10 months brand release to Series A financing New cars debut this year and delivered next year Set in "urgent" what?

As a child co-raised by Geely and Baidu, Jidu, who was born with a "golden spoon", grew rapidly with the support of "parents". On January 26, Jidu Automobile announced that it has completed the A round of financing, which is the second funding received by Jidu in 10 months. Behind the financing, the first is the continuous rise of the threshold for new forces to build cars, and it is also the "urgent heart" of Jidu Automobile to enter the automobile market. The new energy vehicle market continues to expand, but its competition has also entered a white-hot stage, not only with the new car-making forces represented by "Wei Xiaoli", but also with independent brands and joint venture brands chasing back and forth. In the face of many strong enemies, as a "newcomer", Jidu Automobile is eager to accelerate the market layout to seize the share on the one hand, but on the other hand, how to make the product market better recognized is a problem it needs to face.

Re-access to "resupply"

The A round of financing amounted to nearly 400 million US dollars, which was jointly increased by Baidu and Geely, and this is not the first time that Jidu Automobile has received financial support. In January last year, Baidu announced the construction of cars and the establishment of a smart car company. In March of the same year, Baidu and Geely established a joint venture company, and Jidu Automobile was officially established, and received more than 300 million US dollars of start-up capital. This means that within 10 months, Jidu Automobile has received nearly $700 million in capital injection.

Behind the increase in shareholders' holdings is the continuous acceleration of the car-making process of Jidu Automobile. On the 128th day of its establishment, Jidu Automobile completed the modeling design scheme and entered the engineering development stage, completed the wind tunnel experiment of the first model of the sludge model on the 180th day, and started the development of intelligent software related, intelligent auxiliary driving and intelligent cockpit function development on the 207th day.

At present, Jidu Automotive's self-developed electronic and electrical architecture JET1.0, as well as SOA, automatic driving system, core computing power platform, and related sensors are further iterating towards the mass production state. In addition, the design of the interior and exterior of Jidu's first automotive robot mass production car and all parts has gradually entered the stage of mass production mold development. Beijing Business Daily reporter learned that the first car robot concept car will be released at the Beijing Auto Show in April this year, and the mass production model will be listed next year.

While speeding up the layout, the support of funds is indispensable. According to the Jidu automobile plan, a new car is launched every 1-1.5 years, and it is expected to continue to invest 50 billion yuan in the next five years. In the view of Yan Jinghui, a member of the expert committee of the Automobile Circulation Association, "From car manufacturing to product release to sales, the whole process requires continuous capital investment, not only product research and development, but also the introduction of talents into the marketing layout, etc. As a new enterprise, it needs more financial support." ”

For this A round of financing, Jidu Automobile related people said that the successful completion of the new round of financing will help Jidu's research and development and mass production process in automotive robots, and in the future, Jidu Automobile will also increase the introduction and training of talents in high-level automatic driving, smart cockpit, intelligent manufacturing and other related fields.

Time is of the essence

Behind the continuous acceleration of the car-making process of Jidu Automobile, it is facing fierce market competition pressure.

According to the data, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China reached 3.545 million units and 3.521 million units respectively last year, an increase of 1.6 times year-on-year. The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers expects that sales of new energy vehicles are expected to reach 5 million units this year, an increase of 42% year-on-year.

With the expansion of sales, car companies have also riveted enough to increase the "fight". At last year's Guangzhou Auto Show, Great Wall Motors officially released the salon brand and launched its first model , the Mecha Dragon; Feifan Automobile released its first flagship model , the Feifan R7; and Lantu brought a large-scale luxury electric MPV - Dreamer - at this Guangzhou Auto Show. In addition to its own brands, volkswagen introduced pure electric models such as ID.4 and ID.6 in China last year, Honda also introduced the first pure electric platform to two joint ventures in China, and Cadillac also launched the first pure electric SUV - LYRIQ. In addition to new models, in the new force car-making camp last year, "Wei Xiaoli" has formed a large-scale sales volume, with annual sales of nearly 100,000 vehicles, and the three new car plans in the past two years will also be landed.

Industry insiders said that although it has Baidu and Geely as an endorsement, Jidu Automobile is still a newcomer in the new energy vehicle market, and compared with the early entrants, Jidu Automobile has lagged behind in time. In order to seize market share as soon as possible, Jidu Automobile urgently needs products to land as soon as possible.

However, the "urgent" of Jidu Automobile is not only the time of product landing, but also how to make the product more acceptable to the market after landing. Compared with fuel vehicles, in terms of performance and control competition, new energy vehicle products need more "labels", such as Weilai's "service" and Xiaopeng's "intelligence", as a new enterprise can successfully establish corporate uniqueness for consumers is particularly important.

In fact, for this problem, Jidu Automobile has pressed bao on AI. "Just 10 months after the start of Jidu, under the blessing of AI technology, vehicle platform and manufacturing process, Jidu's efficient automotive robot development process has been successfully verified." Xia Yiping, CEO of Jidu Automobile, said: The brain, nerves and trunk of Jidu's self-developed automotive robots are all developing efficiently, and the product delivery will be a benchmark mass production product.

Industry insiders said that the development path of "software-defined automobiles" has become clearer, and intelligence has become one of the core competitiveness of future automotive products. With the help of Baidu technology as an endorsement, Jidu Automobile obviously has an advantage in the competition. However, the car manufacturing process is complex, and various companies in intelligence are also looking for breakthroughs, and Baidu is also present in the cooperation of car companies, and how Jidu Automobile can avoid homogenization in future competition will also become the key.

Beijing Business Daily reporter Liu Xiaomeng