NIO Day 2023 showcased its "muscle" technology, conducted live testing of a 150kWh ultra large battery pack, and answered 140 questions in just over two hours... Looking back at 2023, Li Bin, founder, chairman, and CEO of NIO, may have been one of the busiest car company leaders.
Behind his hands-on efforts, it is not only the responsibility of Li Bin as the helmsman of the enterprise, but also the pressure of the intelligent electric race. If calculated from its establishment in 2014, NIO has been on the road of car manufacturing for 9 years. Since its establishment, NIO has been questioned by the outside world several times and has been on the brink of death. However, as a continuous entrepreneur, Li Bin always manages to safely pull NIO back from the edge of the cliff.
In 2023, "involution" has become a high-frequency term in the entire automotive industry, encompassing both price and value. The once dominant position of NIO Xiaoli has also changed in 2023, with NIO and Xiaopeng's sales gap widening compared to their ideal.
From the initial era of mechanization to the flourishing era of electrification, the automotive industry is gradually entering the era of intelligence. Cars have long departed from the simplest transportation attributes and become a space for intelligent mobile travel, accelerating the integration of electronic consumption and cars.
In this competitive context, NIO needs to break the stereotype from the outside world that NIO only provides good service. In September 2023, at NIO IN 2023 NIO Innovation Technology Day, Li Bin transformed into the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) of the enterprise and released NIO's technology products, as well as the flagship phone NIO Phone.
On December 23, 2023, at the NIO Day 2023, Li Bin once again represented NIO's "muscles" and released four core technologies: self-developed intelligent driving chips, self-developed 900V high-voltage architecture, Tianxing intelligent chassis system, and flagship safety standards.
"NIO's foundation has always been technological innovation. From the first day of its establishment, our team has been committed to positive research and development." Li Bin told media reporters such as China Business Daily at a media exchange meeting on December 24, 2023.
Do technical addition
When it comes to NIO, many people's first impression is that the user operations are done well. The trust of users is the cornerstone of NIO's survival, but such a first impression also brings drawbacks to NIO. Many people only know that NIO's user service is good, but it downplays NIO's technological strength.
In Li Bin's view, NIO's foundation is technology and products. Just because the company's services are done well, it cannot ignore the efforts made by the company in product and technology, especially in technological innovation. "Just because we do a good job of battery swapping, we can't forget that our charging is also the car brand with the most installed charging stations and the widest coverage of charging stations in the country."
The reporter noticed that on NIO Day 2023, NIO Intelligent Electric Executive Flagship ET9 was officially unveiled. According to the introduction, NIO ET9 gathers the latest technological research and development achievements, defining the administrative flagship of the intelligent electric era with technology, integrating flagship appearance, innovative space, globally leading driving and riding experience, intelligent technology, efficient energy supplementation, and comprehensive safety standards. "Dare to think, have potential", ET9 is a smart electric administrative flagship designed specifically for the new generation of high-end business users, which is "the most appropriate, comfortable, and safe".
In Li Bin's view, administrative flagship has always been a technology flagship. ET9 is the crystallization of NIO's full stack technology layout and global leading technology, including 17 global first technologies and 52 leading technologies in the same class. It has applied for 525 patents.
The reporter noticed that in addition to releasing a fully line controlled intelligent chassis, Li Bin also released NIO's first self-developed intelligent driving chip, the Shenji NX9031, on NIO Day 2023. It is the first to use 5nm automotive technology and has over 50 billion transistors.
NIO introduced that from the perspective of comprehensive capabilities and efficiency, a self-developed chip can achieve the effect of four flagship chips, achieving a close integration of computing power and its own algorithms, and sharing cross domain computing resources between intelligent driving and cockpit, bringing ultimate safety and efficiency.
Moreover, in response to the industry characteristics of "long car cycle and fast intelligent iteration", NIO will prioritize whether car owners can continue to enjoy the upgrade of intelligent software technology after purchasing a car. It is worth noting that NIO's intelligent driving chips and underlying software are all self-designed. Upgrading intelligent driving technology over a long period of time will be more timely and convenient, and based on computing power redundancy, it will be the top-level domain control for the next five years, continuously bringing users a reassuring and efficient intelligent driving experience.
Li Bin led NIO to become a practitioner of technological addition. Li Bin told reporters, "The ET9 is not only the crystallization of NIO's own technological innovation, but also a microcosm of China's intelligent electric vehicle industry's transition from an automotive powerhouse to an automotive powerhouse. This is not only the achievement of NIO, but also a small milestone for the entire intelligent electric vehicle industry in participating in global intelligent electric vehicle competition."
Before the NIO Day 2023 event, Li Bin also tested a 150kWh ultra long battery pack. After driving for 14 hours, the battery pack's endurance test showed NIO's battery pack technology with a range of 1044 kilometers using 97% battery power.
Subtracting costs
NIO will also regain the favor of the capital market in 2023. On December 18, 2023, NIO announced the signing of a new round of share subscription agreement with Abu Dhabi investment firm CYVN Holdings (hereinafter referred to as "CYVN"). According to the agreement, CYVN will make a strategic investment of approximately $2.2 billion in cash to NIO through its subsidiary CYVN Investments.
The reporter noticed that NIO announced that after the completion of the above-mentioned investment transaction, CYVN's shareholding in NIO will increase to about 20.1%. This also means that if the above-mentioned transaction delivery is completed, Li Bin will no longer be the largest shareholder of NIO.
Regarding the changes in the largest shareholder, Li Bin responded through the media, saying, "Firstly, when going public, he transferred 50 million shares to a user trust, which means he was no longer the largest shareholder in the economic sense. Secondly, because he has super voting rights, his voting rights still remain the most, and the changes in shareholder voting are very small."
"The sum of the two investments is 3.3 billion US dollars, which should be the record for China's largest foreign direct investment in equity in 2023." Li Bin admitted, "Others always say that NIO has strong financing capabilities, but it is not NIO's strong financing capabilities, but investors' recognition of NIO's research and development investment, brand value, and full stack technology layout."
When it comes to whether the entry of Middle Eastern capital will change the company's established strategy, Li Bin told reporters, "Our strategic investors highly recognize NIO's strategy and its execution ability. This investment will not change our established strategy, and they will only invest based on the premise of recognizing the established strategy and direction. This is definitely a bonus for NIO's development pace and various aspects."
It is worth noting that Li Bin also raised the cost cutting knife in 2023 and started cost reduction. On November 3, 2023, Li Bin confirmed layoffs in an internal letter titled "Organizational Optimization and Two Year Priorities", with a layoff rate of 10%. "The next two years will be the most intense stage of competition in the automotive industry's transformation period, and the external environment is full of huge uncertainty," Li Bin said in an internal letter released.
It is reported that NIO has determined the priority of its business and formulated specific plans for organizational and business optimization, including ensuring long-term investment in core key technologies and maintaining leading advantages in technology and products; Ensure that sales and service capabilities can cope with fierce market competition; Ensure the timely launch of 9 core products from 3 brands; Merge departments and positions with duplicate construction, reform inefficient internal workflow and division of labor, and cancel inefficient positions; Delaying and reducing project investments that cannot improve the company's financial performance within three years.
Expand Moments
Battery swapping has always been a business that NIO has invested a lot of effort in, and it has been questioned by the outside world. However, under the encouragement and promotion of national policies, more and more car companies are expanding their battery swapping business, and the battery swapping model is increasingly favored by new energy vehicle users.
It was also in 2023 that NIO's long-standing battery swapping business ushered in a "spring" and established cooperation with multiple car companies. On November 21, 2023, NIO and Changan Automobile signed a cooperation agreement on battery swapping business. The two sides will cooperate in promoting the establishment of battery swapping standards, the construction and sharing of battery swapping networks, the research and development of battery swapping models, and the establishment of an efficient battery asset management mechanism.
Regarding the battery swapping business, Li Bin stated that from the first day of charging and swapping, NIO has decided to open up to the entire industry. Like internet cloud service infrastructure, NIO Power Exchange Network and NIO Energy Cloud have also taken a path of infrastructure first, internal closed-loop, full scenario verification, and openness to the outside world. After 5 years of development, NIO's battery swapping network and NIO Energy Cloud have accumulated rich experience in research and development, construction, operation, and other aspects. NIO's battery swapping business is ready to open up to the industry.
Afterwards, NIO and Geely signed a strategic cooperation agreement on battery swapping, and the two sides will engage in comprehensive cooperation in multiple fields such as battery swapping standards, battery swapping technology, battery swapping service network construction and operation, research and development and customization of battery swapping models, and battery asset management and operation.
In addition, NIO and Geely will collaborate to establish an efficient battery asset management system, establish a unified battery swapping operation management system, and collaborate on the development of battery swapping passenger cars that are compatible with both parties' battery swapping systems. This cooperation is in line with the development direction of national new infrastructure and new energy, and will accelerate the standardization of battery swapping technology and the scale of battery swapping networks, helping the low-carbon transformation of the automotive industry.
On December 22, 2023, NIO's 1000th battery swapping station was officially launched at the Shaanxi Natural History Museum, and the plan to build 1000 new battery swapping stations was reached ahead of schedule. This is a significant milestone for NIO in terms of battery swapping network infrastructure layout.
Regarding NIO's battery swapping alliance, Qin Lihong, co-founder and president of NIO, stated at a media communication meeting after NIO Day 2023, "Although we have recently disclosed some contracts, in fact, we have signed more than we disclosed, and there is still more to discuss."
It is worth mentioning that on NIO Day 2023, Li Bin also officially released NIO's fourth generation battery swapping station. It is reported that NIO's fourth generation battery swapping station supports multi brand shared battery swapping, reducing battery swapping time by 22%; Equipped with a rooftop photovoltaic system, each swapping station saves nearly 18000 kilowatt hours of electricity annually. According to the plan, NIO will add 1000 new battery swapping stations in 2024.
When it comes to the future industry landscape, Li Bin said, "I believe that by around 2035, Chinese automotive brands will account for 5 out of the top 10 global automotive groups. But (specifically) which 5 will have different answers, and we will strive to become one of them."