Chinese company Xiaomi is all set to reveal its first and highly anticipated electric vehicle (EV) on Thursday. It will reveal its pricing and start taking orders, marking the electronics company’s entry into the world of automobiles. The world’s third largest smartphone vendor has hinted that its car will be priced below 500,000 yuan (USD 69,170.64).
The electronic giant’s entry into the Chinese auto space comes at a time when China’s auto market, the world’s biggest, is battling challenges on several fronts, including a price war and a slowing domestic economy that has affected car demand.
The Xiaomi SU7 SUV has already been displayed in seventy-six stores in 29 Chinese cities and people have prima facie compared it with Porsche Taycan and Panamera sports car models. Xiaomi unveiled the car in December last year and the anticipation for the vehicle has been building up since then. The company announced that it aims to become one of the world’s top five automakers and has touted the SU7 to have technology capable of delivering acceleration better than Tesla and Porsche’s EVs.
The impending launch fulfills an ambition of Xiaomi‘s CEO and founder Lei Jun, who announced the company’s foray into EVs in 2021. He pledged to invest USD 10 billion in its auto business, describing it as “the last major entrepreneurship project” of his life.
The company’s manufacturing partner is the state-owned automaker BAIC Group while the SU7 is short for Speed Ultra 7. While analysts have been split on the success of Xiaomi’s car project, some say it is a natural extension for Xiaomi – whose rice cookers, air purifiers, and other electronics are quite popular in Chinese homes. It also allows the company to offer its users a more seamless digital experience and to collect more data.
Bill Russo, CEO of Shanghai-based advisory firm Automobility, said, “In China’s digitally oriented car market, “there are no better companies at knowing how to monetise screens than mobile device companies.” However, this will be a departure from the company’s image as an affordable brand as the SU7 will be “a bit expensive”.
Some analysts have estimated that the car will be priced at 200,000 to 300,000 yuan (USD 27,668.26 to USD 41,502.39) or above. “Can (Chinese consumers) take that leap psychologically from mass-market, cool, inexpensive consumer products and home products to premium EV?” asked Tu Le, founder of consultancy Sino Auto Insights, noting that most of the vehicles sold in China are below 300,000 yuan.