中 Adjusting Sales Prices Of Major Mercedes Benz Models, 'Is the Korean Market Also Waving'

*This content was translated by AI.

Mercedes-Benz Group recently updated its 2026 China market report. The key point of this report is that it has virtually put down its premium pricing policy and chose to go head-to-head with local brands. The winning move is the price. Focusing on volume models, the company made a surprise reduction from 10% to 15%. The company diagnosed that it is going through unprecedented structural changes due to technological advances and price attacks by Chinese brands beyond just a slowdown in the brand.

This official price cut is causing a significant impact on the market as the headquarters directly revised the brand's price indicator beyond past one-off promotions or dealer-level discounts. It seems difficult for Korea, which imports many models from China, to avoid the impact of this price adjustment.

Specifically, the official price of the C200L model was lowered by about 33,000 yuan and the GLC 300 Coupe by about 68,000 yuan. Some high-priced lineups may cause a price drop of up to 60 million won or more. Mercedes-Benz has taken out such an unconventional price card to prevent the collapse of its dealer network in China. The headquarters directly adjusted prices for dealers who were on the verge of being kicked out due to the accumulation of inventory due to sluggish sales.

It gave the distribution network a breathing room by introducing inventory financial interest reduction and large-scale incentives. However, Mercedes-Benz is operating a "China-for-China" strategy at the same time as adjusting prices, judging that price cuts alone are difficult to cope with strong software-based local brands such as Xiaomi and BYD. This aims to give more authority to local R&D centers in China to reflect technologies favored by Chinese consumers in their vehicles.

Above all, the main goal is to secure advanced autonomous driving technology and AI infotainment systems from China, not Germany. In particular, through cooperation with Chinese self-driving company Momenta, it is striving to secure digital competitiveness by installing level 2++ functions optimized for the local road environment and introducing AI voice assistants in collaboration with ByteDance. These aggressive price cuts and technology investments are expected to put downward pressure on Mercedes' financial indicators in the short term.

In fact, Mercedes-Benz has formulated a decline in profitability by sharply lowering its operating margin target for the automobile sector to 3% to 5% in 2026. To overcome this, it is implementing a specific cost-cutting roadmap to maximize the proportion of locally produced parts in China by 2027 and reduce production costs by up to 20% through supply chain efficiency. Benz's update shows it is focused on practical survival strategies rather than pride.

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*This content was translated by AI.