The German Chancellery already refused to include the former head of the Federation of German Industries (BDI) on the last China visit. Olaf Scholz never officially explained the decision. However, word behind the scenes was that the Chinese hosts did not want the BDI on the trip. One possible reason: The BDI had called for a critical approach to China in a strategy paper. This time, the BDI did not even try to join. It is a regrettable situation, as it clearly demonstrates a successful act of revenge by the Chinese side and a sign of the German Chancellor’s weakness by apparently allowing himself to be told who to take with him on his trips and who not.
In contrast, the sales managers at Xpeng appear much more confident. The Chinese EV manufacturer, which already cooperates with Volkswagen in China, has launched its German business. Xpeng plans to offer the P7 and G9 in Germany in early May. Julia Fiedler was at the German launch and took a closer look at the saloon and the mid-range SUV.
When German Chancellor Olaf Scholz travels to Beijing on April 15, he will not be joined by a Federation of German Industries (BDI) representative. As Table.Briefings has learned from political and business circles, the BDI has not even applied to participate this time.
The Chancellery declined to include a BDI representative on the most recent official China visit in November 2022. No official reason was given. However, the background at the time was that the Chinese hosts did not want the BDI to attend. The association had previously expressed increasing criticism of China.
This was the first time in the German government’s history that a BDI representative was barred from traveling to China despite the Chancellor’s explicit wish. The reason the BDI apparently did not submit an application this time is likely to be that the powerful industry association did not want to embarrass itself with another rejection by the Chancellery, according to people familiar with the matter.
Scholz will be accompanied on his trip to China by three German federal ministers. As first reported by Handelsblatt, according to several people familiar with the travel plans, Environment Minister Steffi Lemke (Green Party), Agriculture Minister Cem Ozdemir (Green Party) and Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) will join him. Such an array of federal ministers is unusual and usually only occurs as part of government consultations.
The presence of Ozdemir, Lemke and Wissing clearly shows that the German government sees opportunities for cooperation with the People’s Republic in the areas of climate and the environment, as well as transport policy. Environment Minister Lemke signed a declaration of intent on cooperation on environmental and climate issues with the Chinese Environment Minister at last summer’s German-Chinese intergovernmental consultations.
Transport Minister Wissing recently campaigned in the German government to not completely exclude the Chinese telecommunication supplier Huawei from the rollout of Germany’s 5G network.
As expected, Scholz will also be accompanied by leading representatives of the German economy. Participants include Siemens CEO, Roland Busch. As the company announced, he will also take part in the trip as Chairman and President of the Asia-Pacific Committee of German Business. According to information from Table.Briefings, the CEOs of
will also be there. Mercedes-Benz confirmed that CEO Ola Kaellenius will be attending. Mercedes counts China’s Beijing Automotive Group Co Ltd and Geely’s Chairman Li Shufu among its two main shareholders. Also registered is Belen Garijo, CEO of Merck KGaA, a manufacturer of laboratory equipment and semiconductor chemicals.
In 2019, the BDI published a strategy paper calling for a critical approach to China. This paper was not least one of the foundations for Germany’s China strategy, passed by the government last year after lengthy internal debates. In it, China is no longer just described as a partner, but also as a competitor and systemic rival. “Excessive dependence on one market is always associated with economic and political risks,” it says.
However, the BDI’s consistent de-risking approach went beyond what was planned at corporate headquarters. Volkswagen, BASF and numerous other DAX companies even want to invest more than ever in China. This way, they are hedging against trade risks and strengthening their position in the world’s largest market.
In late October 2022, the association went even further. In a policy paper on European sovereignty, China was again mentioned frequently – as a source of risk. It called China an autocracy, and the dependence on Chinese raw materials was in part higher than the gas dependence on Russia. It also argued that a secure supply would depend on China not continuing to be the dominant supplier of solar cells.
Scholz intends to travel to Beijing under positive auspices, as he also has some wishes. One issue will again be Russia, Noah Barkin from the German Marshall Fund told Table.Briefings. He said that China has always stretched the EU’s red lines when it comes to supplying Russia with military goods, but there are signs that the Europeans’ patience is now wearing thin. Scholz is facing a “difficult conversation” with President Xi Jinping. “Europe cannot maintain normal relations with Beijing as long as it feeds the Russian war machine.”
As Europe’s envoy, Scholz will probably also address China’s cheap exports due to overcapacity. Trade has tended to become more lopsided in recent years. Instead of balancing each other out, Europe’s deficits and China’s surpluses have increased. China experiences unemployment and low prices and exports more goods than ever before. Scholz wants to emphasize that “a flood of cheap exports to the European market will provoke a political response,” Barkin said.
Xpeng Motors from Guangzhou will launch the P7 saloon and the G9 mid-size SUV on the German market on May 1. Both cars can already be configured on their website and booked for a test drive. The test drives are made at dealerships, as Xpeng relies on the classic dealer model to sell its cars.
Aside from the cars, the focus was on one topic in particular: sales. Xpeng wants to avoid mistakes that lead to low sales figures for many other Chinese newcomers. The brand offers its cars through car dealerships, and Xpeng plans to be represented at 24 locations by the time sales start in May. The manufacturer thus relies on a distribution model that has already brought another Chinese manufacturer success: MG Motor.
Quality service and the availability of spare parts are some of the biggest concerns of car buyers interested in a Chinese EV brand. Markus Schrick, Managing Director for Xpeng Germany, aims to dispel these concerns through dealership sales. As Managing Director, he has already helped promote Hyundai’s growth in Germany and plans a down-to-earth approach for Xpeng.
However, for the plan to work, the brand needs to get as many partners on board as quickly as possible. This is a significant challenge, as the dealers are expected to display a vehicle brand in their showroom that many of them have never heard of and whose long-term potential for success they can hardly assess. On top of this, there is the threat of possible EU punitive tariffs, with the consequences for Chinese EV manufacturers-and therefore also their distributors-not yet foreseeable.
Xpeng tries to make it as appealing as possible for dealers to get on board. While most car brands specify in great detail what the display area for their vehicles must look like, Xpeng keeps the requirements low and is content with just a few logos and advertising pylons. Head of Germany, Markus Schrick, hopes that the deal between Xpeng and VW will also create trust among dealers. “If a company like VW decides to cooperate with Xpeng, they have analyzed it really well.” Volkswagen acquired almost five percent of Xpeng last year and invested 700 million US dollars. In return, Xpeng will develop two VW models for the Chinese market by 2026.
Xpeng is still a start-up and running at a loss. In 2023, the company sold 140,000 cars. Yet the factories in China can already build up to 600,000 vehicles a year. How many of these will end up in Germany? Markus Schrick does not want to set a number. The target is three percent in each segment in which the brand competes.
However, the competition in these segments is fierce. In terms of size, the upper mid-range saloon P7 is somewhere between Tesla’s Model 3 and Model S. Xpeng positions the G9 luxury SUV against models from traditional German brands. Will the G9 stand a chance against cars such as the Audi Q8 e-tron, BMW iX, and Mercedes EQE?
Both models have been on the Chinese market for some time. The P7 was launched in China in 2020 and received a facelift in 2023. It is also available in Germany. The entry-level Long Range Edition with rear-wheel drive costs just under 50,000 euros, but according to WLTP, it puts 276 hp on the road and has a range of 576 km. There is also an all-wheel drive version with 473 hp and a range of 505 km. Those who prefer an eccentric look can also opt for gullwing doors.
The G9 luxury SUV has been available in China since 2022. Starting at 57,600 euros, it is much cheaper than the German competition while offering 312 hp with rear-wheel drive and a range of 460 kilometers. A variant with all-wheel drive, 550 hp, and a range of 520 km is also possible. A smaller SUV is set to follow in 2025 and a compact car in 2026.
The G9 is based on an 800 V platform with a very fast charging capacity of 300 kW. With a suitable charging station, the battery can supposedly be charged from 20 to 80 percent in just 15 minutes. Apart from the charging technology, the car already comes with all the hardware for autonomous driving. Even if this will not be possible in Germany in the foreseeable future.
The P7 and G9 often emit warning sounds when driving, and the reason for this is the driving pleasure. Their handling is excellent, and both models’ acceleration is impressive. However, even slightly exceeding the speed limit triggers a warning beep. The cars’ look, feel, and features make up for their overly cautious nannying.
Xpeng has lined the interior with high-quality materials. Luxurious details include a panoramic glass roof, large displays, seat heating and an intelligent voice control system that even recognizes which seat the person currently speaking to is sitting in. However, the voice control currently only responds in English. The launch edition of the G9 SUV includes front and rear massage seats. There is also an extra screen for the front passenger to watch TV.
In addition to service, driving performance and extras, customers talking to their car dealer are likely to be interested in one question: How do you pronounce it? The answer: Just as it is spelled. The word Xpeng is an abbreviation of the name of Xpeng CEO He Xiaopeng, a tech billionaire born in Hubei in 1977. He founded the internet company UCWeb in 2004, which was acquired by Alibaba ten years later in China’s largest M&A deal. In the same year, 2014, He co-founded Xpeng – a company for autonomous electric vehicles
Xpeng positions itself as a tech innovation brand. To ensure that German journalists understand this, the Chinese company brought an aircraft to the driving event in Germany – the Xpeng X2 passenger drone. The small quadcopter can transport people and baggage weighing up to 200 kilograms and already has a limited flight license in China. Xpeng also has a flying car, which the Chinese presented at the CES electronics trade fair at the beginning of the year. It is a sports car with four large propeller arms that fold from the roof. While it looks like science fiction and the first flight videos inspire little confidence, the vehicle is expected to be available to order in China by the end of 2024.
Xpeng also invests in the development of driver assistance systems. The XNGP system competes with Tesla’s autopilot. Unlike the latter, however, it relies on cameras and uses lidar and radar sensors. It is designed to work even in the most chaotic city traffic and has recently become available for all of China. While the driver’s hands still have to be close to the steering wheel, the G9 SUV has been granted a test license for fully autonomous driving as a robotaxi in Guangzhou since last summer.
Beijing’s battalions of officially mandated internet watchdogs have sophisticated censorship methods at their disposal to ensure that online criticism and problematic revelations quickly disappear from the web. However, tech-savvy bloggers constantly find new ways to bypass the tight controls. Since 2021, an activist who calls himself “Teacher Li” 李老师 has been helping them from overseas to understand the true situation in the country. Millions read his posts, which have earned him legendary status in China.
“Teacher Li is not your teacher” 李老师不是你老师@whyyoutouzhele is the name of Li’s Twitter (X) account, which keeps tricking the censors. Subversive online news they believed to have successfully deleted is swiftly returned to their inbox.
The person behind it is a Chinese artist who has lived in Italy since 2015. Li Ying (李颖), now 31, revealed his identity in an interview with New York Times journalist Li Yang in late 2023. Teacher Li is not a typical exiled dissident who attacks China’s leadership from the outside. He is far more dangerous because he has turned his Twitter account into a virtual helpline for the people of China.
He receives daily news and posts from many provinces of the People’s Republic, raw snapshots, and eyewitness accounts of injustice, protests, or absurdities. These often are screenshots that other bloggers take of domestic WeChats and video clips before censorship strikes.
Li receives them, sorts them, evaluates their credibility and usually forwards them as tweets without comment. For Geremie R. Barmé, who portrayed him for “China Heritage” together with reporter Li Yuan, Li operates a “clearing house for unofficial information.” His pseudonym follows the Taoist wisdom: “The teacher who is no teacher is truly a teacher.”
In 2021, Li initially used his Sina Weibo account within China for such posts. Censorship blocked him. Other bloggers then sent him their mobile phone numbers so that he could register a new account. After 49 accounts were censored, he opened his Twitter page in April 2022 – a foreign account that China’s censors could not touch.
Although Twitter access is blocked in China, privileged users and millions of tech-savvy bloggers use VPN (proxy) servers to bypass the infamous Great Firewall. Li’s Twitter following grew to 1.6 million readers in early 2024. Many share his posts with their friends and acquaintances.
For example, China and the rest of the world quickly learned about Shanghai’s “White Paper” anti-COVID protest movement and recently about many spontaneous expressions of condolence in response to the death of ex-Premier Li Keqiang. Eyewitnesses and those involved reported accidents, misfortunes, or administrative injustices that China’s state media were not allowed to cover.
The censors were so helpless and angry that they started locating and summoning followers of Lis’ tweets individually to deter them. The teacher himself is also feeling the pressure. His parents are being harassed, and even in Italy, he has to fear for his safety and has already moved four times.
The need for a counter-publicity is growing in China’s opaque, highly censored news situation. Li’s posts come at just the right time. In mid-March, he published a list of the latest absurdities in the cult of personality surrounding China’s current leader, Xi Jinping. Bloggers have investigated how often he allows himself to be praised by the official party media as the nation’s mastermind who leads the way. They sent Li a list of 243 examples that had appeared between 2015 and 2024.
The list begins with the official announcement on November 12, 2015, that Party leader Xi is “guiding the future development of the stock market” (为股票市场未来发展指明方向). And it ends with this news from March 11, 2024: Xi shows us the way to overcome the bottlenecks in the development of the new qualitative productive forces (为打通束缚新质生产力发展堵点指明方向).
The more power Xi was able to transfer to himself after 2015 at the two major Party Congresses in 2017 and 2022, the more often the Party media praised him as the ultimate guide and advisor for every conceivable problem. Bloggers mockingly call Xi the personified “chief compass” of the country: “Just like Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao, Xi will also show us the way to hell.”
The founding father of the People’s Republic, Mao Zedong, once condemned such exaggerated adulation in revolutionary times. In his 1942 speech “Against Stereotypes,” he castigated his functionaries’ empty, theoretical ramblings, saying that their Party language was alienating them from the people.
Mao compared their writings to the essays that were required of candidates in the Confucian-influenced imperial civil service exams of the Ming and Qing periods. They would fail if they did not strictly adhere to a set “eight-legged writing scheme” (八股文). Mao also criticized the functionaries for filling “endless pages with empty words without substance” (空话连篇, 言之无物), “puffing them up to intimidate others (装腔作势, 借以吓人).” Their essays, Mao scolded, were like the bandages once used to constrict women’s feet, “long and foul-smelling 真是” – “懒婆娘的裹脚，又长又臭”.
Even when Mao lapsed into his own cult of personality, he still urged his Party to avoid stereotypical formalism and bureaucratism and to criticize and self-criticism. However, this was no longer meant seriously and was merely lip service, just as his political grandson Xi Jinping is imitating him today to maintain his power. Under his wing, the theoretical excesses of Chinese Party propagandists have become even more repetitive and incomprehensible.
And yet sometimes explosive messages are hidden in Xi’s ideological gibberish of today. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to read and understand them between the lines because Xi only allows his essays to be published months or years later and only in selected excerpts.
One such example is a previously unknown speech by Xi, which the Party’s leading theoretical magazine printed for the first time on March 15, 2024. Xi gave the speech 14 months ago, on January 9, 2023, on issues of Party discipline. This was shortly after he previously claimed his lifelong rule and absolute Party leadership at the 20th Party Congress.
Instead of triumphing, Xi appears surprisingly nervous about his internal Party problems. Without mentioning names, he complains: “It is easy for some people to form small cliques, circles and gangs” (些人容易出现搞小山头、小圈子、小嘮伙现象) and warns that “it is easy to destroy a fortress from within. Those who can achieve this can only come from within our own ranks.” (堡垒最容易从内部被攻破，能打败我们的只有我们自己)。
In a special “criticism and self-criticism” session on 21 and 22 December 2023, Xi also showed his dissatisfaction when he apparently accused his Politburo comrades of being an echo chamber and not telling him the truth. The meeting went unnoticed outside of China because it was Christmas, and Xi’s speech was only published as a summary.
However, it does say: Xi expects his Politburo to “present the true situation in a timely and objective manner and to describe not only the positive but also the troubling (… ) and not be deceived by external beauty and false figures” (对工作中了解到的真实情况，要及时客观全面反映上来，不能只报喜、不报忧 … 反对华而不实、数据造假).
These few published quotes at least show that, since early 2023, Xi’s main aim has been to prioritize his regime’s political and systemic security over growth and the economy. We now know for a fact just how bad the People’s Republic’s economy was after the abrupt end of the pandemic in 2023.
We also know about Xi’s domestic political disaster, when he had his foreign and defense ministers and high-ranking military officers disappear overnight, unexplained to this day. Beijing’s propaganda only retrospectively reveals the state of China and its leadership in homeopathic quantities. The loss of transparency is a hallmark of the new era of Xi’s rule. The art of reading between the lines no longer helps. All the more reason why Teacher Li’s tweets are so popular.
Before the taste buds can savor it, it is already a feast for the eyes. The hard work of the farmworkers at the tea planting station in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, makes for a colorful sight. The mostly female pickers only pluck the two finest leaves and the leaf bud and carry them in their basket or a cloth to the collection point. Only the later processing stage decides whether the leaves will become green or black tea.
The German Chancellery already refused to include the former head of the Federation of German Industries (BDI) on the last China visit. Olaf Scholz never officially explained the decision. However, word behind the scenes was that the Chinese hosts did not want the BDI on the trip. One possible reason: The BDI had called for a critical approach to China in a strategy paper. This time, the BDI did not even try to join. It is a regrettable situation, as it clearly demonstrates a successful act of revenge by the Chinese side and a sign of the German Chancellor’s weakness by apparently allowing himself to be told who to take with him on his trips and who not.
In contrast, the sales managers at Xpeng appear much more confident. The Chinese EV manufacturer, which already cooperates with Volkswagen in China, has launched its German business. Xpeng plans to offer the P7 and G9 in Germany in early May. Julia Fiedler was at the German launch and took a closer look at the saloon and the mid-range SUV.
When German Chancellor Olaf Scholz travels to Beijing on April 15, he will not be joined by a Federation of German Industries (BDI) representative. As Table.Briefings has learned from political and business circles, the BDI has not even applied to participate this time.
The Chancellery declined to include a BDI representative on the most recent official China visit in November 2022. No official reason was given. However, the background at the time was that the Chinese hosts did not want the BDI to attend. The association had previously expressed increasing criticism of China.
This was the first time in the German government’s history that a BDI representative was barred from traveling to China despite the Chancellor’s explicit wish. The reason the BDI apparently did not submit an application this time is likely to be that the powerful industry association did not want to embarrass itself with another rejection by the Chancellery, according to people familiar with the matter.
Scholz will be accompanied on his trip to China by three German federal ministers. As first reported by Handelsblatt, according to several people familiar with the travel plans, Environment Minister Steffi Lemke (Green Party), Agriculture Minister Cem Ozdemir (Green Party) and Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) will join him. Such an array of federal ministers is unusual and usually only occurs as part of government consultations.
The presence of Ozdemir, Lemke and Wissing clearly shows that the German government sees opportunities for cooperation with the People’s Republic in the areas of climate and the environment, as well as transport policy. Environment Minister Lemke signed a declaration of intent on cooperation on environmental and climate issues with the Chinese Environment Minister at last summer’s German-Chinese intergovernmental consultations.
Transport Minister Wissing recently campaigned in the German government to not completely exclude the Chinese telecommunication supplier Huawei from the rollout of Germany’s 5G network.
As expected, Scholz will also be accompanied by leading representatives of the German economy. Participants include Siemens CEO, Roland Busch. As the company announced, he will also take part in the trip as Chairman and President of the Asia-Pacific Committee of German Business. According to information from Table.Briefings, the CEOs of
will also be there. Mercedes-Benz confirmed that CEO Ola Kaellenius will be attending. Mercedes counts China’s Beijing Automotive Group Co Ltd and Geely’s Chairman Li Shufu among its two main shareholders. Also registered is Belen Garijo, CEO of Merck KGaA, a manufacturer of laboratory equipment and semiconductor chemicals.
In 2019, the BDI published a strategy paper calling for a critical approach to China. This paper was not least one of the foundations for Germany’s China strategy, passed by the government last year after lengthy internal debates. In it, China is no longer just described as a partner, but also as a competitor and systemic rival. “Excessive dependence on one market is always associated with economic and political risks,” it says.
However, the BDI’s consistent de-risking approach went beyond what was planned at corporate headquarters. Volkswagen, BASF and numerous other DAX companies even want to invest more than ever in China. This way, they are hedging against trade risks and strengthening their position in the world’s largest market.
In late October 2022, the association went even further. In a policy paper on European sovereignty, China was again mentioned frequently – as a source of risk. It called China an autocracy, and the dependence on Chinese raw materials was in part higher than the gas dependence on Russia. It also argued that a secure supply would depend on China not continuing to be the dominant supplier of solar cells.
Scholz intends to travel to Beijing under positive auspices, as he also has some wishes. One issue will again be Russia, Noah Barkin from the German Marshall Fund told Table.Briefings. He said that China has always stretched the EU’s red lines when it comes to supplying Russia with military goods, but there are signs that the Europeans’ patience is now wearing thin. Scholz is facing a “difficult conversation” with President Xi Jinping. “Europe cannot maintain normal relations with Beijing as long as it feeds the Russian war machine.”
As Europe’s envoy, Scholz will probably also address China’s cheap exports due to overcapacity. Trade has tended to become more lopsided in recent years. Instead of balancing each other out, Europe’s deficits and China’s surpluses have increased. China experiences unemployment and low prices and exports more goods than ever before. Scholz wants to emphasize that “a flood of cheap exports to the European market will provoke a political response,” Barkin said.
Xpeng Motors from Guangzhou will launch the P7 saloon and the G9 mid-size SUV on the German market on May 1. Both cars can already be configured on their website and booked for a test drive. The test drives are made at dealerships, as Xpeng relies on the classic dealer model to sell its cars.
Aside from the cars, the focus was on one topic in particular: sales. Xpeng wants to avoid mistakes that lead to low sales figures for many other Chinese newcomers. The brand offers its cars through car dealerships, and Xpeng plans to be represented at 24 locations by the time sales start in May. The manufacturer thus relies on a distribution model that has already brought another Chinese manufacturer success: MG Motor.
Quality service and the availability of spare parts are some of the biggest concerns of car buyers interested in a Chinese EV brand. Markus Schrick, Managing Director for Xpeng Germany, aims to dispel these concerns through dealership sales. As Managing Director, he has already helped promote Hyundai’s growth in Germany and plans a down-to-earth approach for Xpeng.
However, for the plan to work, the brand needs to get as many partners on board as quickly as possible. This is a significant challenge, as the dealers are expected to display a vehicle brand in their showroom that many of them have never heard of and whose long-term potential for success they can hardly assess. On top of this, there is the threat of possible EU punitive tariffs, with the consequences for Chinese EV manufacturers-and therefore also their distributors-not yet foreseeable.
Xpeng tries to make it as appealing as possible for dealers to get on board. While most car brands specify in great detail what the display area for their vehicles must look like, Xpeng keeps the requirements low and is content with just a few logos and advertising pylons. Head of Germany, Markus Schrick, hopes that the deal between Xpeng and VW will also create trust among dealers. “If a company like VW decides to cooperate with Xpeng, they have analyzed it really well.” Volkswagen acquired almost five percent of Xpeng last year and invested 700 million US dollars. In return, Xpeng will develop two VW models for the Chinese market by 2026.
Xpeng is still a start-up and running at a loss. In 2023, the company sold 140,000 cars. Yet the factories in China can already build up to 600,000 vehicles a year. How many of these will end up in Germany? Markus Schrick does not want to set a number. The target is three percent in each segment in which the brand competes.
However, the competition in these segments is fierce. In terms of size, the upper mid-range saloon P7 is somewhere between Tesla’s Model 3 and Model S. Xpeng positions the G9 luxury SUV against models from traditional German brands. Will the G9 stand a chance against cars such as the Audi Q8 e-tron, BMW iX, and Mercedes EQE?
Both models have been on the Chinese market for some time. The P7 was launched in China in 2020 and received a facelift in 2023. It is also available in Germany. The entry-level Long Range Edition with rear-wheel drive costs just under 50,000 euros, but according to WLTP, it puts 276 hp on the road and has a range of 576 km. There is also an all-wheel drive version with 473 hp and a range of 505 km. Those who prefer an eccentric look can also opt for gullwing doors.
The G9 luxury SUV has been available in China since 2022. Starting at 57,600 euros, it is much cheaper than the German competition while offering 312 hp with rear-wheel drive and a range of 460 kilometers. A variant with all-wheel drive, 550 hp, and a range of 520 km is also possible. A smaller SUV is set to follow in 2025 and a compact car in 2026.
The G9 is based on an 800 V platform with a very fast charging capacity of 300 kW. With a suitable charging station, the battery can supposedly be charged from 20 to 80 percent in just 15 minutes. Apart from the charging technology, the car already comes with all the hardware for autonomous driving. Even if this will not be possible in Germany in the foreseeable future.
The P7 and G9 often emit warning sounds when driving, and the reason for this is the driving pleasure. Their handling is excellent, and both models’ acceleration is impressive. However, even slightly exceeding the speed limit triggers a warning beep. The cars’ look, feel, and features make up for their overly cautious nannying.
Xpeng has lined the interior with high-quality materials. Luxurious details include a panoramic glass roof, large displays, seat heating and an intelligent voice control system that even recognizes which seat the person currently speaking to is sitting in. However, the voice control currently only responds in English. The launch edition of the G9 SUV includes front and rear massage seats. There is also an extra screen for the front passenger to watch TV.
In addition to service, driving performance and extras, customers talking to their car dealer are likely to be interested in one question: How do you pronounce it? The answer: Just as it is spelled. The word Xpeng is an abbreviation of the name of Xpeng CEO He Xiaopeng, a tech billionaire born in Hubei in 1977. He founded the internet company UCWeb in 2004, which was acquired by Alibaba ten years later in China’s largest M&A deal. In the same year, 2014, He co-founded Xpeng – a company for autonomous electric vehicles
Xpeng positions itself as a tech innovation brand. To ensure that German journalists understand this, the Chinese company brought an aircraft to the driving event in Germany – the Xpeng X2 passenger drone. The small quadcopter can transport people and baggage weighing up to 200 kilograms and already has a limited flight license in China. Xpeng also has a flying car, which the Chinese presented at the CES electronics trade fair at the beginning of the year. It is a sports car with four large propeller arms that fold from the roof. While it looks like science fiction and the first flight videos inspire little confidence, the vehicle is expected to be available to order in China by the end of 2024.
Xpeng also invests in the development of driver assistance systems. The XNGP system competes with Tesla’s autopilot. Unlike the latter, however, it relies on cameras and uses lidar and radar sensors. It is designed to work even in the most chaotic city traffic and has recently become available for all of China. While the driver’s hands still have to be close to the steering wheel, the G9 SUV has been granted a test license for fully autonomous driving as a robotaxi in Guangzhou since last summer.
Beijing’s battalions of officially mandated internet watchdogs have sophisticated censorship methods at their disposal to ensure that online criticism and problematic revelations quickly disappear from the web. However, tech-savvy bloggers constantly find new ways to bypass the tight controls. Since 2021, an activist who calls himself “Teacher Li” 李老师 has been helping them from overseas to understand the true situation in the country. Millions read his posts, which have earned him legendary status in China.
“Teacher Li is not your teacher” 李老师不是你老师@whyyoutouzhele is the name of Li’s Twitter (X) account, which keeps tricking the censors. Subversive online news they believed to have successfully deleted is swiftly returned to their inbox.
The person behind it is a Chinese artist who has lived in Italy since 2015. Li Ying (李颖), now 31, revealed his identity in an interview with New York Times journalist Li Yang in late 2023. Teacher Li is not a typical exiled dissident who attacks China’s leadership from the outside. He is far more dangerous because he has turned his Twitter account into a virtual helpline for the people of China.
He receives daily news and posts from many provinces of the People’s Republic, raw snapshots, and eyewitness accounts of injustice, protests, or absurdities. These often are screenshots that other bloggers take of domestic WeChats and video clips before censorship strikes.
Li receives them, sorts them, evaluates their credibility and usually forwards them as tweets without comment. For Geremie R. Barmé, who portrayed him for “China Heritage” together with reporter Li Yuan, Li operates a “clearing house for unofficial information.” His pseudonym follows the Taoist wisdom: “The teacher who is no teacher is truly a teacher.”
In 2021, Li initially used his Sina Weibo account within China for such posts. Censorship blocked him. Other bloggers then sent him their mobile phone numbers so that he could register a new account. After 49 accounts were censored, he opened his Twitter page in April 2022 – a foreign account that China’s censors could not touch.
Although Twitter access is blocked in China, privileged users and millions of tech-savvy bloggers use VPN (proxy) servers to bypass the infamous Great Firewall. Li’s Twitter following grew to 1.6 million readers in early 2024. Many share his posts with their friends and acquaintances.
For example, China and the rest of the world quickly learned about Shanghai’s “White Paper” anti-COVID protest movement and recently about many spontaneous expressions of condolence in response to the death of ex-Premier Li Keqiang. Eyewitnesses and those involved reported accidents, misfortunes, or administrative injustices that China’s state media were not allowed to cover.
The censors were so helpless and angry that they started locating and summoning followers of Lis’ tweets individually to deter them. The teacher himself is also feeling the pressure. His parents are being harassed, and even in Italy, he has to fear for his safety and has already moved four times.
The need for a counter-publicity is growing in China’s opaque, highly censored news situation. Li’s posts come at just the right time. In mid-March, he published a list of the latest absurdities in the cult of personality surrounding China’s current leader, Xi Jinping. Bloggers have investigated how often he allows himself to be praised by the official party media as the nation’s mastermind who leads the way. They sent Li a list of 243 examples that had appeared between 2015 and 2024.
The list begins with the official announcement on November 12, 2015, that Party leader Xi is “guiding the future development of the stock market” (为股票市场未来发展指明方向). And it ends with this news from March 11, 2024: Xi shows us the way to overcome the bottlenecks in the development of the new qualitative productive forces (为打通束缚新质生产力发展堵点指明方向).
The more power Xi was able to transfer to himself after 2015 at the two major Party Congresses in 2017 and 2022, the more often the Party media praised him as the ultimate guide and advisor for every conceivable problem. Bloggers mockingly call Xi the personified “chief compass” of the country: “Just like Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao, Xi will also show us the way to hell.”
The founding father of the People’s Republic, Mao Zedong, once condemned such exaggerated adulation in revolutionary times. In his 1942 speech “Against Stereotypes,” he castigated his functionaries’ empty, theoretical ramblings, saying that their Party language was alienating them from the people.
Mao compared their writings to the essays that were required of candidates in the Confucian-influenced imperial civil service exams of the Ming and Qing periods. They would fail if they did not strictly adhere to a set “eight-legged writing scheme” (八股文). Mao also criticized the functionaries for filling “endless pages with empty words without substance” (空话连篇, 言之无物), “puffing them up to intimidate others (装腔作势, 借以吓人).” Their essays, Mao scolded, were like the bandages once used to constrict women’s feet, “long and foul-smelling 真是” – “懒婆娘的裹脚，又长又臭”.
Even when Mao lapsed into his own cult of personality, he still urged his Party to avoid stereotypical formalism and bureaucratism and to criticize and self-criticism. However, this was no longer meant seriously and was merely lip service, just as his political grandson Xi Jinping is imitating him today to maintain his power. Under his wing, the theoretical excesses of Chinese Party propagandists have become even more repetitive and incomprehensible.
And yet sometimes explosive messages are hidden in Xi’s ideological gibberish of today. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to read and understand them between the lines because Xi only allows his essays to be published months or years later and only in selected excerpts.
One such example is a previously unknown speech by Xi, which the Party’s leading theoretical magazine printed for the first time on March 15, 2024. Xi gave the speech 14 months ago, on January 9, 2023, on issues of Party discipline. This was shortly after he previously claimed his lifelong rule and absolute Party leadership at the 20th Party Congress.
Instead of triumphing, Xi appears surprisingly nervous about his internal Party problems. Without mentioning names, he complains: “It is easy for some people to form small cliques, circles and gangs” (些人容易出现搞小山头、小圈子、小嘮伙现象) and warns that “it is easy to destroy a fortress from within. Those who can achieve this can only come from within our own ranks.” (堡垒最容易从内部被攻破，能打败我们的只有我们自己)。
In a special “criticism and self-criticism” session on 21 and 22 December 2023, Xi also showed his dissatisfaction when he apparently accused his Politburo comrades of being an echo chamber and not telling him the truth. The meeting went unnoticed outside of China because it was Christmas, and Xi’s speech was only published as a summary.
However, it does say: Xi expects his Politburo to “present the true situation in a timely and objective manner and to describe not only the positive but also the troubling (… ) and not be deceived by external beauty and false figures” (对工作中了解到的真实情况，要及时客观全面反映上来，不能只报喜、不报忧 … 反对华而不实、数据造假).
These few published quotes at least show that, since early 2023, Xi’s main aim has been to prioritize his regime’s political and systemic security over growth and the economy. We now know for a fact just how bad the People’s Republic’s economy was after the abrupt end of the pandemic in 2023.
We also know about Xi’s domestic political disaster, when he had his foreign and defense ministers and high-ranking military officers disappear overnight, unexplained to this day. Beijing’s propaganda only retrospectively reveals the state of China and its leadership in homeopathic quantities. The loss of transparency is a hallmark of the new era of Xi’s rule. The art of reading between the lines no longer helps. All the more reason why Teacher Li’s tweets are so popular.
Before the taste buds can savor it, it is already a feast for the eyes. The hard work of the farmworkers at the tea planting station in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, makes for a colorful sight. The mostly female pickers only pluck the two finest leaves and the leaf bud and carry them in their basket or a cloth to the collection point. Only the later processing stage decides whether the leaves will become green or black tea.
