After nearly a decade of attempt, Apple recently abandoned its efforts to produce an electric car last year, eliminating a project sunken in 10 billion dollars.
But last year in China, Xiaomi Electronics launched its first electric car after only three years of development and provided 135,000 cars. He pledged to double this number in 2025.
Xiaomi’s ability to succeed as Apple could not explain how China completely dominates the supply chain of electric cars. Chinese companies mastered the manufacture of electric cars. By eavesdropping on this infrastructure, Xiaomi managed to get the ingredients quickly and secondly.
More Chinese electric vehicle companies – including Leapmotor, Li Auto and Seres Group – have started to make a profit after burning money for years in its intensive competitor to the largest car market in the world.
Xiaomi is not the only Chinese electronic consumer company that branched into electric cars. Huawei Communications Giant, targeted by the United States government, is working on sanctions and legal procedures for years, to the establishment of independent leadership programs. Huawei has cooperated with many Chinese auto manufacturers, including Seic Motor, Baic and Chery.
Xiaomi has long been compared to Apple. It has made bets that their competitors rushed to a tradition, such as selling its low -cost phones mainly with a high -design. Its CEO, Lei Jun, to wear like the co -founder of Apple Steve Jobs, in jeans and a black shirt, for the first time on the Xiaomi phone in 2011.
The first electric car from Xiaomi was brought in last March: SU7, a four -door sedan with artificial intelligence features that could help in parking lots, operate movies for passengers and Xiaomi home appliances from the road. Mr. Lee said his goal is that he is performing like Porsche. But at $ 30,000, it’s a quarter of the price.
Xiaomi manufactures all types of electronics, from robot vacuum cleaners to air conditioners, which are connected through the operating system and controlling them in their application. SU7, in some aspects, just another tool. It can use the data collected from other devices about the daily driver’s routine to determine the best time to charge the car batteries.
“Xiaomi has really started to infiltrate your home,” said Gary Ng, an economist at Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking. “Everything is linked together, and this is something that other companies cannot do.”
While SU7 got only Xiaomi only a small part of sales of the best electric car makers in China, it places Xiaomi between Chinese companies that deal with a major blow to driving foreign car manufacturers on the Chinese market for premium cars. In the year when SU7 has passed for sale, delivery operations in Porsche in China decreased by approximately 30 percent.
On Thursday night in Beijing, Xiaomi released an upscale version, SU7 Ultra, along with a distinct version of its latest smartphone. The company organized a flashy humor for the car by Preliminary About the Nürburgring race in Germany, where, as Xiaomi said, he set a record for “the fastest sedan with four doors”.
Xiaomi also plans to issue a sporty facility, this year, according to the organizational stadiums in China.
Chinese electric car companies have benefited from government support billions of dollars, which helped them control the supply chain to the same minerals inside the car batteries. This early edge helped two Chinese, BYD and Aperex Technology – known as Catl and add it to the list of Chinese military companies in the Pentagon in January – the largest electric battery maker in the world.
Xiaomi used this supply chain in its favor. Its cars have BYD and Catl batteries. She managed to start quickly to produce SU7 in a company factory, and building workers in Beijing work around the clock on a second factory.
All of this manufacturing capacity helps Chinese electric car companies to move from development to production in a much lower time than traditional car manufacturers in China, allowing them to provide new marketing models quickly and focus on making programs that can constantly update them.
Intensive competition at home has prompted many Chinese car makers to flood the global car market with reasonable prices. Last year, BYD sold more than four million new cars worldwide.
Cui Dongshu, Secretary -General of the China Automotive Association for Passengers, said it is a matter of time before Xiaomi cars were on the road outside China.
Xiaomi’s popularity gave it as a manufacturer of all types of consumer electronics well of knowledge about Chinese consumer preferences. On the first day, SU7S has been delivered, buyers can go to the Xiaomi App Store and get accessories to deceive cars, such as analog dashboard watch and a set of physical switches attached to the touchpad.
“The strength of the brand places Xiaomi before many competitors,” said Tu Lu, Managing Director of Sino Auto Insights. “This is what it takes to sell cars worldwide, because it is not just a consumer product, it is an emotional product.”