Category: China

Neta opens global headquarters in Shanghai

delivered 11,080 vehicles in April and is targeting sales of 300,000 units in 2023.

(Image credit: Neta)

Neta Auto, Hozon Auto's electric vehicle (EV) brand, has opened its global headquarters in Shanghai as it attempts to create a more premium brand image.

Neta's global headquarters in Shanghai's Putuo district has officially opened with functions including strategy planning, resourcing, decision-making, and coordination of the company's global operations, according to a press release today.

The facility is also Neta's flagship experience center, research and development center, data center, and service center, it said.

Models including the Neta S, Neta GT, Neta U-II, and Neta V are being showcased at the facility.

Neta was founded in 2014 and previously had a Shanghai headquarters in the city's Minhang district, but no global headquarters, according to its website. The company has a design center in Beijing and a factory in Tongxiang, Zhejiang province.

Neta has been seen as a budget EV maker since its inception, as its vehicles are priced primarily at the lower end of the market, with the Neta V and Neta U priced at around 100,000 yuan ($14,130).

Neta's flagship sedan, the Neta S, is its first effort at the premium end of the market, with the model primarily targeting the RMB 200,000 to 300,000 price range.

The Neta GT sports car was launched on April 18 with a starting price of RMB 178,800 to RMB 227,800.

Neta delivered 11,080 vehicles in April, which was up 25.72 percent from 8,813 units in the same month last year and up 9.84 percent from 10,087 units in March, according to data released by the company on May 1.

Neta S delivered 2,237 units in April, up 1.41 percent from 2,206 units in March, according to the company.

Neta has a sales target of 300,000 units in 2023, local media China Securities Journal reported on February 7.

The EV maker has sales of 152,073 units in 2022, up 118 percent year-on-year, including 3,456 units delivered overseas, according to data it previously announced.

($1 = RMB 7.0768)

Neta GT sports car officially launched, priced from $26,000

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Seres’ sub-brand Landian sends 1st 500 cars to overseas markets

Seres officially launched the Landian brand on March 30 and made its first model, the plug-in hybrid E5, available with technology from and .

Landian, the new energy vehicle (NEV) sub-brand of the Seres Group, began exporting vehicles, even though the new brand was officially launched only two months ago.

On May 25, Landian shipped the first 500 units of its midsize hybrid SUV Landian E5 to overseas markets, according to a press release from the brand on Sunday.

The vehicles will arrive in two weeks in markets along the "Belt and Road", Landian said.

Seres -- a key automotive partner of Chinese tech giant Huawei -- officially launched the Landian brand on March 30 and made its first model, the plug-in hybrid E5, available.

Equipped with technology from Huawei and BYD, the Landian E5 is a mid-size SUV available in 5- and 7-seat versions with a starting price of RMB 139,900 ($18,940).

The model uses the F31A 1.5L PHEV-specific engine and DHT300 electric hybrid system from BYD's FinDreams Power.

The Landian E5 also comes with Huawei's HiCar 3.0 system, a lite version of HarmonyOS for cars, but supports features including seamless connectivity with cell phones.

The Landian E5 drew strong interest from dealer partners during online presentations with overseas dealers, Landian said yesterday.

Landian literally means blue electricity in Chinese, and the brand is positioned as a builder of the Internet of Everything ecosystem in the "E era," where the letter E refers to Electric, according to Seres.

In 2023, the Landian brand will build 340 experience stores and 160 delivery centers, Seres previously said.

Seres Group sold 6,917 NEVs in April, down 19.12 percent year-on-year and 18.73 percent from March, according to data it released earlier this month.

That includes 2,953 vehicles for the Seres brand, according to the group, which did not release NEV sales for its other brands.

($1 = RMB 7.0756)

Seres unveils new NEV brand Landian and 1st model E5 with BYD, Huawei technology

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Mercedes-Benz launches EQE SUV in China, prices start at $68,660

The EQE SUV is priced at about half the price of the EQS SUV that Mercedes-Benz launched in China on February 21.

Mercedes-Benz launches EQE SUV in China, prices start at $68,660-CnEVPost

(Image credit: Mercedes-Benz)

Mercedes-Benz has launched a new electric SUV in China that is about half the price of the more expensive EQS SUV it launched earlier this year, trying to capitalize on the opportunities presented by the rapid growth of the world's largest electric vehicle (EV) market.

Mercedes-Benz's joint venture in China, Beijing Benz, let the EQE SUV go on sale on May 27, based on the EVA all-electric platform, the 12th model produced by the German luxury carmaker in China.

The vehicle is available in four versions in China, with starting prices of RMB 486,000 ($68,660), RMB 510,000, RMB 564,600 and RMB 630,600 respectively.

That price is roughly half that of the EQS SUV that Mercedes-Benz launched in China on February 21, which was offered in two versions starting at RMB 910,500 and RMB 1,100,500 at launch.

The EQE SUV measures 4,880 mm in length, 2,032 mm in width and 1,679 mm in height, with a wheelbase of 3,030 mm.

Mercedes-Benz launches EQE SUV in China, prices start at $68,660-CnEVPost

In terms of powertrain, the model is available in two versions, 350 4MATIC and 500 4MATIC, with electric motors of 215 kW and 300 kW respectively, and they accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in 6.8 seconds and 5.1 seconds respectively.

The EQE SUV comes standard with a battery pack with a capacity of 96.1 kWh and a maximum CLTC range of 613 km.

The vehicle supports a maximum charging power of 128 kW, and the minimum time required to increase the range from 10 percent to 80 percent is 48 minutes.

The vehicle supports the Adaptive Damping System Plus (ADS+) and AIRMATIC options.

Mercedes-Benz launches EQE SUV in China, prices start at $68,660-CnEVPost

For comparison, the EQS SUV measures 5,137 mm in length, 1,965 mm in width and 1,721 mm in height, and has a wheelbase of 3,210 mm. It can accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in 6.2 seconds.

The launch of the EQE SUV comes at a time when Mercedes-Benz's performance in the Chinese EV market has been lukewarm.

In the China Passenger Car Association's (CPCA) ranking of car companies' new energy vehicle (NEV) sales in China, Mercedes-Benz never made it.

On November 15, 2022, Mercedes-Benz announced a reduction in the suggested retail prices of some EQ series models by up to RMB 237,600 to boost sales.

($1 = RMB 7.0782)

Mercedes-Benz slashes EQ series prices in China by up to $33,740

Mercedes-Benz launches EQE SUV in China, prices start at $68,660-CnEVPost

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Pony.ai launches robotaxi service with no safety officer on board in Shenzhen after Guangzhou

Pony.ai has previously been approved to provide robotaxi service without a driver in the car in Beijing and Guangzhou.

(Image credit: Pony.ai)

Pony.ai, a Chinese startup backed by Toyota Motor and Capital, has brought its fully unmanned robotaxi service to yet another Chinese mega-city as it continues to advance its self-driving ambitions.

On May 29, Pony.ai received a permit in Shenzhen to conduct robotaxi services without a safety officer in the vehicle in the city's core areas, the only one to receive the permit in the city so far, according to a press release today.

Founded in late 2016, Pony.ai has established R&D centers in Silicon Valley, Guangzhou, Beijing and Shanghai, and is running robotaxi operations locally.

In late 2019, NIO Capital said it invested in Pony.ai for an undisclosed amount when it announced the completion of a more than $200 million fundraising. In February 2020, Pony.ai announced it had raised $400 million from Toyota.

Pony.ai launched the robotaxi app PonyPilot in December 2018 and received a permit to operate the robotaxi service for a fee in Beijing in November 2021.

On March 17, Pony.ai announced that it received a license in Beijing to operate fully unmanned robotaxi services within a 60-square-kilometer area in the Yizhuang Economic Development Zone.

On April 26, the company said it was granted permission to offer robotaxi service without a safety officer in the vehicle in Guangzhou, when it put 17 robotaxis into operation.

The expansion of the driverless footprint to Shenzhen confirms Pony.ai's ability to quickly roll out self-driving technology in different cities, it said.

Driverless vehicles need to undergo rigorous testing before hitting the road, including remote scenarios, extreme scenarios, safety management, network and data security, risk response, and a comprehensive assessment by experts and government departments, Pony.ai said.

Successfully passing these tests proves Pony.ai's technical prowess, it said.

To date, Pony.ai has more than 1 million kilometers of fully unmanned testing and nearly 200,000 paid travel orders, the company said.

Pony.ai starts offering robotaxi service in Guangzhou without safety officer in vehicles

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NIO opens new plant in Hefei to produce swap stations

is aiming to add 1,000 battery swap stations this year, and to make up for the lack of capacity, it decided to build a new plant in Hefei to produce them, an executive said.

(NIO Power senior vice president Shen Fei talks to the media in Shanghai in March 2023. Image credit: CnEVPost)

NIO (NYSE: NIO) has added a new factory to produce battery swap stations to support its aggressive plan to add 1,000 battery swap stations this year, which it announced three months ago.

A new battery swap station was shipped from the Hefei, Anhui plant on Friday evening, and the station was installed in Xiamen, Fujian this morning, according to NIO Power senior vice president Shen Fei.

Shen revealed the development today on Weibo, which is the first time we've seen content about NIO's new battery swap station factory in Hefei, home to two of NIO's vehicle assembly plants.

NIO decided to add 1,000 battery swap stations this year after the Chinese New Year, and to make up for the lack of capacity, the company decided to build a factory in Hefei to produce these facilities, Shen said.

It took three months from the time that decision was made to the time the first battery swap station was shipped from the plant, according to Shen.

Shen did not provide more details, but the progress appears to have been made with the help of NIO's battery swap station supplier.

Shenzhen-traded Shandong Weida Machinery, which has been supplying battery swap stations to NIO, said on March 29 that its Kunshan, Jiangsu-based subsidiary Swap had developed and delivered the third-generation battery swap stations for NIO.

Swap will continue to develop, produce and supply according to NIO's actual demand and orders in the future, Weida said at the time on an investor interactive platform.

Swap is a joint venture established in 2017 by NIO Power and Weida's industrial robotics subsidiary Demac, dedicated to the design, development, production and manufacturing of automatic battery swap systems, according to information on its official website.

It is unclear how many factories Swap has in China to produce battery swap stations for NIO, which has a factory in Hungary to produce the facility that went into operation in September 2022.

The third generation of NIO's battery swap stations was unveiled at the NIO Day 2022 event on December 24, 2022, capable of storing up to 21 packs, up from 13 for its predecessor generation and five for the first generation of the facility.

NIO announced plans at the time to add 400 battery swap stations by 2023, though that plan was raised to 1,000 on February 21.

William Li, NIO's founder, chairman and CEO, said at the time that the company would further accelerate the deployment of battery swap stations, with a goal of having more than 2,300 battery swap stations in China by the end of 2023.

Speaking at a press conference on the first day of the Shanghai auto show on April 18, Li said that NIO would add about 200 battery swap stations per month starting in June.

As of May 29, NIO had 1,432 battery swap stations in China, 383 of which are located along highways, according to data monitored by CnEVData.

The company also has 2,624 charging stations in China, providing 15,591 charging piles.

NIO swap station tracker

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Musk once laughed at BYD, but now thinks ‘their cars are highly competitive’

"That was many years ago. Their cars are highly competitive these days," Musk said.

A video of (NASDAQ: TSLA) CEO Elon Musk laughing when asked about (OTCMKTS: BYDDY) in an interview has sparked widespread discussion on social media from time to time.

Now, as the video has sparked renewed buzz on Twitter, Musk has responded.

"That was many years ago. Their cars are highly competitive these days," Musk said in a May 27 reply below a video shared by Tesla Owners Silicon Valley on Twitter.

In a 2011 interview, a Bloomberg host mentioned that Tesla began to have competitors, such as BYD, which was ramping up.

Musk laughed at those words and asked the host if she had seen BYD's cars.

Musk's reaction at the time was understandable; after all, BYD was just a Chinese car company targeting the lower end of the market in 2011 and was far less well-known than it is now.

Even in 2019, BYD's annual sales of only 461,400 units across all models are nowhere near the 2 million sales of SAIC Volkswagen in the same year.

BYD saw explosive sales growth in 2021 and stopped production and sales of vehicles powered entirely by internal combustion engines in March 2021.

BYD sold 1,863,494 new energy vehicles (NEVs) in 2022, up 208.64 percent from 603,783 in 2021.

For comparison, Tesla delivered 1,313,851 vehicles worldwide in 2022, up 40.38 percent from 935,950 in 2021.

In the first quarter of the year, BYD sold 547,917 passenger NEVs, up 92.81 percent year-on-year, including 264,647 battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and 283,270 plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEVs).

Tesla's vehicles were all BEVs, delivering 422,875 units in the first quarter, up 36.39 percent year-on-year.

Ford CEO Jim Farley expressed similar opinions on May 26, calling Chinese electric vehicle (EV) makers its main competitors in the segment.

Farley said that China has some of the best battery technology and is dominating EV production at the Morgan Stanley Sustainable Finance Summit.

He used BYD as a prime example of a Chinese automaker that has successfully developed and sold EVs, first in China and now in Europe.

"I like BYD. Totally vertically integrated, aggressive … very, very impressive company. And they were always committed to electric," Farley said when asked which company was doing the right thing in making EVs.

Tesla delivers 39,956 vehicles in China in Apr, exports 35,886 units from Shanghai plant

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