The comments come after a digital rendering of what looks like a modern all-electric Beetle surfaced online.
Category: eMobility
Lordstown Motors Files For Bankruptcy, Sues Foxconn For “Bad Faith”
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Changan teases electric sedan under new brand
The Qiyuan A07 is a mid to large-size sedan that will be offered in BEV and EREV versions, a previous regulatory filing shows.
(Image credit: Changan Qiyuan)
Chinese auto giant Changan Automobile is upping its bets in the electric vehicle (EV) segment, starting the warm-up for a new sub-brand and its first model.
The Changan sub-brand, called Qiyuan (启源), today posted several images on Weibo about the Qiyuan A07, showing exterior and interior design details of the sedan.
It is worth noting that Changan has not yet officially launched the Qiyuan brand, which has recently registered accounts on several social media platforms.
Yesterday, Qiyuan posted its first Weibo post, a preview video of the Qiyuan A07.
Qiyuan did not reveal more information about the A07, although the model previously entered a filing catalog of the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.
The Qiyuan A07 is a mid to large-size sedan with a length, width and height of 4,905 mm, 1,910 mm and 1,480 mm, respectively, and a wheelbase of 2,900 mm, according to the filing.
The dimensions are slightly smaller than BYD's flagship sedan, the Han EV, which measures 4,995 mm in length, 1,910 mm in width and 1,495 mm in height, with a wheelbase of 2,920 mm.
Similar to Changan's other sub-brand Deepal, the Qiyuan A07 will be available in battery electric vehicle (BEV) and extended-range electric vehicle (EREV) versions.
The Qiyuan A07 BEV has an electric motor with a peak power of 190 kW, the same as the Deepal SL03 BEV. The Qiyuan A07 EREV has a peak electric motor of 160 kW, the same range-extender as the Deepal SL03, and a displacement of 1.5L with a power of 70 kW.
The Qiyuan A07 BEV is equipped with battery packs with capacities of 58.1 kWh and 79.97 kWh, respectively, with CLTC ranges of 515 km and 710 km. The Qiyuan A07 EREV is equipped with a 28.39 kWh battery pack with a battery range of 170 km.
Changan sold 244,996 units in May, including joint venture brands, with new energy vehicles (NEVs) contributing 35,934 units, or 14.7 percent, according to figures it announced earlier this month.
Deepal sold 7,021 units in May, bringing January-May sales to 33,585 units.
Changan's EV brand Deepal launches S7 SUV at about half price of Tesla Model Y
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Chinese self-driving truck startup sued by Pony reportedly winding down
Just 19 months old, Qingtian Truck is nearing a shutdown and employees have been dismissed, according to local media.
(Image from Qingtian Truck website)
A Chinese self-driving truck startup that was previously sued by Pony.ai is reportedly winding down, the latest setback seen in the space.
Just 19 months old, Qingtian Truck is nearing a shutdown, with employees having been displaced and its operating entity facing liquidation, according to a report by local media outlet Jiemian today.
Qingtian Truck's engineers have also been leaving the company, the report said, citing self-driving industry sources.
The company's registration information has not yet changed and its operating status remains intact, although its website has not been updated with company news since January, the report noted.
Qingtian Truck was founded in Beijing in November 2021 to work on self-driving truck technology.
It received an angel funding round of nearly $10 million from 5Y Capital, the only round it has disclosed, just two and a half months after its founding.
In August 2022, Pony.ai, a self-driving startup backed by Toyota Motor and Nio Capital, sued Qingtian Truck and its key executives, Pan Zhenhao and Sun Youhan, alleging that the latter had infringed on Pony.ai's trade secrets.
Pan and Sun are two of the founders of Qingtian Truck and had worked for Pony.ai.
Pony.ai asked the court to order Qingtian Truck to stop infringing on its trade secrets and ask it to pay economic damages and expenses totaling RMB 60 million ($8.3 million).
In April, Qingtian Truck filed a countersuit against Pony.ai, claiming that the latter had abused its intellectual property rights and engaged in unfair competition.
In June, the two announced that they had reached a settlement, each withdrawing its lawsuit against the other.
It's unclear what the main reason is for the current woes facing Qingtian Truck, but investors appear to be increasingly cautious about the prospects for commercialization in the autonomous driving space at a time of slowing economic growth in China.
On May 15, Shanghai Securities News reported that e-commerce giant Alibaba's DAMO Academy is no longer retaining its autonomous driving business and team, which is being fully integrated into its logistics arm Cainiao.
This means that Alibaba's self-driving business is entering a whole new phase of moving from cutting-edge technology exploration in the lab to applications in real-world scenarios, the report noted.
($1 = RMB 7.2135)
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Great Wall Motor steps up electrification transition as Tank brand launches 1st NEV model
The Tank brand has launched its first NEV model, the Tank 500 Hi4-T. The brand has sold more than 10,000 fuel-powered vehicles in most months of the past year.
(Image credit: Great Wall Motor)
Great Wall Motor is continuing its electrification transition, though it has fallen significantly behind major rivals, including BYD (OTCMKTS: BYDDY).
The automaker's personalized brand Tank officially launched the Tank 500 Hi4-T, the brand's first new energy vehicle (NEV) model, at an event yesterday, with only one version available and a starting price of RMB 335,000 ($46,290).
The Tank 500 Hi4-T is the plug-in hybrid vehicle (PHEV) version of the fuel-powered Tank 500 which is offered in nine versions with a starting price range of RMB 335,000 to RMB 395,000.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T's starting price of RMB 335,000 means that Tank is essentially phasing out the lower-trim versions of the Tank 500 with this PHEV model in order to gain a larger presence in the NEV market.
Tank's current models are all off-road SUVs, including the Tank 500 and the less expensive Tank 300.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T measures 5,078 mm in length, 1,934 mm in width and 1,905 mm in height, and has a wheelbase of 2,850 mm, which are essentially the same dimensions as the fuel-powered Tank 500, except for a slightly longer length than the latter's 5,070 mm.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T is powered by a 2.0T engine with a maximum power of 180 kW and a peak torque of 380 Nm, and an electric motor with a maximum power of 120 kW and a maximum torque of 400 Nm.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T has a combined power of 300 kW and 750 Nm of peak torque, and can accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h in 6.9 seconds.
The model is equipped with a ternary lithium-ion battery pack with a capacity of 37.1 kWh and has a pure electric range of 120 km in NEDC and 110 km in WLTC.
It supports fast charging, taking 24 minutes to charge from 30 percent to 80 percent and 42 minutes to recharge from 30 percent to 100 percent.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T has a fuel tank of 70 L and consumes 9.55 L per 100 km at the lowest charge under WLTC standards.
Powered by this powertrain, the Tank 500 Hi4-T has a combined WLTC fuel consumption of 2.2 L per 100 km.
Like the current mainstream NEV models, the Tank 500 Hi4-T is equipped with L2 driving assistance system with functions including smart parking, adaptive cruise control, lane assist, collision warning and automatic braking.
The Tank 500 Hi4-T show cars and vehicles used for test drives are already available at Great Wall Motor's stores.
Great Wall Motor is one of the most successful local car companies in China, but is clearly lagging behind in the NEV market.
In the past few months, Great Wall Motor has increased its efforts in the NEV market with the launch of several products including the Lanshan DHT-PHEV and the Haval Xiaolong.
Great Wall Motor sold a record 23,755 units of NEVs in May, up 104.13 percent year-on-year and up 59.83 percent from 14,863 units in April, according to data released earlier this month.
Including conventional fuel vehicles, Great Wall Motor's total sales in May were 101,020 units, up 26.18 percent year-on-year and up 8.49 percent from 93,107 units in April.
This means that NEVs contributed 23.5 percent of Great Wall Motor's sales in May.
As a comparison, its main competitor BYD stopped production and sales of vehicles powered entirely by internal combustion engines in March 2022 and switched to focus on producing plug-in hybrids and pure electric vehicles.
BYD sold 240,220 NEVs in May, up 108.99 percent year-on-year and up 14.23 percent from April.
The success of the Tank line of off-road SUVs over the past few years and the lesser competition they face may be one of the reasons for the brand's slow transition to electrification.
The Tank brand has sold more than 10,000 units per month over the past year, except for January and February of this year, when it sold 5,915 and 6,344 units, respectively.
($1 = RMB 7.2376)
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