China's first domestic lidar stock officially entered the sprint IPO state.
LiDAR star unicorn Hesai Technology has just filed a prospectus with the SEC.
Market rumors say that Hesai Technology plans to raise $150 million, with a valuation of $3 billion.
The prospectus disclosed that up to now, Hesai has delivered more than 100,000 lidars, ranking first in the world in lidar shipments in the ADAS field in 2022, and the customers it has cooperated with are not limited to star companies such as Lili, Jidu, Geely Lotus, Baidu, Meituan, and Xiaomi.
In the first nine months of 2022, the revenue was 790 million yuan, which is more than any listed lidar company in the world, such as Velodyne, Ouster, Luminar and so on.
How to say, the commercialization of lidar is a new representative.
Core data of Hesai Technology
Hesai Technology was founded in October 2014, and started as the first to make gas sensors.
Since 2016, Hesai has shifted its main business to the research and development, manufacturing and sales of lidar products.
The prospectus disclosed the key operating data of Hesai Technology in the past four years.
The first is revenue.
The revenue of Hesai Technology in 2019, 2020 and 2021 was 348 million yuan, 416 million yuan and 721 million yuan respectively.
Revenue in the first nine months of 2022 was RMB793 million, an increase of 72.77% from RMB459 million in the same period of the previous year.
It is not difficult to see that Hesai's revenue has risen sharply since 2021, and its revenue in the first 9 months of 2022 has exceeded that of the whole of 2021.
According to a research report by Frost & Sullivan Consulting, compared with the world's listed lidar companies, Hesai's revenue in the first nine months of 2022 (793 million yuan) ranked the highest among them, more than 3.6 times higher than the revenue of the second-ranked company.
Hesai's revenue in the first nine months of 2022 has exceeded that of listed companies such as Velodyne, Ouster, Luminar, and Innoviz.
The increase in revenue was mainly due to the increase in automotive lidar shipments, from 2017 to December 31, 2022, Hesai delivered a total of more than 103,000 lidars, of which the total shipment of lidar in 2022 exceeded 80,400 units.
The research report further disclosed that in 2022, Hesai Technology delivered 62,000 lidar units to the field of assisted driving ADAS, ranking first in the world in terms of lidar shipments in this field in 2022, and it is also the world's first company that ships more than 10,000 lidar per month.
The most well-known case before is the ideal car. The Max versions of the ideal L9 and L8 are equipped with Hesai LiDAR, and both models have entered the rhythm of monthly delivery of more than 10,000, and Hesai has also taken off together.
In terms of R&D expenditure, it also shows a trend of increasing year by year:
In the first nine months of 2022, Hesai invested 376 million yuan in R&D, an increase of 78.2% from 211 million yuan in the same period of the previous year.
But even so, as of now, Hesai is still in a loss state:
The net losses of Hesai Technology in 2019, 2020 and 2021 were 120 million yuan, 107 million yuan and 245 million yuan, respectively.
Net loss for the first nine months of 2022 was $165 million, narrower than $175 million in the same period last year.
Hesai said that this loss is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. Because they also have to invest in the design, development and replacement of LiDAR, as well as manufacturing capabilities, while exploring emerging markets, increasing product parts inventory, and expanding recruitment and marketing, revenue may be difficult to cover expenses.
However, it is worth noting that compared with its peers, Hesai has a higher gross profit margin, 70.3%, 57.5% and 53% in 2019, 2020 and 2021, respectively, and a gross profit margin of 44% in the first nine months of 2022.
As of September 30, 2022, Hesai had a total of RMB751 million in cash on its books.
What supported the IPO of Hesai Technology?
In addition to LiDAR, Hesai also provides gas sensors that can remotely detect methane leaks and support the generation of real-time data and visual reports through corresponding applications.
In the first nine months of 2022, lidar accounted for 91.6% of Hesai's total revenue, and gas sensors accounted for 2.2%.
Hesai's existing lidar products mainly include the following 5 types:
Introduced from left to right, Pandar128 was released in August 2020, mainly for the reliability and functional safety design of automotive regulations, with ultra-high point frequency, image-level perception, and long-range detection.
The QT128 is an ultra-wide-angle close-range lidar with a vertical field of view of 105°, and was officially released in January 2022.
Released in September 2020, XT32 is a mid-range lidar based on self-developed chips, mainly targeting the robot, unmanned transportation and other markets, as of December 31, 2022, Hesai XT series lidar shipments exceeded 10,100 units.
AT128 was released in 2021, belongs to automotive-grade semi-solid-state lidar, according to previous disclosures, in September 2022, AT128 achieved monthly delivery of more than 10,000 units, and AT128 has received orders from OEMs including Lili, Jidu, Gaohe, Lotus, etc., and recently officially announced that SAIC Feifan and Changan Automobile also included SAIC Feifan and Changan Automobile.
FT120 is a pure solid-state lidar, used for short-range blinding, mainly for the ADAS pre-installation mass production field, just debuted at CES not long ago, has obtained a number of OEMs a total of more than 1 million fixed points.
At present, Hesai's lidar products are mainly for three major business sectors.
Passenger cars or commercial vehicles with ADAS assisted driving systems, including Lili, Jidu, Geely Lotus, Changan, etc.
Driverless fleets carrying passengers/cargo, such as Robotaxi and Robotruck, have worked with customers such as Baidu, Aurora, Pony.ai, AutoX, WeRide, Zoox;
Unmanned delivery logistics vehicles, street cleaning robots, and logistics robots in limited areas, and cooperative customers include Meituan, Nuro, and Neolix (Neolith).
Correspondingly, AT128 and FT120 products are mainly provided to the first business segment, Pandar128 and QT128 are mainly provided to the second largest business segment, and XT32 is mainly provided to the third business segment.
On the technology side, the company's current R&D projects include next-generation ASIC chips, solid-state lidar and lidar algorithms.
As of December 31, 2022, Hesai holds a total of 321 patents in China, and 483 patents are pending; Hesai holds 28 patents in the United States and Europe, with a further 230 patents pending.
The company currently has a total of 713 engineers, accounting for more than 70% of the total number of employees, and more than 53% of the engineers have master's degree or above.
Who built Hesai Technology?
The company's co-founders include 3, namely CEO Li Yifan, Chief Scientist Sun Kai, and CTO Xiang Shaoqing.
First of all, let's look at CEO Li Yifan, born in 1986, graduated from Tsinghua University with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering, and received his master's and doctoral degrees from the University of Illinois in mechanical engineering.
Prior to founding Hesai, Yifan Li served as a principal engineer at Western Digital Group in Silicon Valley from 2013 to 2014.
Li Yifan has been selected as one of the "2021 Young Global Leaders" by the World Economic Forum, "China's 40 Business Elites Under 40" by Fortune magazine, "35 Most Innovative and Influential Under 35" by MIT Technology Review, and won the "Red Dot Design Award" in Germany.
In addition, Li Yifan has more than 100 patents in the fields of robotics, motion control, and sensors.
The second is Chief Scientist Sun Kai, born in 1985, graduated from the School of Mechanical and Power Engineering of Shanghai Jiao Tong University with a bachelor's degree, and graduated from the Department of Mechanical Engineering (major) and the Department of Electronics (minor) of Stanford University in 2013.
During his time at Stanford University, Dr. Kai Sun's research focused on using lasers and novel detection technologies to build ultra-fast, highly sensitive molecular measurement systems suitable for extremely harsh conditions, which were applied to the study of chemical reaction kinetics.
During his Ph.D., many papers were selected into the British Physical Society Collection, the American Optical Society Collection, Argonne National Laboratory Centennial Collection, and won the 2013 Best Paper Award of the journal Measurement Science and Technology.
Before returning to China to found Hesai Technology, Dr. Kai Sun worked as a research assistant at Stanford University in 2014.
Then there is CTO Xiang Shaoqing, born in 1985, who graduated from the Department of Precision Instruments and Mechanics of Tsinghua University with the first comprehensive score in the whole department, and won the honor of excellent graduate of the whole university.
In 2007, he received a full scholarship to study at Stanford University in the United States, obtained a double master's degree in electrical engineering and mechanical engineering, and independently completed the design and development of several intelligent mechatronics systems.
After graduation, he worked in Apple's US headquarters to be responsible for circuit system design, and participated in the prototype design, technology development and overseas production line erection of multiple generations of iPhone; He also worked at Samsung's global headquarters research center, responsible for the concept development of consumer products.
In addition to the three co-founders, the company's executives include CFO Xie Dongying (former CFO of NIO), Yang Cailian, vice president of operations, and Zhang Yi, independent director (currently CFO of Sina).
According to the prospectus, Li Yifan holds 8.6%, Sun Kai holds 8.9%, Xiang Shaoqing holds 8.6%, and Xie Dongying holds 1.2%.
In addition, the company's major shareholders include Lightspeed China, Baidu, Bosch, Xiaomi and others.
Up to now, Hesai has received a total of 536 million US dollars in financing, and investors include Xiaomi, Meituan, Bosch, Baidu, Lightspeed, Hillhouse, CPE, Qiming and other institutions.
Compared with the prospectus submitted by Hesai when it sprinted to the Science and Technology Innovation Board in January 2021, the following changes can be summarized:
The first is that the main market for the product has changed. Previously, it was mainly for the RoboTaxi market, mainly for vehicles, but now it is for the mass-produced smart car market, mainly for automotive-grade semi-solid states.
Second, mass production capacity has changed. Previously, the maximum production capacity of lidar was no more than 6,188 units a year, and now the shipment of lidar in 2022 exceeds 80,400 units.
Third, revenue capacity has also changed. Revenue in the first three quarters of 2020 was $253 million, but now revenue for the first three quarters of 2022 is $793 million.
Fourth, R&D investment and the number of R&D personnel have also changed. The previous R&D investment in the first three quarters of 2020 was 163 million yuan, and now the R&D investment in the first three quarters of 2022 is 376 million yuan; as of September 2020, there were only 270 R&D personnel, and now there are 528 R&D personnel.
Of course, the IPO of Hesai Technology is not only a reflection of Hesai's own strength, but also an inevitable development result under the outbreak of automotive lidar and the dividend of China's smart car market.
If Hesai once delayed the mass production scale in the RoboTaxi market, then the efforts on the vehicle-mounted lidar were almost the result of changing lanes and overtaking.
There are choices, more effort.
Now it is taking the lead in opening the US stock IPO process, and once successful, it will undoubtedly be a new beginning for China's smart car industry chain and autonomous driving companies to list in the United States.
By the way, maybe you don't know, the name of Hesai actually comes from San Jose, the hinterland of Silicon Valley in California, USA, when the founding team of Hesai had a life relationship before returning to China, and was named in reverse Chinese translation and pinyin.
Now, with this name, reverse to Wall Street financing to raise money.
Prospectus Portal: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1861737/000110465923004072/tm2120356-19_f1.htm#tERTT
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