China EVs & More

Tu and Lei spend the first few minutes of the show recapping their overall feelings about Auto Beijing 2024 (the show) and how it was a bit different from Auto Shanghai 2023. They both reflect on what the legacy automakers revealed at the show and how the legacies presence in Beijing this year was much different than what it was for 2023 in Shanghai. There's a pulse. Tu talks about when he bumped into the GM management team while being interviewed by CNBC's Eunice Yoon at the Chevy booth. They both then spent a bit of time reflecting on their 3-day trip from Beijing to Shenzhen in the XPeng G9 Performance including the performance of X-NGP and their thoughts on charging infrastructure during their trip. Tu moves the discussion over to his experience attending the 500K production vehicle for NIO that was held at their Hefei headquarters. The podcast closes with Tu and Lei's experience spending a few days in Shenzhen and getting to do some other memorable things while there.

First, Tu and Lei recorded this episode while driving from Beijing to Shenzhen in an XPeng G9 Performance. XPeng kindly lent it to them for the three day trip where they stopped into Zhengzhou & Changsha before hitting their final stop - Shenzhen. For most of the trip (>90% of the miles which were a total of ~1.5K), they used XPeng's intelligent driving system called X-NGP. The purpose of the trip was to test the X-NGP system and get a feel for the charging infrastructure in China. They also recorded a video of their conversation and posted it to their newly launched YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnQkkMqjpoFs0yHmqmKitNQ Tu and Lei spend a few minutes talking about Elon's visit and rewind back to just arriving to China and what they've been up to since they arrived. The two also give some of their initial impressions and takes on the auto show. They then move to their trip so far, talk in more detail about the EV they're driving and their experience with charging. **Tu and Lei were NOT paid by XPeng to do the trip and XPeng had no editorial control over anything they posted or said.** The podcast ends with their thoughts on the connected vehicle world bifurcating with the possibility of EV companies needing a tech stack for China and a tech stack for the rest of the world.

Tu starts off the podcast with an update on what he's been up to the last few days including visiting Jiyue and getting a sneak peek of the Jiyue 07 and attending the launch event for the Zeekr 009 Grand, a 4 seat executive MPV. Tu also had a chance to get a close look at the Xiaomi SU7 in the flesh. That transitions into a full discussion about Xiaomi and what they need to do to build on the success of the SU7. Tu and Lei then pivot back into a detailed discussion of the 009 Grand and their expectations for the super luxe vehicle. The segment closes out on Tu and Lei talking a bit about the new Li Auto L6, their smallest EREV in the lineup, but still a clone of the others. Lei lists out all the debuts that will occur during the lead up and at the auto show.

Tu and Lei kick this podcast off by going over March sales numbers and move into discussing some of the recent incentives that have been offered by EV brands in order to keep sales momentum going. The detail some of the challenges that contibute to the ongoing price war and how Tesla has fated during a price war they initiated. They then contrast that with Xiaomi's sales momentum since launch and how that stands out and hasn't lost any steam. The last big topic the two tackle in this podcast is the upcoming Beijing Auto show and what their expectations are and what they hope to see there. Tu quickly discusses some of the challenges that Ford and Stellantis brand Ram are starting to see in the US market with truck sales and the pod closes out with their thoughts based on current conditions of Tesla being able to find any growth in sales this year compared with 2023.

This podcast begins by dissecting the Reuters article about the Tesla Model 2 being cancelled as a passenger vehicle. The conversation moves over to Tesla sales in China, predictions about total sales for 2024 and what Tesla could do to boost sales in 2024. They pivot over to a quick discussion about Porsche's struggles in China and what it'll take to turn its sales around in the China market. They also spend a few minutes discussing Xiaomi's continued sales and XPeng's struggles. Tu then talks briefly about Janet Yellen's visit to China and her emphasis on overcapacity in China. Tu then specifies that the overcapacity is much more prevalent on the ICE side, not so much the EV side but that there would nonetheless be pressure to export due to the price war and the inability for many Chinese EV brands to gain any sustained sales traction. The episode closes out with what Lei and Tu are looking forward to when they both travel to China for Auto Beijing 2024.

Tu and Lei get right to the Xiaomi SU7 launch. They talk about Lei Jun's showmanship and the popularity of the Xiaomi brand in China which all helped to build excitement for this product launch. After an extended discussion about ALL THINGS Xiaomi SU7, they move the conversation over to Lei's trip to the NYC Auto show. Lei talks a bit about the World Car of the Year awards and who ultimately won. Lei also happened to visit a Rivian store and was able to see the R2 for the first time in real life and instantly fell in love.

Li Auto adjusting their Q1 sales guidance downward was the first topic of discussion in this week's podcast. Of the three WeiXiaoLi triplets, Li Auto has been the darling of Wall Street but their sales have very suddenly hit a wall Tu then gives a short lesson on master production schedules, ordering parts and lead times and how any sudden change in that schedule can complicate things and lead to issues with the supply chain and inventory levels. Tu and Lei move back to a conversation about Xiaomi and their staying power and the power of social media in China and how it can help and hurt you in a very fast and severe way. Lei moves the discussion over to the annual press conference from BMW and how they also would like to continue with free markets for Chinese imports into the European market. The podcast closes out with some quick hits about some photo ops between CEOs, the EV100 and Nvidia GTC conferences, who spoke at them and what they said.

Lei headed over to Germany for Porsche's Annual Press Conference so much of the podcast was dedicated to what Lei learned about during his visit and led to a broader discussion about Volkswagen Group and what Tu thought about VW Group's annual press conference and how important Porsche is to Volkswagen Group's global goals. After a detailed discussion on Germany's largest automaker and one of its most important brands, the discussion moved over to NIO and their reaching 40M swaps. Tu and Lei also talked a bit about NIO's mass market brand Onvo and how it'll be positioned alongside the NIO premium brand and the yet to be launched Firefly brand. The podcast ends with a discussion on not counting VW Group out just yet, although the mountain they need to climb to get back into the driver's seat in China seems insurmountable at this time. Tu also briefly discusses some of the initial quality challenges some BYD vehicles are having in the export markets, but doesn't see anything out of the ordinary or that shoud be cause for alarm just yet. BYD is new to those markets and their products will react to each of the climates differently but it's a learning process that should help them strenghthen the future quality and reliability of their global portfolio.

Tu and Lei start this podcast out with going over the latest news on the tariff situation on Chinese EVs in the US and EU with the EU now also seeming to lean towards increasing protectionism. Lei then moves the discussion over to the R2 launch from Rivian, the follow up to their R1 and emphasizes the affordability factor with the R2. This turns into a broader discusision about Rivian and what it will take for them to ultimately be a successful automaker. Their attention turns to the Two Sessions, the Chinese government's largest conference that sets the economic priorities for the year and has most automotive CEO's attending. Lei dives into some of the details of the policies that are being considered at the conference. The podcast closes with Tu discussing the recent investments by legacy OEMs as well as BYD & Great Wall into Brazil and South America and how their powertrains differ from the battery electric vehicle. He believes that this is one of the next big potential growth opportunities and the investment into the sector illustrates that.

Lei begins this podcast with a brief explanation of the effects of the Lunar New Year on passenger vehicle sales traditionally. Tu points out BYD's social media campaign about how 'electric is cheaper than gas' after they'd cut prices of their already low priced vehicles, so much so that they are cheaper than ICE vehicles from Volkswagen and some of the other foreign automakers. Lei predicts that Li Auto may be the next EV startup that emerges from the pack in 2024 as others continue to struggle with price cuts and vehicles that aren't as popular among Chinese consumers. Tu and Lei then spend a few minutes to share their opinions on the US goverment's connected vehicle investigation and let's just say that both seem skeptical. The podcast ends with a discussion on potential HiPhi partners or acquirers including a look at Changan who have been rumored to be kicking the tires recently.

Tu begins the podcast talking about how the price war still has legs and will likely last through the end of this year into 2025. BYD has been leading the way with price cuts on their more popular vehicles daring their competitors to do the same. Tu then talks about the Buick Electra E5 EV that has just gone on sale for ~$23K and wonders out loud why they can't sell that in the US for a similar price. The discussion shifts to the technology companies that have entered the EV competition, in particular Huawei, Xiaomi and Baidu via Jiyue. With Jiyue's sales struggles, they openly wonder what is too much technology and whether Xiaomi can come up with the 'just right' approach to stuffing their EV with tech features. They then point out how many legacy automakers have announced dialing back its EV ambitions and the challenges they still have to overcome. They focus on the German automakers and reveal that one of their next MAX guests is Daniel Kirchert, former BMW executive who also co-founded BYTON. The podcast ends with Tu hoping that there's another price cut for the Model Y in the US since it may put him over the top for buying it himself.

Tu and Lei start out the podcast by wishing each other 'Happy New Year' and discuss a bit about the holiday and their traditions and how it's celebrated by their families. Lei then moves over to discuss the Chinese Opinions on NEV trade cooperation and both of them add their opinions about how the language and roll out of the opinion piece should be interpreted. Tu then spends a few minutes discussing how the premium used passenger vehicle market has changed and is now more of a buyers market. He then talks about being a guest on Autoline and some of the topics they discussed including Chinese brands entering Mexico. Tu and Lei then transition to the news that Ford has a skunkworks team in SoCal working on a profitable small vehicle and unpack their thoughts on that. The podcast closes with news that HiPhi may be about to close its doors for good and others that have likely built their last vehicles.

Tu and Lei start the podcast out with some of their family traditions for Lunar New Year. They then move onto unpacking January sales numbers and emphasizing the MoM comparisons not that important due to Lunar New Year being in January last year. Tu anticipates what we should see in March and beyond depending on how panicked the OEMs will be coming out of the New Year break, likely around late February. The goal of course is to keep the metal moving at a brisk pace of course. Tu and Lei then move over to the discussion about Evergrande, the Chinese real estate development company being forced into liquidation by a Hong Kong court and how that will affect Hengchi, their EV brand. Tu then talks about the impact that could be felt from the just announced partnership between Didi and CATL. The podcast closes with a brief clarification on export numbers and who the actual leader in global exports for passenger vehicles was in 2023.

Tu and Lei begin with briefly discussing their latest MAX episode with Gansha Wu, Founder & CEO of UISEE - an autonomous driving startup based in China. Tu and Lei then transition over into a detailed discussion about Tesla’s earnings and the role that the China market plays in their earnings and operations and how most analysts miss how important the China market is to everything that Tesla does. Lei then changes gears into a discussion about the recently unveiled Porsche Macan EV that still doesn’t have pricing for the China market announced. Tu gets into the recent challenges that Porsche had in the China market and how this could really be a catalyst for the resumption of growth in the China market for Porsche, but it’s going to have stiff competition now. Tu and Lei close the show on the announcement that DJI will have, none other than BYD, as an investor and partner for their ADAS systems which should help make ADAS a common feature in mass market vehicles in China sooner rather later.

Lei throws a curveball to begin the show and talks about some of China’s societal challenges, namely the aging population and shrinking number of babies born. Tu chimes in with his experience coming to the US at a very early age. They broaden the discussion out a bit to bring in a few more noteworthy challenges to round out the discussion. Tu & Lei get into some of the discounts that were announced last week and get into the forecasted export numbers and some of the surprise automakers that could be exporting out of China in 2024. Tu points out that each year that the China market breaks sales records makes the following year even tougher to top. And the combination of a tough Chinese economy, high interest rates and the slowdown in the US & EU all point to a more challenging 2024. Tu shifts the conversation to the Lotus Emeya and what brands and products it may be going after and whether or not they should be nervous. The podcast closes on the news that TuSimple is exiting the US market and how EV related IPOs aren’t likely going to find many takers in 2024.

Tu and Lei dedicate this episode to the sights and sounds coming out of Las Vegas CES 2024. Lei spends the first half of this episode unpacking all that he saw and thought about the technology he experienced and the people he spoke to. Tu and Lei then go onto some of the macro sales numbers that came from China for 2023 and unpack what they all mean, including GM's slide since 2017. Tu closes out the podcast by telling Lei he's considering buying a used Tesla from Hertz now that they've put a number of them on sale.

Tu and Lei begin the podcast out with a look back at how Tesla ignited the price war in the beginning of 2023. They move onto a discussion about Xiaomi and CEO Lei Jun's strategy for entering the market and building up excitement for their first vehicle that's due to launch in the next year and finally making guesses on what their vehicle's price will be once announced. They move the conversation over to how difficult it is for the legacy automakers to keep up with the constant barrage of new brands, products and endless refreshes in order to not lose pace in the China market. They acknowledge that most automakers aren't able to keep up which could lead to even more challenges in the future. Tu and Lei briefly discuss making sure to follow the people that are out there getting it done and visiting the countries, trying out the vehicles and meeting with the executives. They end the podcast with their review of 2023 and a discussion about which events shaped the year.

Each year this episode is HIGHLY anticipated and is ALWAYS one of the most downloaded epsiodes of the year. If you want to hear what they think of 2024 in China and around the world for the EV, battery and mobility space, you have to listen to this episode.

Tu and Lei begin the podcast and take quite a bit of time to share their thoughts on NIO Q3 earnings and how to look at the numbers. They back out of the earnings to briefly review the announcements that NIO has made over the last several months. Tu moves out a few thousand feet to talk about the China market and some of the players in it and then the discussion quickly moves over to the Stellantis announcement regarding their partnership with Silicon Valley battery swapping startup Ample. Tu and Lei push on to a discussion about the final language for the Inflation Reduction Act that was released last Friday and how it may affect the market and the strategies of all involved in the EV space. The last two topics touched on were Tu's attendance and thoughts on the Mary Barra fireside chat and her answers relative to EVs, batteries and Cruise. He then pushes into the rumor that Tesla is ready to double capacity at ShanghaiGiga from about 1.2M to over 2M units of capacity.

Tu and Lei start out the podcast with a quick review of the November sales and a broader discussion about the difficulty of and pressure on the EV makers to grow sales in an ultra competitive environment. They both then spend a few minutes unpacking the announcement & implications of VW developing an EV platform called the China Main Platform (CMP) based on the MEB platform for the China market ONLY and how that's likely to do. Lei gets Tu's thoughts on Elon mentioning that in the future the Top 10 EV makers will be Tesla with the other 9 all being Chinese. The podcast shifts over to discussing all the latest moves by Huawei, who both agree have been very aggressively moving into the connected, EV space over the last couple years with a goal to grow revenues from this new division significantly over the next several years. The podcast ends with both discussing NIO's expanding swap partnerships in China, now including Geely.