NIO is an electric car start-up from China. The company has a development center in Munich and plans to expand into Europe in 2021. The China.Table editorial team has all the NIO news. NIO: Electric car start-up from China The Shanghai-based start-up NIO specializes in the development and production of electric cars. The company also wants to revolutionize the charging process with its own battery swapping system. Its biggest competitors are the Chinese companies BYD, Geely and Xpeng. NIO also wants to sell its electric cars in Europe before the end of 2021. The start-up from the People's Republic of China wants to be the first to become active in Norway. NIO already has a design and marketing development center in Munich. But in spring 2020, the company was fighting against bankruptcy. New loans and cooperation with the city of Hefei saved the start-up. Who is behind NIO? William Li is the founder and current CEO of NIO. He was born on a dairy farm in 1974. In 2000, he founded the Bitauto automotive platform. The portal provided marketing services and information for China's emerging automotive industry. The website went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2010 and is currently valued at around one billion dollars. It now provides companies and customers with comparative data on new and used cars. In 2013, William Li sold the Bitauto site and invested in a large number of start-ups. He is now involved in a total of forty companies in the IT and mobility sectors. At the same time, he gathered investors around him. He raised a total of USD 2.8 billion from well-known companies such as Tencent, Baidu and Lenovo. William Li financed NIO and founded the electric car manufacturer in 2014. Together with Lihong Quin from Roland Berger and Jack Cheng from Fiat Chrysler. Because of his career, William Li is nicknamed the Elon Musk of China. These are the vehicles from NIO However, the electric car brand NIO only made its public debut in 2016. On the same day, William Li presented the NIO sports car EP9. It was primarily used to build the brand's image. The vehicle is an electric super sports car. The car has four motors with 340 hp each. However, only six were built. Investors were allowed to buy one model each for around USD 1.5 million, after which NIO presented its actual production vehicles. The NIO ES8 is an SUV with seven seats. The ES6 is also an SUV, but about twenty centimeters shorter. It therefore only has space for five seats. The EC6 is based on the ES6, but has a sportier roofline. It gives the SUV a coupé silhouette. A saloon, the ET7, is due to be launched on the market in 2022. All NIO vehicles are currently only available to buy in China. What makes NIO special? There are many start-ups in the People's Republic of China that produce electric vehicles like NIO. However, NIO enjoys a special position. But what makes NIO special? The hype that the brand is enjoying is partly due to the prominent investors who have already invested in the company. On the other hand, it is due to a revolutionary system for replacing the batteries: the cars are driven onto a lifting platform. This raises the vehicle. The empty battery is automatically replaced with a full one. The process takes around three minutes. The Better Place company has failed with such a system in Israel, just like Tesla in the USA. In China, the infrastructure seems to be more suitable and the customers more open. NIO already operates 190 exchange stations. How many cars does NIO sell? NIO sold 43,728 electric cars in 2020. This means the company doubled its sales from the previous year. A trend that is set to continue. In the first quarter of 2021, NIO already sold 20,060 electric cars. Compared to the same period last year, this is an increase of 423%, but NIO is still in the red. This is not surprising, as the impressive growth figures are mainly due to the small starting size. In 2020, NIO generated a loss of EUR 675 million. At the beginning of 2020, NIO was even threatened with bankruptcy. Only government loans were able to avert bankruptcy. The city of Hefei in south-east China stepped in. In return, NIO committed to building both a factory and a research center in the city of 8 million people. Battle of the start-ups: NIO or BYD? The market for electric cars in China is huge. In the first quarter of 2021, ten million vehicles with alternative drive systems were registered in the People's Republic. However, this does not just mean electric cars, but also hybrid models. Due to strict emissions regulations and legal quotas, however, the trend is rising.NIO competitor BYD is considered a leader in the field of battery technology. In March 2021, the company sold 16,301 electric cars. NIO only sold 7,257 electric cars in the same period. However, NIO and BYD are both up-and-coming companies in the segment. And they are financially well equipped. BYD was able to raise EUR 3.2 billion via a capital increase. NIO raised a further EUR 1.2 billion via convertible senior notes. When will NIO come to Germany? It is still unclear when NIO will come to Germany. Despite the design and marketing development center in Munich. However, a market launch in Europe is firmly planned. NIO wants to be available in Norway as early as the third quarter of 2021. The choice is no surprise. The country is a pioneer in Europe when it comes to electromobility, and the NIO ES6 vehicle was originally due to be launched on the German market in 2020. However, the company has postponed its plans. According to NIO, the SUV would have performed poorly in the Euro NCAP crash test. The electric car manufacturer did not want to ruin its reputation and postponed the launch in Europe. NIO meaning The Chinese name of NIO is Weilai. This means something like blue sky coming. The company also wants the English translation Blue Sky Coming to be understood as its corporate philosophy. According to its own statement, NIO is committed to "a radiant world of tomorrow". The meaning of NIO refers to the fact that the electric cars are locally emission-free. This at least reduces smog, which is a problem in many large Chinese cities, and the NIO logo also symbolizes this meaning. The upper semicircle stands for the sky, openness and the future. The two columns moving towards each other in the lower half symbolize earth and forward movement. NIO explains its self-image as follows: "The automotive future lies in intelligent, electrically powered and autonomous vehicles. With this formula, we want to lead the way into the future." XPT: The NIO subsidiary The company XPT has been around since 2015. It is an NIO Inc subsidiary. XPT builds electric motors and battery packs. However, the company is not a wholly owned subsidiary of NIO. External investors hold twenty percent of the supplier. The plan of NIO and XPT founder William Li is for the subsidiary to develop independently. It is intended to accept orders from other car manufacturers and be able to survive without NIO.XPT's motors have so far mainly been installed in NIO's electric cars. The reason for this is that the units have an output of over 200 hp. Too much for the mass market in China. But in view of the growing demand for electric cars, this is a niche with growth potential. In addition to the motors, XPT builds battery packs including the associated management and cooling systems. Control units and automated driving technologies are also being developed. News about NIO The editorial team of China.Table explains the current situation of the electric car manufacturer NIO, its competition from BYD or Tesla and the latest news from the electric car market in the People's Republic.
Software glitch: Nio recalls hundreds of thousands of vehicles
Nio is recalling hundreds of thousands of vehicles due to a software fault. The issue involves problems affecting the instrument cluster and the central infotainment screen in some cars.
By Leonardo Pape