Xiaomi Auto

Xiaomi Auto (小米汽车; legally Xiaomi Automobile Co Ltd) is a Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Beijing. It is a subsidiary of Chinese consumer electronics company Xiaomi. Founded in 2021 by Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun, the company mainly develops and manufactures electric vehicles.
In 2021, Lei Jun received a call informing him that Xiaomi had been sanctioned by the United States. During an emergency meeting with the board of directors, someone raised the question of what would happen to Xiaomi's 30,000 or 40,000 employees if the company's mobile phone business could no longer continue. This led to Xiaomi's diversification into car manufacturing.
Lei Jun then received strong recommendations from his friends, such as Nio Inc. CEO William Li and XPeng CEO He Xiaopeng to enter the automotive industry. He acknowledged that the transition into smart electric vehicles was an inevitable trend.
On March 30, 2021, Xiaomi announced that would establish a wholly-owned subsidiary dedicated to the intelligent electric vehicle (EV) business. The initial investment for this venture was set at 10 billion Chinese yuan, with an expected total investment of 10 billion US dollars over the next 10 years. Lei Jun, the CEO of the group, would also serve as the CEO of the intelligent electric vehicle business. On September 1, 2021, Xiaomi Automobile Co., Ltd. was officially established.
At that time, commentators suggested to Lei Jun that the priority should be launching the car as soon as possible, rather than handling everything in-house, and that Xiaomi should collaborate with an established OEM. However, Lei Jun rejected this approach, stating that he will not take shortcuts. By not outsourcing, all core technologies had to be developed in-house during the manufacturing process.
Following the announcement, Xiaomi Auto attracted a wide range of talent, including Liu Anyu, an early Xiaomi entrepreneur, Li Tianyuan, a European-based car designer that built his career in BMW, and Hu Zhengnan, a partner at Shunwei Capital. Xiaomi Auto's recruitment efforts were met with an overwhelming response, receiving approximately 380,000 job applications.
On November 27, 2021, the Municipal Government of Beijing and Xiaomi officially signed a cooperation agreement, formally announcing Xiaomi Automobile's establishment in the Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone. Xiaomi Automobile plans to build a two-phase vehicle factory with a cumulative annual production capacity of 300,000 vehicles. The production capacities for the first and second phases are 150,000 vehicles each. The first car is scheduled to roll off the production line in the Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone in 2024, marking the commencement of mass production.
In March 2022, Xiaomi Group released its annual performance report for 2021. The report revealed that Xiaomi's intelligent electric vehicle business had progressed beyond expectations since announcing the car manufacturing plan in March 2021. Xiaomi's first trial production car was completed on 16 August 2023 and subsequently underwent extensive winter and summer vehicle testing. As of December 2023, the research and development team for its automotive business has grown to exceed 1,000 people, and it is anticipated that formal mass production will commence in the first half of 2024.
On 28 December 2023, Xiaomi has unveiled its first electric car, the SU7. The SU7 was formally launched on 28 March 2024 in Beijing, with Xiaomi starting to take orders for the car on that day. As of June 2024, the total number of Xiaomi Auto's offline retail stores in China exceeded 12,000.
In July 2024, Xiaomi Auto gained an independent car-making qualification from the Chinese government after previously using BAIC Motor's credentials. In the same month, Xiaomi Group spent 840 million to purchase Beijing Yizhuang New Town to build a car manufacturing plant.
On November 15, 2024, Lei Jun announced that he plans to launch an end-to-end large-scale intelligent driving system that can realize the full-scene intelligent driving experience of driving and parking by the end of the next month, and named its end-to-end intelligent driving system service Xiaomi HAD (Xiaomi Hyper Autonomous Driving).