Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Niu Technologies second quarter 2021 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session, and instruction will follow at that time. As a reminder, we are recording today's call. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. Now, I'll turn the call over to Mr. Jason Yang, Investor Relations Manager of Niu Technologies. Mr. Yang, please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Hello, everyone. Welcome to today's conference call to discuss Niu Technologies results for the third quarter 2021. The earnings press release, corporate presentation, and financial spreadsheets have been posted on Niu's investor relations website. This call is being webcast from our company's website and a replay of the call will be available soon. Please note, today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve risks, uncertainties, assumptions, and other factors. The company's actual results may be materially different from those expressed today. Further information regarding the risk factors is included in the company's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statement except as required by law.
Our earnings press release and this call include discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. The press release contains a definition of non-GAAP financial measures and the reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial results. On the call with me today are our CEO, Dr. Yan Li, and the CFO, Miss Fion Zhou. Now, let me turn the call over to Yan.
Oh, thanks, Jason, and thanks everyone for joining us on the call today. In the third quarter, we have seen a strong growth again with our total sales volume reaching 397,000 units, a 57% year-over-year increase, making this our best quarter for sales in our history in terms of volume. The sales volume in China market reached 392,000 units, a significant increase of 60% year-over-year, while the volume in the international market reached nearly 5,000, down 11% compared to last year, primarily due to the shipping issues that you are all aware of that continue to delay orders that we have received and manufactured, but cannot leave the factory and therefore cannot be booked as sales.
In the first three quarters of the year, our sales volume totaled 800,000 units, an increase of 77% compared with the same period last year. The strong Q3 growth in the China market showcases the strength of our growth strategy, which includes the expansion of our product portfolio to cover a wide range of electric scooters and the rapid expansion of our retail channels and geographic footprint. As mentioned in the last earnings calls, starting this year, we have launched five new vehicles under the Niu brand and the five new vehicles under the GOVA brand, which enabled us to have a wide range coverage of consumer needs from mid to high end. The new product design also take into account preferences of both male and female customers, allowing us to attract a wider range of customer group.
In the electric motorcycle class, our entry model, GOVA G3, has a starting price of CNY 3,699, and our top-of-the-range NQi GT has a price tag of CNY 20,299. We have a total of eight series and 22 electric motorcycle product offerings. For the electric bicycle class, we have our entry-level, GOVA G0, with the price of CNY 2,499, and our top-of-the-line model, UQi+, with the price of CNY 8,999. We have a total of 12 series and 42 product offerings. From the design style, we have three series, the G, F, and C, each with distinctive design style under the GOVA brand. Under the Niu brand, we have the N, M, and U series, each with a unique and elegant style.
In terms of performance, we offer a driving range of 40 km-100 km on one charge for both electric motorcycles and electric bicycles. Since the rollout of China regulations on electric bicycles over the past 2.5 years, we have quickly developed a full product portfolio to cover the mid- to high-end market. The full coverage was the key to fast growth in Q3, and also set a solid foundation for future growth in 2022. As we continue to expand our product portfolio this year, we are simultaneously expanding our retail store footprint across China rapidly. Q3 is traditionally a peak season for sales, but a low season for store expansion.
However, this time we were able to cover our best sales quarter ever while also adding another 320 Niu branded stores across China, which is 1.6x of the expansion pace compared to Q3 2020. As of September 30th, we now have 2,686 stores operating in China. We're well on track to have 3,000 stores in operation by end of 2021. These stores will serve as the foundation to drive sales growth for 2022. Now, moving away from sales for a moment. I'm very proud of a milestone we hit as a company last month. On October 11, our more than 2 million users helped us reach the 10 billion km riding mark. It was the first time 10 billion km has been recorded in two-wheeler industry history.
To celebrate this awesome milestone, we launched a series of marketing campaigns with the slogan of Feel a Bit Proud or Feel a Bit New, starting in September, and it will run through the end of the year. The brand of Niu represents style, technology, and freedom. Along those brand values, we have selected a set of representative new users, then share their story with Niu scooters over multiple channels. These users include photographers, travel enthusiasts, talk show hosts, and others. Each story showed how riding a new vehicle has helped them with their daily urban commute and make their lives a little better or Feel a Little Bit Pride or Proud with Niu. These stories and the videos have been broadcasted over social media channels like Weibo, WeChat, and our website.
Of course, many of the KOLs and KOCs have also created their own content around the theme of Feel a Little Bit Proud, a Bit New, just further amplifying our message and reach. In just a few short weeks all those have achieved nearly 100 million views. More importantly, it helped to convey our brand value to our users and potential customers. The message positioned Niu, not just as an electric scooter company, but also as a lifestyle brand. Besides the user stories, we also launched a social media video campaign with a feature video of Feel a Little Bit Proud. The video has been aired across social media, offline and has even been showcased in the ads for the new James Bond film, receiving more than 500 million views.
Now, considering Niu has more than 2 million users, we also engage our users with a treasure hunt location-based game on our app. Users receive a raffle ticket if they ride their Niu past a secret spot in their city. These tickets can be redeemed for various prizes like accessories, and also enter them into a lottery for a 10 billion km limited editions. In our initial rollout in 10 cities over the past month, more than 2 million digital raffle tickets have been collected by our users, showing just how engaged our users are with our brand, product, and services. All of those user-centric activities and marketing campaigns have improved our brand awareness significantly in the China market. Those campaigns especially resonate with the Gen Z users who are seeking brands that have deeper meaning. Niu's commitment to style, technology, and freedom is something they value greatly.
The combination of marketing campaigns and with our continuous retail store expansion sets up for another quarter of growth here in Q4. Now looking at international sales for a moment here, our Q3 was a little below expectation as compared with the China market. This is not a result of decreased demand. As many of you are aware, international logistics continues to create ever longer backlogs, and we're not immune from it. In fact, our order book was 50% higher than what we actually shipped. Everything that is being shipped is typically on backorder at any one of our points of retail across the globe. Despite the low season in Q3, we're in fact very optimistic with Q4 for the international market orders.
We're excited about tomorrow, actually, on November 23rd, when we will launch several new products at EICMA, the largest two-wheeler show globally, held in Milan, Italy, including our most powerful 125 cc electric moped, the MQi GT EVO, our first 150 cc hybrid moped, the YQi, and our upgraded e-bike, the BQi, and two additional KQi kick scooters. Many of which will be shipped this quarter and in stores to kick off the sales season in February across Europe and Americas. First, in the electric motorcycle moped classes, we will launch the MQi GT EVO. EVO will be the mark of new performance line. The MQi GT EVO will be unveiled at EICMA, and is the first product launching our new EVO series.
It has been redesigned inside out with a top speed of over 100 km/h and an exciting 0-60 km/h track time seen under six seconds, outstripping its gas-powered rivals. We believe this is a first electric moped that can really compete on price and outperform on power and speed with its petrol competitors in the 125 cc class of mopeds. In addition to the performance, the MQi GT EVO has added a number of features that include a keyless ignition, electric anti-theft locking, and an all-new TFT color dashboard, customizable via the user's app. We have already received several thousand orders to be shipped in Q4, and the MQi GT EVO will be in stores in Europe and America as early as February with a price tag of EUR 5,000.
Besides the MQi GT EVO, we'll be also debuting our first 150 cc equivalent hybrid moped, the YQi. The YQi combine the best traditional IC engines and the lithium iron battery-powered electric motors. It come with a 150 cc IC engine coupled with a 2.4 kW electric motors, providing exhilarating acceleration that is much superior to even a traditional 250 cc moped. The YQi is positioned as a gateway vehicle for EV for two-wheeler enthusiasts who have not made the transition away from petrol.
It is still in development and will be available in Europe and Americas in late 2022. Now with the addition of YQi, MQi GT EVO, and also the upgraded NQi GTS and the RQi, our quad motorcycle, we have provided a full coverage of motorcycles from 100 cc- 150 cc, greatly expanding our traditional offerings, our 50 cc equivalent electric moped internationally. We believe this will further consolidate our leadership in the electric motorcycle market globally. Now, as we mentioned last earnings call, we have entered the micro-mobility market with the pre-sales of our kick scooter product, the KQi3, on Indiegogo on July 13. After a successful run on Indiegogo, we then have received more than 15,000 orders by the end of September 30. Tomorrow at EICMA in Milan, we'll bring two new kick scooter products to the market.
Something we call a KQi3 Max, which will be an upgrade of KQi3 Pro. It is equipped with a more powerful upgraded 450 W motor, and with a larger lithium battery capacities, which can easily reach a speed of 35 km/h and have a dry range of 65 km. There's no mass market product like this in the market right now, and we're excited about it. It will be priced at EUR 949. We'll also bring an even more economical kick scooter into the family, called the KQi2. The KQi2 takes many design cues of KQi3, and with more user customizable features. The KQi2 has a top speed of 25 km/h and a riding range of 40 km. It will be priced at EUR 499.
With the sleek and stylish design, the KQi2 is expected to become a favorite urban mobility commuter globally. The KQi2 will be shipped before the end of December 2021. Now, with the KQi3 and the KQi2, we have a robust lineup of kick scooter products with price starting at EUR 499 up to EUR 949. We have a portfolio of offerings that meet the budget of wide range of customers who are looking for affordable solutions for their urban commute. We have already received many orders, and we expect to ship more than 20,000 units of kick scooters in Q4 to fulfill the first batch of orders. We will also expand our offerings into the e-bike market.
Tomorrow at EICMA, we'll launch our new e-bike product called the BQi that has a stylish urban minimal design and is capable of extended ride range of 100 km, thanks to its two removable batteries. The BQi will be priced under EUR 1,500, making it the most powerful and affordable commuter e-bikes to hit the market in 2022. The continued growth for e-bike demand across Europe and Americas is exciting growth spot for us in both those markets. With product like BQi, we think we can quickly tap into the demand of the next 12 months. Now, with the kick scooters and e-bikes to cover micro-mobility market, we're also expanding our international sales channel.
Besides the current 153 flagship and premium stores and 1,000-plus authorized dealers, we have also established our e-commerce presence on channels like Amazon and also offline channels, which will allow us to enter into consumer electronics stores like the MediaMarkt in Europe and many across the U.S. Supported by the diversified product offerings and channel expansions, we're quite optimistic with our international sales in Q4 and in 2022 beyond. Now, I'll turn the call over to Fion to discuss our financial results. Fion?
Thank you, Yan, and hello, everyone. Our press release contains all the figures and the comparisons you need, and we have also uploaded Excel format figures to our IR website for your easy reference. As I review our financial performance, we are referring to the third quarter figures unless I say otherwise, and all the monetary figures are Chinese yuan unless otherwise noted. Our quarter three sales volume reached 397,000 units, representing a 58% year-over-year growth. China sales volume increased by 60%, primarily driven by new product launches in the past two quarters and the continued retail network expansion. One new e-bicycle model, C0, and one upgraded e-motorcycle model, G3, were available on the market in quarter three. These two models contributed around 16% of our total sales volume in the third quarter.
We opened 750 new stores in China during the first half of this year. The newly opened stores not only contributed to our sales volume growth, but also played a critical role in promoting our brand and gaining our market share. We opened another 320 new stores in the third quarter, which will help us with further steady growth in the future quarters. International sales volume, however, decreased by 11% as a result of continued challenges from international shipping. With regards to product mix, N Series accounted for 6% of total sales volume, M Series accounted for 6%, U Series accounted for 13%, and GOVA products accounted for 75%. Out of the 75% from GOVA products, 41% was from the low price model G0, F0, and C0.
Remaining 34% was from other GOVA models with relatively higher retail price. The increased mix in GOVA product was due largely to two reasons. First, the new GOVA product launches in quarter two and early quarter three. S0, C0, G3, and F4 have been very successful and drove quite a bit sales growth in quarter three. Second, during the third quarter, company provided promotional activities for the GOVA series products in order to encourage faster adoption of compliant e-bicycles in China. Total revenue increased by 37% to CNY 1.2 billion, slightly lower than guidance we provided earlier, primarily due to the lower than expected sales from international markets. Revenue from China e-scooter sales remained strong and increased by 45%. The accessories, spare parts, and service revenue from China market also increased by more than 40%.
The decrease in international markets we believe is short term, and we are looking forward to positive growth in the future quarters. Our ASP in quarter three declined by 13% year-over-year. Let's look at the details. In China market, the scooter ASP decreased by 9% year-over-year, chiefly due to the sales from low price models G0, F0, and C0, which accounted for 41% of total sales volume, compared with 27% in the same time last year. In international markets, the scooter ASP decreased by 18%. As mentioned in the last two quarters earnings call, the depreciation of U.S. dollar and the change in the way distributors place orders are the key reasons for the decrease. Compared with quarter two, our international scooter ASP increased by 5%.
If we take out the impact from kick scooters, the ASP increase is around 14% quarter-over-quarter. The ASP of accessories, spare parts, and services was CNY 267 per scooter, a 29% decrease mainly because of the declining sales from international markets. Gross margin was 20%, 0.9 percentage points lower than this time last year. As a consequence of weaker international sales, this has reduced our margin by around 1.1 percentage point. However, 0.2 percentage point decline was offset by the increasing margin and increasing proportion of accessories, spare parts, and services revenue from China market. Therefore, net impact was 0.9 percentage point decline. Our total operating expenses, excluding share-based compensation, were CNY 143 million, increased by CNY 46 million or 48% year-over-year.
The increase was caused by CNY 25 million higher branding and advertisement in sales and marketing expenses, CNY 11 million higher depreciation expenses of new store openings, and CNY 13 million higher staff costs. As percentage of revenue, our operating expenses excluding share-based compensation was 11.7%, 0.9 percentage points higher than quarter three last year, mainly due to higher branding and marketing expenditures. Our net income was CNY 92 million, a 15% increase year-over-year. The adjusted net income was CNY 102 million, and the adjusted net margin was 8.3%, 1.8 percentage point decline compared to the same period last year. As mentioned above, due to the 0.9 percentage point gross margin decline and increase from operating expenses as 0.9 percentage of revenue.
Turning to our balance sheet and cash flow, we ended the quarter with CNY 1.6 billion in cash deposits and short-term investments. Our operating cash flow was positive CNY 402 million, much higher than our net income. Our quarter three capital expenditures was around CNY 76 million, mostly related to capacity expansion of CNY 26 million and new store openings of CNY 50 million. Now let's turn to guidance. We expect the fourth quarter revenue to be in the range of CNY 840 million-CNY 908 million, an increase of 25%-35% year-over-year. With that, let's now open the call for any questions that you may have for us. Operator, please go ahead.
Reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one on your telephone. To withdraw your question, press the pound or hash key. Once again, if you wish to ask a question, press star and the number one on your telephone keypad. Your first question comes from the line of Vincent Yu of Needham & Company. Please ask your question.
[Non-English content ]. Hi, management, thanks for taking my question. I have questions on these three topics. One is our overseas business. How do we think about the shipping constraints will continue to impact our revenue in next quarter, and how we think this backlog will be realized in next few quarters? Our second question is on the supply chain. How do we think about these rising costs and the part costs impacting our operations? Third question is, I would like management to share some insights on the e-scooter replacement cycle, especially under current relatively soft macro condition. Thank you.
Hey Vincent, if you don't mind, I'll answer this question in English. I think first one with the shipping backlog, I think Q3 has been a bit tough. Obviously for international Q3 used to be also, you know, you look at it actually historically it has been a low season because whatever we ship in Q3 is actually going to be arriving in Europe and the Americas in sort of Q4. It's actually, you know, actually the winter season, it's actually low sales. We actually expect that Q4 shipping start to improve, especially, October and November is still a bit tough, but we start seeing actually, you know, capacity start to empty out in, you know, second half, you know, starting like November and also in December. We actually have a lot of orders in backlog, and they're supposed to be go on the ship in December. You know, both from the motorcycle point of view, electric motorcycle and also the, you know, the 20,000+ electric scooters. I think that's for the international sales in terms of shipping backlog. It wouldn't be necessarily a block issue in Q4, because demand side, we still see a strong demand for both motorcycles and also for the kick scooters. Now on the supply chain issues. I think early this year, the supply chain issues was really a shortage of chipsets, especially the imported chipsets, that we had, you know, that impact a little bit our business, but not significantly. Then we were able to actually redesign our MCUs, all this stuff, actually use the replacement, you know, the domestic China chipset to replace some of the imported ones. That actually helped to reduce the impact. Right now it's actually the Q3 is nothing too much. I think really we're looking at Q4, and maybe next year there might be pressure in terms of raw material prices, in terms of lithium batteries. First half of this year, we actually see the pressure not from lithium battery, but from like all other stuff like copper, steel. That actually impact the, you know, the cost for our chassis, also the cost for tires, all this stuff. We actually increased the product price basically April this year to offset those the raw material price increases. Now going into 2022, we actually think there might be a there might be a case that the lithium battery price will go up a bit, which, you know, many of you guys already observe in the market, because the EV industry in China is actually booming. That actually will create cost pressure on our side. The remedy to that will be, we're looking at, you know, potential solutions to increase the product retail price as well as the ex-works price in early 2022 to offset that. This is not really new to us. In fact, you know, you will look at, you follow Niu for a number of years, every year, we increase our product price by somewhere around 3%-5%, even though the average ASP sometimes decline because the product mix. You look at the individual product wise, the price actually goes up. A lot of times it's because, you know, because of CPI, also because we actually use to offset the the cost increases. Lastly with the policy induced the replacement volume. We're actually start to see some of the impacts start to kick in. For example, in Beijing, you know, it start city by city. In early this year, we see some provinces now like Beijing. Beijing just, you know, Beijing actually in November 2018, they start to issue what do you call it, temporary licenses until the April of 2019. Then that temporary license is only good for three years. Actually start in November 1st this year, city of Beijing actually will disallow the temporary licenses, the yellow licenses. If you actually drive a yellow license electric scooter on the street, your scooter will get confiscated, and then you actually got like CNY 1,000 fine. That actually drive a bit retail sales in October, as well as I think going forward, even the winter season for Beijing wouldn't be that cold in terms of sales, because a lot of people actually need to buy replacement scooters.
We start seeing for Beijing now, then the second we start seeing for the entire Zhejiang province, they're rolling out something similar, that will actually probably have an impact starting this, basically this winter season lasting until the next spring. Obviously, you're not gonna see a huge jump like 4x or 3x or 4x jump in the retail demand. It will still impact, I think the overall market demand. I think this is one of the reasons that even in Q3, we roll out quite a bit GOVA products, and actually during our call, you see the GOVA product represents 75% of our sales in Q3. A lot of times, because those replacements, a lot of those replacements are not extremely high-end.
Many of them are mid-end product. That's why our mid-end product offerings start to really take up some of the market share, starting in Q3. Hopefully that addresses your questions.
Yes, very helpful. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Jing Chang of CICC. Please ask your question.
Hi, Jason. Hi, Yan. Thank you for your communication, and congrats to Fion on taking all this. Now I have two questions. The first is about the average selling price of accessories. So we can see that the average selling price of accessories and services fluctuated greatly in different quarters. I wonder how much of the average selling price comes from overseas battery packs and how much of it from the subscription service fee and also other accessories. And also how do we anticipate on the fourth quarter and also the future? And my second question is you can see that the sales volume of N, M, and U series decreased a lot in the third quarter compared to this year.
So ASP and our new product launched next year, are managed focusing on high-end models. First, how to look at the competitiveness of our new high-end products, and also if our peers' products keep low prices, and in addition, how to see our sales growth momentum under such products next year.
Okay. I will answer the first question. Actually in quarter three, the accessory and spare parts revenue was CNY 90 million, and services revenue was CNY 50 million. You know, as we mentioned, the accessory and services revenue increased a lot in the China market. This quarter we lose the international market, and that's why the accessory and services revenue declined in the international market. With the recovery of the international sales in quarter four, as Yan mentioned, and those kind of other revenues you will recover with the same line as the international sales. We still rely on quite strong increase in the future quarters of this kind of revenue.
Okay. I think for your second question, yes, I think for Q3, as I mentioned that the NMU, basically the new branded products, which we group the NMU and the new branded products, actually the volume actually did decrease, partially because really in Q3 and the second half of Q2, essentially May and June, we rolled out like five new GOVA products. That actually with the marketing campaign really try to gain market share in the mid-end product replacement customers. I think that actually if you look at our business because our business is not exactly direct to consumer. Our business model is actually we sell to distributors, and distributors sell to retail stores, and retail stores to consumers.
Along those lines, there are capital being used by the distributors and capital being used by the retailers. To some extent, you can understand that as we have more new product in GOVA, if our distributors and retailers, they only have limited capitals, right? Some of the capital will be occupied by the GOVA products. I think that's where it's actually create the capital drain is done by the distributors on the GOVA product, less on the NMU, that actually create a temporary decrease on NMU. Second is actually, we haven't done too much in terms of in Q3, haven't really roll out a new product for NMU except M2S, which is an upgraded version for M2. I think that also create a little bit drag on NMU product.
Going forward, I think in 2022 we have planned actually quite a number of new product under the NMU series, and that will actually help to increase not only the percentage and also increase the sales volume of the NMU product. We're actually you know quite promising and quite hopeful about 2022 for the NMU series.
Okay. Thank you.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, you will need to press star one on your telephone. Your next question comes from the line of Bin Wang of Credit Suisse. Please ask your question.
Thank you. I got two questions. Number one is about your service income. Is that linked to your low-end version of the GOVA series, which means the GOVA series naturally have a less revenue income. That's why your revenue growth has been lower compared to the scooter growth. Just want to know the different products related to the revenue, can we see any difference? That's number one question. Number two is about, can you elaborate a lot about the market dynamic of the new category? Because we are very familiar with the kick scooter on your upcoming hybrid products. You mentioned about cc is the hybrid. It means you will have an engine in the electric scooter, different names. Thank you.
All right. Bin, I think I'll address those two questions. One was the service income. Yes. Some of the GOVA product are not doesn't have the smart IoT devices. To that extent, we're not gonna see what you call the connectivity income from those GOVA products. But it's not all GOVA product doesn't have the connectivities. There are portion of GOVA product will have what they call add-on boxes possible at the store. Those GOVA product, actually we're still able to charge the user still pay a connectivity fee along the GOVA product. That maybe address some of the concerns here.
Second, we didn't mention explicitly, but you know, really starting this year, we start getting service revenues from our sharing scooters. We're getting about, you know, $10 per month per scooter, not entirely on the entire fleet. Some operators haven't paid yet, but approximately on half the fleet. I mean, as we have more sharing vehicles deployed globally, you're gonna see that income stream come in nicely. I think that's two parts of services. Now on the new categories, I assume you are asking about the hybrid product. Yes, the hybrid products are our first attempt. We'll debut this product actually tomorrow at EICMA. You know, you're gonna see the news on the design. It's actually a beautifully designed product.
What we see is actually there is one part of motorcycle categories that we're not able to attack. That's actually around the 150 cc-250 cc motorcycles. That part of motorcycle still represent roughly about, you know, 30% of market in Europe and the United States. The reason being that it actually require a longer drive range. If you simply just do electric, it will be too expensive for users to buy unless you go with the sort of, you know, the industry product like a Zero, which is like EUR 10,000, even more. What do we have is this is actually a completely internal design technology that actually combine a combustion engine with the electric motor, and or even with the battery into it.
Actually will allow user to have an unlimited drive range, well, limited by the gas tank. At the same time, when you do a city commute, will use more of the electric motors such that it will actually give you a more environmentally- friendly internal gasoline usage per kilometer. This product will be probably available towards the second half of 2022. This, in EICMA, we're gonna show the concept design and some of the technologies. The product's still in development, and will be ready in the second half of 2022.
Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Wei Shen of UBS. Please ask your question.
Good evening, Jason, Yan, and Fion. Thank you for taking my question. The first is about the margin. Investors are concerned about the price war in this year, and which was most severe in the third quarter. We noted from mid-November, Yadea and AIMA have raised prices by 5%. So can I have your view on the price war and the impact on margin trend in 2022? This is my first question.
Maybe I'll mention first, and then I'll have Fion to talk a bit more on margin part. Yes. I yeah, you know, to be honest, I think both, you know, those two players have been involved in price war. You know, we are not engaged in the price war, but we did a bit marketing promotion our GOVA product in Q3. 'Cause a lot of price war happened in the really low end. Even with our GOVA entry product at CNY 2,499, we're still like mid-end product. We're not even at low end yet. Right. To some extent, we see our margins still much higher than Yadea's and AIMA's margin. And obviously now every you know, they start to raise price in September.
We haven't done that yet. The reason we haven't done that yet, because we did a little bit in April that helped to absorb some of the cost, and then we'll also carefully observe the market to see when the right time to increase the price. As I mentioned earlier, with what we observed, you know, the trend of lithium battery prices, there is likely that we're gonna increase price in early 2022. We usually do that during the holiday seasons as well, the Chinese New Year seasons will have a less impact in terms of the retail. Yeah, I think that's my comment.
Yeah, I think you already addressed all the factors.
Okay.
Again, also, because the margin, I know there are a lot of moving parts, including the price war and also the commodity price. So what's your general view on 2022 margin? Because I see there are some margin pressure in third quarter, and what's your view on the fourth quarter in 2022? Thanks.
Maybe I can give some insight and then Yan will add extra comments. As Yan mentioned, actually, even though we consider about the retail price increase in early 2022, we're still facing the higher raw material cost problem. Luckily that we have made the cost optimization, and those initiatives began to show positive effect, and that's why we didn't see any huge margin loss in this quarter. Those cost optimization initiatives will bring benefit in the future quarters. With the strategy that we may increase the retail price with around 3%-5%, which will not bring the negative feedback from the customers. I think we can still remain the good growth margin. Yan.
Yeah. I think that's about it. I really, you know, on one hand, I don't see we're gonna see a margin decline next year, but, you know, on the other hand, I think, you know, we'll see a stable margin with a slight increase.
Okay. Thank you. My next question is about your new product. You just mentioned that you have prepared a lot of new products, including the kick scooter, the electric motorcycle in 2022. Because we are not really familiar with these new market segments, can you give us more color like the sales guidance in 2022 or 2023? Which product line will become a significant contribution in terms of revenue in the next two to three years? Thank you. Because I think some of the products are mainly for brand building, it's not for volume sales. Correct me if I'm wrong. Thank you.
No. Yeah. I think let me put it this way, right? I think it's too early for us to give out guidances, but if I think there's three categories. One, we're looking at the kick scooters. The kick scooter, the entire market does about, you know, I think from what I read, you know, probably like 6 million-8 million units per year. It depends on whether you include some of the kids ones or not. You know, this year, 6 million-8 million, mostly in United States and Europe.
Those two markets where we do have a strong brand in terms of urban mobility, and I think this year we initially have our KQi3 and now with the, you know, the KQi3 Max and KQi2, and then potentially next year we're gonna have a couple more kick scooter products that will give us a wide range of product that, you know, help us to cover the entire, you know, product, range span for the, that 6 million units of entire market. The entire market is 6 million units. We're actually, you know, quite optimistic with our growth in our kick scooter. Now the e-bike. The e-bike is also about 6 million units a year. Roughly about 80% in Europe and about 10%-15% United States.
We have two e-bike products so far. We have our EUB-01, we launched last year, start to make some sales this year. We have our BQi to be launched at EICMA tomorrow. That product wouldn't be available for sales until Q1 or early Q2 of 2022. You know, as we will actually put, you know, start to actually generate more product along the e-bike categories. Both the kick scooter and e-bikes, we have two dedicated team for it, and we're actually committed to those two product categories. I do think they are volume or revenue generators. Now, with the other motorcycle product, put this way, if you just look at the European market, then the
Not just look at the electric, the entire European market, it's about 1.5 million-2 million units a year in terms of motorcycles. Majority are petrol at this point. Within that, you know, the entire market, about 50% are 100 cc below, and 50% are like 125 cc above. Our product offering used to be 50 cc below. By 50 cc below means the drive speed is like 50 km/h . We start to have like a 70 cc-80 cc product, like a drive speed of 70 km/h-80 km/h . The MQi GT EVO and also the upgraded NQi GTS and also the RQi product, both are at, you know, 90 km/h , 100 km/h, 120 km/h.
Those are actually really to attack the other 50% of market, which is 100 cc above. We never had product in that market. It's a wide space for us. You can see those in those markets actually. I do think those products are also revenue generators.
Very clear. Thank you.
As there are no questions. Thank you. Seeing no more questions on the queue. Let me turn the call back to Mr. Li for closing remarks.
Well, thank you, operator. Thank you all for participating in today's call and for your support. We appreciate your interest and look forward to reporting to you again next quarter on our progress. Thank you.
Thank you all again. This concludes the call. You may now disconnect.