Elon Musk Failed To Quash This Chinese Billionaire's Tesla Rival-- Now It's Going Global  March 7_V2 - video Dailymotion

Forbes

Last year, He Xiaopeng survived a brutal price war started by Tesla. Now he's betting on international growth to fire up his EV brand, Xpeng.  Chinese automaker Xpeng isn’t a giant in the country’s fiercely competitive EV market, yet it has sky-high ambition—literally. At January's seminal CES tech trade show in Las Vegas, a company subsidiary displayed a model of a planned flying car and said it would begin deliveries in China toward the end of 2025.  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ywang/2024/03/04/elon-musk-failed-to-quash-this-chinese-billionaires-tesla-rival---now-its-going-global/?sh=3093fb8154fa  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00 Here's your Forbes Daily Briefing for Thursday, March 7.

00:05 Today on Forbes, Elon Musk failed to quash this Chinese billionaire's Tesla rival.

00:11 Now it's going global.

00:14 Chinese automaker Xpeng isn't a giant in the country's fiercely competitive EV market,

00:19 yet it has sky-high ambition. Literally.

00:23 At January's seminal CES Tech Trade Show in Las Vegas,

00:27 a company subsidiary displayed a model of a planned flying car

00:31 and said it would begin deliveries in China toward the end of 2025.

00:36 Now, there's hefty skepticism about that time frame,

00:39 especially as China doesn't have a clear regulatory framework that would allow flying cars.

00:45 But while consumers might never be able to pilot such a vehicle,

00:48 the Las Vegas promotion could help strengthen Xpeng's image

00:52 as a high-end brand using sophisticated technology.

00:56 Its co-founder, He Xiaopeng, has made Xpeng one of China's pioneering EV producers.

01:03 He Xiaopeng, the company's chairman and CEO, wasn't at CES

01:08 and isn't talking to the media about flying cars at the moment.

01:11 The billionaire has plenty on his plate,

01:13 including dealing with the increasingly cutthroat EV competition at home

01:17 and pushing multiple goals of the Hong Kong and New York listed company

01:21 to expand internationally, to be a high-end EV producer abroad,

01:26 to end a string of losses, and to become one of China's three largest EV makers by 2030.

01:32 By deliveries, Xpeng wasn't in the top 10 in 2023.

01:36 Last year, the mogul survived a crisis stemming from a brutal price war started by Tesla,

01:42 which made its vehicles 40% cheaper in China than in the U.S.

01:47 To boost battered sales, He introduced the G6 SUV to compete with Tesla's Model Y

01:53 and brought in Volkswagen as an investor.

01:56 In July, the German carmaker agreed to put in $700 million and own 4.99% of Xpeng.

02:04 Full-year Xpeng financials aren't out yet, but in the third quarter of 2023,

02:09 revenue was up 25% year-over-year to 8.5 billion yuan, which is about $1.2 billion,

02:16 though losses widen to 3.9 billion yuan.

02:20 He, the 47-year-old boss of the Guangzhou-based EV maker,

02:24 said in an exclusive interview in December in Beijing,

02:27 "Challenges also present opportunities.

02:30 If it weren't for the challenges, I wouldn't be so determined to make the changes."

02:35 This year will be another one of intense competition,

02:38 especially after Tesla in January slashed prices across multiple markets, including China.

02:44 Wang Hanyang, a Shanghai-based analyst at 86 Research, says,

02:49 "The competition this year will be very, very aggressive."

02:53 Wang added that while the company made solid advances in late 2023,

02:58 "Xpeng isn't entirely out of its tough spot."

03:03 He is a computer science graduate of South China University of Technology in Guangzhou.

03:08 He is also no stranger to boom and bust cycles.

03:11 The Hubei native's first venture wasn't in the auto sector.

03:15 In 2004, after working for Hong Kong-listed software developer Asia Info,

03:20 he started a mobile browser operator called UCWeb.

03:23 In 2014, he sold the company in a $4.3 billion deal to Alibaba.

03:29 The e-commerce giant later became an investor in Xpeng,

03:32 the auto company that He, sensing opportunities in the then-nascent EV sector, co-founded in 2014.

03:39 But when the company in 2018 readied its first model, the G3 SUV, for mass production,

03:46 consumer demand fell as the Chinese government cut back on EV purchase subsidies.

03:51 Xpeng managed to secure $400 million in funding from investors,

03:55 including private equity firms, and He himself, to survive.

04:00 It went public in New York in 2020, raising $1.5 billion.

04:05 Shares once surged to value the firm at $57 billion,

04:09 almost more than Ford and General Motors combined at the time.

04:13 As its second model, the P7 sedan, became an instant success and fueled optimism

04:19 the Chinese EV maker might emerge as a serious contender to Tesla.

04:23 But the stock later spiraled down as competitors launched new models

04:27 and the COVID-19 lockdown hit the firm's supply chain.

04:31 On the first day of 2024, He launched a seven-seater MPV, or multi-purpose vehicle,

04:38 called the X9, that targets the luxury market, with a starting price of 360,000 yuan,

04:44 the equivalent to $50,255.

04:48 And He promised a faster pace of launches ahead.

04:51 To look for growth, the automaker chief is turning to Europe,

04:54 the world's second biggest EV maker after China, by vehicles delivered,

04:59 and a place moving to phase out non-electric cars by 2035.

05:04 For full coverage, check out Yiu Huang's piece on Forbes.com.

05:09 This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes. Thanks for tuning in.

05:13 [music]

Elon Musk Failed To Quash This Chinese Billionaire's Tesla Rival-- Now It's Going Global March 7_V2

Category

Transcript

Recommended