Xiaopeng Automobile has made new progress in acquiring the assets of Didi's intelligent vehicle development business.
On the evening of November 13th, Xiaopeng Motors - W (09868. HK) announced that the initial delivery of the acquisition of Didi's intelligent vehicle development business assets had occurred on November 13th. After the initial delivery, all Didi member companies had become wholly-owned subsidiaries of Xiaopeng Motors, and their financial performance would be consolidated into Xiaopeng Motors' consolidated financial statements.
According to the share purchase agreement, Xiaopeng Automobile has allocated and issued 58.1642 million Class A ordinary shares to Didi as initial consideration shares, accounting for approximately 3.25% of Xiaopeng Automobile's issued and outstanding share capital after the allocation and issuance of initial consideration shares.
Official announcement screenshot
According to the announcement on August 28th this year, there is a gambling agreement in the cooperation between Xiaopeng Automobile and Didi. In addition to the immediate delivery of equity to the other party's assets, Didi needs to complete SOP and annual sales targets in order to acquire further shares, with a maximum of 5%.
As the core of this strategic cooperation, both parties will jointly launch a new electric vehicle brand, project code "MONA", and the first product is expected to start mass production in 2024. Gu Hongdi, Vice Chairman and President of Xiaopeng Automobile, explained at the time that MONA's sales could reach 100000 vehicles in the Didi Travel system in order to obtain more shares. If we can achieve the annual sales target of 180000 vehicles for two consecutive years, we will receive the highest incentive share and receive a total consideration of 5%.
It is reported that as the second brand created by Xiaopeng Automobile, the new brand model will form a differentiated positioning with Xiaopeng's existing brand products, focusing on the "150000 price range". At the performance meeting of the previous second quarter, He Xiaopeng, chairman of Xiaopeng Auto, disclosed that he would launch a full autonomous vehicle in the mainstream 150000 class market to promote the popularization of automobile intelligence.
According to the data from the Passenger Transport Association, from 2017 to 2022. The models priced between 100000 and 150000 yuan have always been the main force in the market, with sales accounting for no less than 26%. At the same time, with the improvement of consumer awareness, the 150000 yuan family car race track has also become the most highly anticipated and fiercely competitive field for consumers. In addition, with the help of Didi's transportation system and user base, Xiaopeng Automobile has confidence in setting an annual sales target of 100000 vehicles for the "MONA" project.
Specifically, Xiaopeng Automobile will continue to complete all of MONA's mass production research and development as well as some sales based on its preliminary work. Didi mainly supports the sales and operation of transportation from an ecological perspective, while Xiaopeng will continue to sell in the field of intelligent TO C.
It is worth mentioning that Xiaopeng's "circle of friends" has been continuously expanding. A month before Xiaopeng announced its cooperation with Didi, it announced its cooperation agreement with Volkswagen.
On the evening of July 26th, Volkswagen and Xiaopeng Motors announced that they had reached a technical framework agreement and would jointly develop two Volkswagen branded electric models, which will be put into production in 2026. According to the cooperation agreement, Volkswagen will increase its capital to Xiaopeng Automobile by approximately $700 million (nearly 5 billion RMB) and acquire approximately 4.99% of Xiaopeng's equity at a price of $15 per ADS (American Depositary Stock).
It is understood that the cooperation between the two parties mainly focuses on the field of intelligent technology. Xiaopeng Automobile stated in the announcement that the cooperation model will be developed based on "Xiaopeng Automobile's G9 platform and intelligent networking and ADAS software".
In the industry's view, the cooperation between Xiaopeng and Volkswagen will be a mutually beneficial transaction. On the one hand, Xiaopeng's sales in the first half of the year were sluggish and its gross profit was sluggish. On the other hand, Volkswagen, in its core position in the Chinese market, is constantly losing out on sales of new energy vehicles and urgently needs to strengthen its intelligence.
Xiaopeng Motors previously released its mid-term performance report for 2023, which showed that it completed 41400 vehicle deliveries in the first half of this year, a year-on-year decrease of 39.9%. The total revenue was 9.1 billion yuan (RMB, the same below), a year-on-year decrease of 38.9%. The gross profit margin was -1.4%, compared to 11.6% in the same period last year. The net loss was 5.14 billion yuan, compared to 4.4 billion yuan in the same period last year. As of the end of the first half of the year, cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash, short-term investments, and time deposits amounted to 33.74 billion yuan, compared to 38.25 billion yuan at the end of last year.
For the future, Xiaopeng Automobile believes that short-term challenges will not change the overall trend of the long-term development of China's smart electric vehicle market. Xiaopeng will firmly invest in core technologies of electrification and intelligence in the long term, and accelerate the release of multiple new products in the future to enter the harvest period.
According to Xiaopeng Motors' previously released data on the delivery of smart cars in October, Xiaopeng Motors' monthly delivery volume of smart cars reached a record high of 20000 units, an increase of 31% month on month and 292% year on year; In the third quarter of this year, Xiaopeng delivered over 40000 smart cars, an increase of 72% compared to the second quarter.
As of press release, Xiaopeng Automobile's stock price was at HKD 63, up 3.36%, with a total market value of HKD 112.9 billion.