NEV startups to do battle as each pass production targets

Everything to fight for as Nio, Xpeng and Li Auto press on into next round of competition

The forerunners of Chinese new energy vehicle startups are estimated by insiders to dash into a full competition stage, as they have each rolled off or delivered their 10,000th model, which is regarded as a market confidence threshold.

Chinese NEV maker Xpeng rolled its 10,000th P7 model off the production line on Tuesday. It took less than 160 days from the launch of the first P7 in May.

"The rolling off of the 10,000th P7 not only demonstrates our self-built intelligent factory in Zhaoqing (in Guangdong province) has met the requirements of efficient production, but also shows that our flagship product the P7 has been well received by our customers," said He Xiaopeng, founder of Xpeng, auto portal Gasgoo reported.

Li Auto, also known as CHJ Automotive, announced on Oct 18 that it had delivered more than 20,000 Leading Ideal One models to customers.

From December 2019, it took the NEV startup 10 months to deliver 20,000 vehicles.

China's leading NEV maker, Nio, achieved a delivery of 10,000 units earlier than both the two rival automakers.

Statistics show that by the end of 2018, Nio delivered 11,348 units of its ES8 sport utility vehicle.

China's top-tier NEV makers also achieved delivery growth last month.

Nio delivered 4,708 cars in September, up 133.2 percent year-on-year, which is also a record high for the automaker in terms of monthly deliveries.

In the first three quarters this year, Nio delivered 26,375 cars, an increase of 113.7 percent from the same period of 2019.

Xpeng delivered 3,478 vehicles in September, up 145 percent year-on-year, marking a record high of its monthly deliveries in 2019.

Li Auto delivered 3,504 of its Leading Ideal One cars last month, up 29.3 percent month-on-month.

According to industry experts, Nio, Xpeng and Li Auto, which have crossed the threshold of 10,000 delivered vehicles, will compete in fields including services, marketing channels and technologies.

As a follow-up move after getting a 7-billion-yuan ($1.05 billion) investment from the Hefei government in April, Nio opened its China headquarters in the capital city of East China's Anhui province on Oct 9.

The NEV maker is ramping up its efforts to promote not only its core businesses－including research and development, supply chain and sales and services－but infrastructure development such as charging piles and power charging facilities.

By the end of August, the number of Nio's charging piles in China had reached 1,326.

Li Auto is accelerating its development of technology and marketing channels.

The startup reached a cooperation agreement with Nvidia, a world leader in computer technology, and the automobile electronics supplier Desay SV last month.

Based on the tripartite strategic cooperation, Li Auto will independently conduct automatic driving programming and algorithmic logic setting, in an attempt to become the first NEV maker in China to fully develop a Level 4 autonomous driving system.

At the end of September, Xpeng started the construction of an intelligent automobile plant in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

The intelligent plant is expected to be completed and put into operation by the end of 2022.

The plant will be used for Xpeng's R&D of new models, vehicle production, sales and smart mobility testing.

zhangdandan@chinadaily.com.cn