehicle prices and model parameters, viewing pictures, viewing dealer’s information, visiting its Autohome Mall and participating in forum discussions. The company also launched a lite version of the Autohome application to attract younger audiences.

Content and Tools

The foundation of the company’s platform is a large amount of originally-generated content, professionally-generated content, user-generated content, as well as a comprehensive automobile library and extensive automobile listing and promotional information organized around its automotive information database. Leveraging its content and user data, as well as its technological capabilities, the company also offers a series of intelligent tools on its platform to provide its users with a smooth and efficient purchase experience.

Originally-generated Content

The company’s originally-generated content is created by its dedicated editorial team and includes automobile-related articles and reviews, pricing trends in various local markets, photographs, video clips and live streaming. This content covers topics throughout the automobile ownership life cycle, from automobile research, selection and purchase to ownership and maintenance and to eventual replacement. In 2018, the company launched a new channel focusing on new energy vehicles to accommodate the increasing interest and attention of its users on new energy vehicles. The company’s review writers obtain first-hand experiences by test-driving many newly released vehicle models provided by various automakers. The company also has an AH-100 Vehicle Rating System which applies standard criteria to measure a comprehensive set of performance-based features of the vehicles on sale, such as safety, dynamics, fuel consumption, comfortableness and driving experience. The company’s AH-100 Vehicle Rating System helps automobile consumers make an easier choice when selecting vehicles to purchase. In 2021, the company further launched its motorcycle model library and car-in-use model library to expand its content offerings and rolled out Modified Car channel to broaden its user reach. In 2022, the company launched its new energy vehicle library to expand its product service and offerings to cater to users’ diverse needs. The company is also able to attract more users by leveraging its core IP brands. The company’s editorial team at its Beijing headquarters and sales offices located in 63 cities throughout mainland China work closely with automakers, dealers and other industry participants to create automobile-related articles.

The company follows well-developed guidelines in creating and publishing content with attention to details, such as the angles of photos, image sizes and the time between industry events and the relevant article publication. These practices enable the company to streamline its editorial process and quickly and efficiently make national and local content available to its users, while ensuring that it maintains high-quality standards and a consistent user experience.

Professionally-generated Content

In 2016, the company launched an open content platform to invite the key opinion leaders and influential bloggers or writers in the automotive field to contribute their high-quality professional review, analysis and insights on automotive-related topics, including vehicle reviews, industry trends, auto photography, maintenance and others. The company’s diversified professionally-generated contents complement its automotive ecosystem strategy and bring its users enriched and customized content consisting of high-quality articles, photographs, video clips and live streaming. As of December 31, 2022, the company had 29,598 professional content contributors on its platform. The company is expanding its collaboration with automakers, key opinion leaders, professional experts and social media to further upgrade its professionally-generated content ecosystem.

User-generated Content and User Forum

The company’s platform hosts an open and vibrant community of automobile consumers, from first-time buyers to sophisticated automobile enthusiasts. The company’s user community centers around its discussion forums, which are organized based on vehicle models, cities and regions, and various topics of interest. Registered users utilize its discussion forums to share a wide range of automotive experiences such as driving experiences and usage and maintenance tips. Users also frequently provide reviews of automobiles or automotive products and services, post questions and receive answers from fellow forum members. The company continued to enhance user engagement and participation in the content generation and delivery process. For example, the company launched the lite version of the Autohome application to attract younger audiences.

The company strives to ensure the credibility, appeal and usefulness of its forums by identifying verified automobile owners and empowering selected registered users as forum moderators. The company’s verified automobile owners are registered users whose vehicle ownership has been confirmed through various channels. The company’s forum moderators are generally active registered users with significant forum post counts whom it has identified as being reputable automobile enthusiasts within its online community.

As of December 31, 2022, the company had over 189.5 million registered users. The company has taken a series of measures to ensure that there is no inappropriate, illegal or offensive advertising content published on its platform, particularly content contributed by users. The company has dedicated advertising content reviewers who review the content posted on its platform and block illegal and inappropriate advertising content by using its sensitive words filter. The company gives a conspicuous reminder in its user agreement and the content uploading page that users should ensure that the content uploaded is legal and does not violate any third-party rights. Information published by automobile dealers on its platform is accompanied by a warning that the information comes from dealers and its truthfulness, accuracy and lawfulness are the responsibilities of the publishers, not the platform. In addition, the company works with relevant government authorities in policing the content on its platform and remove illegal content and provide regular trainings on content monitoring to relevant employees.

Automobile Library and Listing

The company has one of the most comprehensive automobile libraries within its industry in mainland China with approximately 70,400 vehicle model configurations as of December 31, 2022.

The company’s automobile library covers the substantial majority of passenger vehicle models released in mainland China. It includes a broad range of specifications covering performance levels, dimensions, powertrains, vehicle bodies, interiors, safety, entertainment systems and other unique features, as well as automakers’ suggested retail prices. The scale of content in the company’s automobile library, which would require significant time, expertise and expense to replicate, makes it a valuable tool for its users in researching both new and used automobiles. The company’s database also includes a large amount of new and used automobile listings and promotional information. With the comprehensive and continuously updated listing information, users can conveniently search for up-to-date information of vehicle models without having to visit each individual dealer at their local showrooms. In addition, its automotive library contains a significant amount of user-generated content originating from its user forums. Leveraging the company’s innovative AR- and VR-related technologies, it utilizes three-dimension technology to restore the actual appearances of vehicles and present stereoscopic 720-degree review of automobiles on its platform. Compared to the traditional two-dimensional picture-based display of automobile appearances, the AR- and VR-based vehicle review functionality on its platform enables users to have a real perception of the specific vehicles they are interested in buying and has greatly enhanced user experience. In 2021, the company also launched its motorcycle model library and car-in-use model library to diversify its content offering and in 2022, the company launched new energy vehicle library to expand its product service and offerings to cater to users’ diverse needs.

Interactive Tools

Leveraging the rich content and user data on its platform and ptsadvanced AI and data technologies, the company has developed a portfolio of intelligent tools to facilitate its users’ potential vehicle purchases. For example, AskBob is a smart assistant tool empowered and enhanced by its rich data and unique algorisms and can generate customized purchase reports for users on the basis of each user’s browsing records and other data. The company’s car model comparison tool allows users to select a number of car models and compare them by a variety of metrics and other information, thus enabling the users to make an informed purchase decision based on extensive and immediately available comparative data. The company’s 7-step purchase tool facilitates each step of a user’s purchase process from developing a purchase intent, viewing and choosing cars to visiting a dealer store and picking up the purchased car. The Intelligent Car Finder, on the other hand, is an interactive AI-based tool trained by the rich data it has and can answer a variety of questions from potential purchasers and recommend suitable choices to the users.

Services

Media Services to Automakers

Leveraging the company’s large and rapidly growing user base and utilizing the user intelligence data it has collected, it provides advertisers with a broad range of advertising solutions and tools. The company’s advertisers under media services are consisted primarily of automakers and automobile brands’ regional offices. The majority of the company’s online advertising service contracts involve multiple deliverables or performance obligations presented on PC and mobile platforms and in different formats, such as banner advertisements, links and logos, other media insertions and promotional activities that are delivered over different periods of time. As millions of consumers visit its platform for automotive information, the company has become an increasingly important medium for automakers and automobile brands’ regional offices to conduct their advertising and marketing campaigns.

Automakers typically utilize the company’s advertising services for brand promotion, new model releases and sales promotions. The company is well-positioned to provide solutions to meet all of these needs. The company’s large and growing automobile purchase- and ownership-oriented user base provides a broad reach for automakers’ marketing messages. The company’s automotive content delivery and advertisement management platform allows it to segment its user base in a number of different dimensions, including by users’ geographical locations and specific automotive interests, and enables it to place advertisements with targeted audiences likely to be receptive to particular advertising messages.

Leveraging its large user base and extensive forum posting data, the company provides automakers with more reliable and timely business insights than traditional customer surveys or other post-sales feedback channels. For instance, it analyzes user posts in its forums to evaluate consumer behavioral and preference response. In addition, it organizes various types of offline national or local events for its automaker customers through its online marketing campaigns and user forum activities to complement its advertising services. For example, the company helps automakers increase their brand awareness and execute sales promotions by organizing large-scale test driving activities and for specific vehicle models in multiple cities across mainland China. Users can conveniently participate and interact with automaker representatives through its forums.

As is customary in mainland China, the company sells its advertising services and solutions primarily through third-party advertising agencies that represent the automakers and automobile brands’ regional offices. The company typically enters into individual advertising agreements with the third-party advertising agencies. Although it sells its advertising services and solutions to third-party advertising agencies, the company considers the automakers and automobile brands’ regional offices, who are the main decision makers as to whether to place advertisements on its websites and mobile applications, to be its end-customers.

As a result, its sales efforts focus primarily on automakers and automobile brands’ regional offices. However, through direct contact between its sales team, advertisers and advertising agencies, the company is able to maintain good relationships with existing advertisers and their advertising agencies. The majority of the advertising content on the company’s platform is provided by advertisers or created by advertising agencies or other third parties.

Leads Generation Services to Dealers

The company’s leads generation services enable its dealer subscribers to create their own online stores, list pricing and promotional information, provide dealer contact information, place advertisements and manage customer relationships to help them reach a broad set of potential customers and effectively market their automobiles to consumers online and ultimately generate sales leads. The company’s leads generation services also include used car listing services, which provide a user interface that allows potential used car buyers to identify suitable listings and contact the relevant sellers. The company provided leads generation services to 24,126 dealers in 2022

Dealer Subscription Services

The company provides subscription services to dealers which allow them to market their inventory and services through its websites and mobile applications, extending the reach of their physical showrooms to potentially millions of internet users in mainland China and generating sales leads for them. The company’s dealer subscription services are delivered through its dealership information system mainly on a fixed-fee basis, typically for a period of one year. Through the web-based interface of its dealership information system, dealers can create online stores hosted on the company’s websites and mobile applications and upload and manage their automobile inventories, pricing and promotional information. Potential automobile purchasers can interact with its dealer subscribers online or through phone numbers presented on the platform to inquire for more detailed information and schedule test drives. The company’s dealer subscribers can track all the interactions with their customers originating from its websites and mobile applications, analyze the number of sales leads and assess the effectiveness of their marketing activities.

The company continues to develop its dealer subscription services and have begun to implement additional enriched and upgraded services, which will allow it to expand sales leads based on consumer behaviors and preferences and enhance leads conversion and personalized marketing, and further to offer upgraded subscription packages at different price levels.

Advertising Services for Individual Dealers

The company also offers advertising services for individual dealers to complement its leads generation services. The company’s dealer customers utilize its advertising services and leverage its large user base to support their sales and marketing activities. In addition to larger brand promotion advertising campaigns organized by the automakers or the group dealers, individual dealers utilize its advertising services to further enhance their visibility in local community, address local market conditions and promote local events. The company also facilitates the process and connect its users from online to offline to generate sales leads and transaction for its dealer customers.

Used Automobile Listing and Other Platform-based Services

The company’s used automobile listing services allow dealers and individuals to market their used automobiles for sale on its websites and mobile applications. The company’s used auto listing database has been expanding rapidly.

The che168.com website is a platform primarily focusing on used automobile services and is dedicated to providing features consisting of content, listings and interactive functionality similar to the company’s autohome.com.cn website. The company has been continuously developing and enhancing the functions of the used automobile website and application and have begun to provide advertising services, dealer subscription services, generation of sales leads and other platform-based services in selected cities.

Online Marketplace and Other Services

The company’s online marketplace and other businesses include its data products, its new and used car transaction services and its auto financing business, among others. The company’s data products leverage its intelligent big data analytics capabilities and massive pool of accumulated user data to provide end-to-end data-driven products and solutions for automakers and dealers across different stages of the value chain. The company facilitates new and used vehicles transactions and provide other platform-based services for new and used car buyers and sellers. In September 2022, the company launched its first offline experience store – Autohome Energy Space – in Shanghai, providing users with a one-stop car selecting and purchasing experience. The company also provides an extensive suite of auto-related services to its users by integrating TTP’s offline vehicle examination, ownership transfer services and other ancillary services with its online services. Through its auto financing business, the company provides services to its cooperative financial institutions that involve facilitating the sale of their loans and insurance products to consumers and used automobile sellers.

Data Products

The company has been leveraging its AI, big data, cloud capabilities and other technologies to continue developing and providing to automakers and dealers innovative data products from the end of 2017 and have successfully advanced its data and intelligent recommendation and reinforced its entire ecosystem by providing highly differentiated value and data-driven end-to-end SaaS based solutions to its customers. The data products and solutions the company offers to automakers and dealers on its platform primarily consist of Intelligent R&D, Intelligent New Car Launch, Intelligent Activities, analytical tools and customized data reports prepared based on its big data and multi-dimensional analyzes on user reviews, purchasing interest and preferences, geographical competitive advantages of the relevant automakers and dealers and their geographical distribution strategies, and Intelligent Showroom, Smart DCC, Smart Sales, Smart Aftersales, Smart Call-Out, Smart Assistant, Compass and Smart Quality Control. The company’s Intelligent New Car Launch product generates large user attention with comprehensive launch plans based on big data, informing automakers of when and where to launch new products, what groups of potential buyers to target, what competition and selling points strategies to adopt, and what creative content to use in the launch. Post-launch, automakers continue to benefit from its Intelligent Activities services in maintaining a high level of market enthusiasm in the newly launched products and other mature products. The Intelligent Showroom, which is an intelligent and scenario-based marketing platform, integrates the technologies of AR, VR, big data and voice recognition to achieve the functions of panoramic car shopping, smart push notifications and smart shopping guide. On this premise, the company has further launched a series of additional digital technology products for automakers from the end of 2021 and developed five series of data tools through 2022. Going forward, the company will continue to enrich its data product portfolio to cover the data needs of the entire automobile ownership life cycle.

Used Vehicles Transactions

After the acquisition of TTP, the company continuously enhances its strategic synergy and integration with TTP. The company’s transaction platform for used vehicles functions as a transaction system, which connects automobile buyers and used automobile sellers and facilitates their vehicle transactions on its platform through providing a wide range of auto related services, such as online bidding services, auto financing products and valuation tools. The used vehicle transaction platform has improved the under- served used automobile market and addressed problems, such as lack of sourcing, traffic and consumer confidence, and has fostered business-to-consumer purchasing experiences for its consumers. The company also provides comprehensive auto-related services to its users by integrating TTP’s offline vehicle examination, ownership transfer services and other ancillary services with its online-based services.

New Vehicles Transactions

In 2014, the company launched Autohome Mall, an online transaction platform. Autohome Mall is a broad online transaction platform for users to review automotive-related information, purchase coupons offered by automakers for discounts and make purchases to complete the transaction. The company primarily generatse revenues by providing platform-based services and transaction-oriented marketing solutions and collecting commissions for transactions facilitated by its platform, for new vehicle transactions.

Auto Financing Services

Since 2017, with the collaboration and integration of its business with Ping An Group, the company has been developing its auto financing business to address the under-served auto financing market in mainland China by providing comprehensive online-based financial services. The company gradually shifted its focus from leads generation to transaction facilitation and promote successful transactions with targeted and diversified auto financial services. Based on users’ preferences and its big data analysis, the company recommend a broad range of loans and insurance products offered by its cooperative financial institutions to its users that have auto financing needs and match them to facilitate transactions as an insurance brokerage service provider with the relevant license from the CBIRC. The company also introduced merchant loans offered by its cooperative financial institutions to automobile sellers. Through its platform, the company plans to enable its users and automobile sellers who are in need of auto financing to easily access various high-quality loans and insurance products and allow its cooperative financial partners to effectively increase the volume of their financing transactions. The company primarily generates revenues from collecting commissions for facilitating transactions of auto-financing and insurance products on its platform.

Strategy

The company follows a user-centric strategy for its system architecture and have developed a robust and scalable technology platform driven by AI, big data and cloud technologies with sufficient flexibility to support its rapid growth. A key component of the company’s user-centric strategy is its user intelligence engine, which the company has developed and is continually enhancing.

Sales and Marketing and User Acquisition

The company’s nationwide in-house team of sales representatives sells its services to automakers and dealers. As of December 31, 2022, the company had 1,453 sales and marketing representatives operating its physical sales office network spanning 58 cities across mainland China and visiting customers in an additional 120 satellite cities. The company’s sales team is equipped with specialized automotive industry knowledge and expertise, understands its customers’ needs and is trained to help them develop their advertising strategies. Salespeople work directly with the company’s advertisers and advertising agencies that represent advertisers. The company’s sales team also maintains close relationships with its dealer customers by, among other things, providing continuing training, support and ongoing customer service for its dealer subscriptions services and other value-added services. The company’s sales team for transaction business is in charge of customer services and maintains its relationships with automakers, its dealership partners, and business development personnel.

The company provides regular in-house and external education and training to its salespeople to help them provide current and prospective customers with information on, and the advantages of using, its services. The company focuses its sales and marketing efforts through search engines, navigation websites and mobile platforms to retain and strengthen its leading position in terms of user reach. For example, the company cooperate with application stores and mobile browsers to promote its mobile applications and its websites. The company also conducts online marketing events on Autohome Mall and other traditional and social media channels as well as offline promotional campaigns with its partners.

The company conducts the annual Singles’ Day campaign to generate quality sales leads and further facilitate the transactions. Since the fourth quarter of 2017, the company has been paying for TV ads on different channels of the China Central Television, the predominant state television broadcaster in mainland China, to reach more audience in the third- or lower-tier cities and towns in mainland China and promote their recognition of its platform as a one-stop destination for selecting and purchasing automobiles and various types of auto-related services.

The company has also engaged celebrities, primarily athletes, as its brand spokespersons to further promote its brand and stimulate user interest in its platform.

Intellectual Property

The company’s intellectual property includes trademarks and trademark applications related to its brands and services, software copyrights, trade secrets and other intellectual property rights and licenses.

The company holds ‘AUTOHOME’ trademark in China through the VIEs (variable interest entities), with each registered under different categories. In addition, as of December 31, 2022, the company held 122 pending trademark applications and 591 registered trademarks. As of December 31, 2022, the company had 97 registered domain names, including its main website domain names, autohome.com.cn, che168.com and ttpai.cn, 474 pending patent applications, and 282 registered patents. The company had 804 computer software copyrights as of December 31, 2022.

Competition

With respect to its auto media and leads generation businesses, the company faces competition from mainland China’s automotive vertical websites and mobile applications, such as BitAuto, Dongchedi, Xcar and PCauto, from the automotive channels of major internet portals, such as Sina and Sohu, and from companies engaged in mobile social media, news, video and live-streaming applications. The company’s uto finance business faces competition from other auto finance companies, such as Yixin and Souche. In addition, the company faces competition from companies engaged in social media business, such as ByteDance and Tencent, companies engaged in data product offering, such as BitAuto and Dongchedi, and companies engaged in AI and big data technologies.

Seasonality

The company’s quarterly (year ended December 31, 2022) revenues and other operating results have fluctuated in the past. The company’s business experiences seasonal variations in association with the demand for automobiles in mainland China. For example, the first quarter of each year generally contributes the lowest portion of its annual net revenues primarily due to a slowdown in business activities around and during the Chinese New Year holiday, which occurs during the period.

Environmental, Social and Governance Initiatives

Pursuant to the Measures for the Supervision and Administration of Online Trading (which became effective on May 1, 2021 and apply to business activities involving the sale of commodities or provision of services through the Internet and other information networks, as well as the supervision and administration thereof by market regulatory departments), online transaction operators shall go through the market entity registration in accordance with the law, except for the circumstances under which registration is not required as specified in Article 10 of the E-Commerce Law. In addition, online transaction operators shall disclose commodity or service information in a comprehensive, truthful, accurate and timely manner, and protect consumers’ right to know and right to choose.

History

The company was founded in 2005. The company was incorporated under the laws of the Cayman Islands in 2008. The company was formerly known as Sequel Limited and changed its name to Autohome Inc. in 2011.