Real shot of Xiaomi cars on the road: lidar, yellow calipers, the first coupe for young people?
Text | Shi Xin
Ed Director
After almost crossing the entire Yizhuang and crossing the Maju Bridge in the South Sixth Ring Road, we finally came to the door of the Xiaomi Automobile Factory.
This is already the edge of the city, many car factories are located here, BAIC, Mercedes-Benz, GAC, Toyota, here is the core of Beijing's automobile manufacturing park, the latest construction of the Xiaomi car factory is undoubtedly one of the most concerned, here, China's first mobile phone company independent car dream is about to be completed.
Xiaomi car factory, photo by Hedgehog Commune
On November 15, 2023, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the "Announcement on Road Motor Vehicle Manufacturers and Products" (Batch 377), among which "Xiaomi brand pure electric vehicles" are impressively listed. According to the document information, the product trademark of Xiaomi Automobile is "Xiaomi brand", and the enterprise name is "Beijing Automotive Group Off-road Vehicle Co., Ltd."
More than two and a half years after announcing the creation of a car, Xiaomi cars have finally come into the public eye.
Xiaomi car has a total of two product model publicity,The announcement discloses the photos and performance information of Xiaomi car in detail,The first product of Xiaomi car will be named SU7,Both models belong to the medium and large sedan level,In the eyes of many netizens,Xiaomi car is similar to Porsche Taycan,Quite a high-end coupe temperament。
Xiaomi SU7, source official website of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology
On the afternoon of the 15th, Lei Jun, CEO of Xiaomi Group, released a Weibo, saying that "the whole ecology of people, cars and homes, my heart is more surging", and at the same time, it is reported that Xiaomi cars will be mass-produced in the first half of 2024. In the midst of all the attention, Xiaomi cars are coming to life, and a new story is about to begin.
As a senior rice fan, with my curiosity about Xiaomi cars, I came to the Xiaomi Automobile Factory in Beijing Yizhuang Economic and Technological Development Zone. Unexpectedly, I also had a close "encounter" with Xiaomi Automobile.
When the Xiaomi car is on the road
"People who don't have a story don't deserve to go to Beijing Maju Bridge. ”
Driving on the South Sixth Ring Road, we are about to cross the famous Maju Bridge, one of the largest gig markets in Beijing. Compared with the bustling crowds and high-rise buildings in the Fifth Ring Road, this is already the urban-rural junction of Beijing, and it does not have the style of a first-tier city in terms of road planning or urban construction. Two kilometers further south is the Xiaomi car factory.
It's a much more "desolate" place than expected. To the north of the factory is the Hechuang Industrial Center, where several buildings stand tall, but there don't seem to be many companies actually living there, and there are not many people around.
Hechuang Industrial Center, photo taken by Hedgehog Commune
On the side of the factory, there are few high-rise buildings, and there is a large open space around the factory, which is mostly overgrown with grass, and in some places there are piles of building materials, and the nearby road is occasionally crossed by large trucks, which is clearly still under construction.
Wasteland around the Xiaomi car factory, photographed by the Hedgehog commune
The liveliest is the north gate of the Xiaomi car factory. On both sides of the road in front of the park, there are dozens of cars parked, and a few rows of electric vehicles, their owners may be the employees of the Xiaomi Automobile Factory, the parking lot in the park is almost full of cars, and there is a large open space between the park fence and the workshop, where there are no vehicles parked, and there are almost no buildings, and you can overlook the No. 5 assembly workshop in the distance. According to the information disclosed on the Internet, this is the parking area for commercial vehicles, and perhaps it is here that Xiaomi Auto completed its initial driving tests.
The north gate and No. 5 assembly workshop of the Xiaomi Automobile Factory, photographed by the Hedgehog Commune
On the map software, the Xiaomi car factory is also marked with the words "under construction". In April 2022, the construction of the first phase of the Xiaomi Auto Factory was officially launched, and it was officially completed ten months after construction. The first phase of the factory covers a total area of about 720,000 square meters, including six workshops and two buildings, including die-casting, stamping, body, painting, assembly and battery. On the east side of the factory, you can see the office building and laboratory building marked with the Xiaomi logo, and on the south side of the factory is the No. 1 workshop, which can clearly see the words "die-casting workshop" on the outer layer of the workshop.
Die casting workshop No. 1, photographed by Hedgehog Commune
There are not many pedestrians at the north gate of the factory, but there are close to ten security guards. It is worth noting that whether it is a workshop or an office building, the huge Xiaomi logo on the outer wall is covered with a layer of gray cloth, and not long ago, this iconic logo designed by Hara Kenya has not been covered, perhaps because Xiaomi wants to be more "low-key".
On October 21, the logo has not been covered by the Xiaomi car factory, taken by the Hedgehog Commune
Not long after I stopped outside the north gate, a car painted in camouflage drove into the open space in front of the assembly workshop, and I immediately turned on my phone camera to close the distance. Judging from the shape of the whole car and the lidar on the front windshield, this is exactly the Xiaomi car, and we finally saw this star product that has set off heated discussions before it is listed.
Although the wrapping is tight, you can still feel the "temperament" of Xiaomi cars: the overall body is relatively slender, the low-lying and fastback shape, and the streamlined overall design give the whole car a coupe feeling, and the triangular headlights that extend to both sides of the front are open, which shows the "momentum" of the C-class car. But I have to say that, like the discussion on the Internet, the actual car of Xiaomi Auto is indeed somewhat similar to the Porsche Taycan.
Compared with the public photos and data on the website of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Xiaomi car is 4997mm long, 1963mm wide, 1455mm high, wheelbase 3000mm, proper C-class car configuration, after seeing it with your own eyes, you can indeed feel the "high-end" route of Xiaomi car, the appearance design and texture of the whole vehicle is indeed more advanced, different from the "Pratt & Whitney" route at the beginning of Xiaomi mobile phone, Lei Jun wants to let "the first new energy vehicle for young people" fill the row.
Before I had time to carefully appreciate the appearance of the Xiaomi car, this Xiaomi car seemed to be about to drive out of the park, so we hurried to get in the car and prepared to have a close encounter with the Xiaomi car. After a while, two Xiaomi cars covered in paint drove out of the park in turn and turned left onto the road. There are not many vehicles on the nearby roads, and the population is very sparse, which is indeed very suitable for "car practice", and these two cars may be doing road tests.
We also had a "rub shoulder" with Xiaomi Automobile. The co-drivers of both cars sat in the passengers, and I could see that the seat interior of the second car was bright red, which made the whole car more "coupe" temperament, and the wheels of this car were also paired with yellow Brembo calipers, which reminded me of the nickname "Porspie".
According to the news released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Xiaomi Auto SU7 not only has three versions of ordinary, Pro, and Max, but also can choose different configurations in rearview mirror style, windshield style, sunroof glass style, rear windshield glass, wheel hub, caliper color and other parts. The second car is obviously the optional version, and the appearance of the whole vehicle has indeed been improved to a certain extent.
Xiaomi car option, source of the official website of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology
Driving on the road, the speed of the two cars is not fast, the driving attitude is relatively stable, but the sense of movement is very strong, driving on the road one after the other. At this time, I also found that the first car seems to be an "ordinary version", the connection between the front windshield and the canopy is very smooth, and I don't see obvious lidar, and the lidar on the top of the second windshield is very obvious, but compared with some "friends" on the market, Xiaomi car lidar is not "abrupt", the bulge is not big, and the lines are relatively soft, with the canopy glass, it may not be too obvious.
After driving a few hundred meters, we finally felt the acceleration of Xiaomi cars at the end of the red light at an intersection, although neither car put the accelerator pedal "to the end", but the overall acceleration attitude is still very beautiful, we just watched them drift away, until we couldn't see the beautiful through-type taillights.
According to the information that has been disclosed, the single-motor version of Xiaomi cars is equipped with a 220kW motor of United Automotive Electronics, with a maximum speed of 210km/h, and the dual-motor version is equipped with 220kW/275kW dual motors of Inovance Power, and the maximum speed can reach 265km/h. There is news that the zero hundred speed of Xiaomi cars is less than three seconds. The news may be true, after all, the sense of sportiness is there.
It's a pity that I didn't get to see the smart cockpit and interior of Xiaomi cars with my own eyes, and I didn't feel the battery life of BYD Fodi and CATL, but seeing Xiaomi cars on the road has made this visit worthwhile.
We turned around again and drove back in front of the Xiaomi car factory, looking out at the huge assembly hall, which will produce 150,000 Xiaomi cars for Xiaomi in the coming year, and will officially go to market in a few months. As the first and probably the only mobile phone manufacturer in China to make its own cars, Xiaomi is walking on an unprecedented road, price, positioning, user needs, in addition to complaining and ridiculing, Lei Jun and Xiaomi are facing a new test.
Today, when the first outlet of China's new energy enterprises is about to end, what kind of efforts has Xiaomi Auto experienced and what fate will it face?
After 900 days of hard work, Xiaomi's car manufacturing ushered in a big test
On March 30, 2021, on the podium of Xiaomi's spring press conference, Lei Jun paced, and a few lines of words were written on the screen behind him: "Electric vehicles, do it, or not do it, this is a question".
At that press conference, he finally announced the news of Xiaomi's car, Xiaomi Group, which has been deployed in mobile phones, smart homes and other fields for many years, finally entered the automobile manufacturing industry. Different from the laughter and conversation when the mobile phone was released, Lei Jun seemed full of ambition when announcing the construction of the car.
This is indeed one of the most important decisions in his entrepreneurial history, the success of Kingsoft and Xiaomi mobile phones is vivid, but building a car is another level of difficulty in entrepreneurship. Since the rise of the new energy wave, nearly 500 new energy car-related companies have been born in China, but when the time comes to 2023, there are only about 50 new power car companies left in normal operation in China, with a survival rate of one-tenth, as evidenced by the failure of car companies such as WM and Aiways.
As one of the world's largest mobile phone manufacturers and the world's top 500 enterprises, Xiaomi's "family background" is needless to say, just when Xiaomi mobile phones were still suffering from the "OEM" and "assembly" controversy, Lei Jun decided to invest 10 billion US dollars in 10 years, with an initial investment of 10 billion yuan, directly wholly owned to build cars, build factories independently, and do not consider financing in the short term. For domestic technology companies, this is undoubtedly an "all in".
At present, there are three main types of domestic and foreign companies entering the field of new energy vehicles. One is Tesla, Wei Xiaoli and other new power car companies, early entry into the game, although starting from scratch but have the advantage of time scale, in the user and technology accumulation and market share has a lot of advantages; the second is BYD, Geely as the representative of the traditional car companies, they themselves have a long experience in car manufacturing, in the car qualifications, car technology accumulation is profound, new energy is their future selection of development path, this kind of car companies often in the price, It has advantages in terms of models, and at the same time, it can cooperate with Internet technology companies to launch new brands through joint ventures.
The third type is Internet technology companies such as Xiaomi, compared with the first two, Internet companies may have advantages in mobile terminals and network services, but for them who lack experience in making cars, car manufacturing qualifications, and consumer cognition, it is not possible to directly build cars. As strong as Huawei's Wenjie, AVATAR, and Zhijie, it is also based on cooperation with Dongfeng Thalis, Changan, CATL, Geely and other automobile companies to shine.
As Lei Jun said, Xiaomi's car manufacturing will surely become the most significant entrepreneurial project in his entrepreneurial career, and he will bet on all the accumulated achievements and reputation in his life to fight for Xiaomi cars. What's more, the timing of Xiaomi's entry into the game is not good, in 2021, although the new energy vehicle industry is still in full swing, the final window period has undoubtedly come to an end, which will be more obvious in 2023.
But Lei Jun is not a "car white", he is one of the investors of Xiaopeng and Weilai, from a certain point of view, he understands the doorway in the car manufacturing very well, and also recognizes the problems in the development of the industry. But in that speech, Lei Jun also explained the reason why he had to build a car: after experiencing US sanctions and the involution of the mobile phone industry, he and his team deeply realized that building a car will definitely become Xiaomi's choice in the future.
On the one hand, competitors have entered the game to build cars, if Xiaomi does not want to become the next "Nokia", naturally cannot lag behind; on the other hand, the successful establishment of Xiaomi mobile phones and Xiaomi intelligent ecology can also bring valuable ecological advantages to Xiaomi cars; the most important point is that now Xiaomi can afford to gamble.
After the official announcement of the car, at the personal level, Lei Jun regards car building as one of the most important priorities, and accepts direct reports from seven executives of Xiaomi Auto every day, and in September 2021, the Xiaomi Auto team expanded to 17 people, and Xiaomi Auto has also attracted car-making bigwigs from BMW, Wuling, BAIC, Geely and many other well-known car companies.
Lei Jun himself also stepped up his understanding of car manufacturing, not only test drove various models, visited a number of car manufacturers, but also read a large number of car-related books and biographies, after the announcement of Xiaomi Auto, the Weibo that was widely popular on the Internet after the announcement of "Lei Jun reads Porsche" screenshot was released during this period.
Xiaomi is also stepping up the progress of car manufacturing. By the end of 2021, Xiaomi decided to settle its production base in Beijing Yizhuang Economic and Technological Development Zone, and set up an algorithm team of nearly 500 people to build the intelligent ecology of Xiaomi Auto.
In April 2022, the construction of Xiaomi's automobile factory was officially launched, during which Xiaomi stepped up its research and development. In August 2022, Lei Jun announced for the first time at the press conference the progress of Xiaomi's car manufacturing in the field of autonomous driving, and throughout 2022, Xiaomi applied for more than 400 automobile-related patents, including autonomous driving, car charging, power, intelligent cockpit and other car manufacturing fields. At the same time, Xiaomi has also begun to enter the upstream and downstream of the car-making field through investment, acquisitions, etc., and more than a dozen companies such as Shendong Technology, Tudatong, and Honeycomb Energy have been included in Xiaomi's territory.
In 2023, Xiaomi will move faster. In March, Lei Jun announced the progress here, saying that the overall progress exceeded expectations, and there was news that Xiaomi Auto had completed winter and summer tests. In June, the Xiaomi automobile factory was officially completed, and the car was only built in an instant, and in August, the news that Xiaomi Automobile obtained the car-making qualification was disclosed, and Xiaomi Automobile finally entered the trial production process.
Now, Xiaomi Auto has finally unveiled the mystery and come to us. Two and a half years have passed since the official announcement of the car, and more than 900 days have been in the test, and Xiaomi cars are about to usher in mass production.
Remember the passionate night on March 30, 2021, when Lei Jun officially announced the construction of the car, the followers were also passionate, and the live barrage was full of "overturning Tesla", the difficult eve has passed, has the dawn of Xiaomi cars really arrived?
Xiaomi, can it be the first car for young people?
After the public photos of Xiaomi cars were exposed, the most discussed is undoubtedly the price.
Although "Baoshi Mi" and other ridicule are endless, but for the market, price and positioning is a part of the real determination of Xiaomi's success in making cars, after all, Xiaomi as a well-known domestic technology company"cost-effective" player, once swept the entire mobile phone market with affordable mobile phones, and low quality has become one of the synonyms of this company.
The problem is that Xiaomi cars are too "high-end", whether it is the "Porsche-flavored" shape or the positioning of the C-class car, it seems to show the unreality of "199999 make a friend".
After the official "debut", some media speculated that the price of Xiaomi cars should be between 25 and 350,000 yuan, competing with products such as Wenjie, Xiaopeng, BYD Dynasty, and Zhijie;
No matter how you guess, more than 250,000 is already everyone's consensus, but this price range undoubtedly does not belong to the ranks of "the first car for young people". Perhaps because of the experience of mobile phones hitting the high-end for many years, Lei Jun put the initial direction of car manufacturing in the mid-to-high-end positioning, which may be conducive to the construction of future car brands, but it is likely to disappoint young "rice fans".
But judging from the published data, the overall performance of Xiaomi cars is the high-end tram route, whether it is the positioning of the C-class car, or the shape of the coupe, as well as the high-end version of the 800V high-voltage platform, 265km/h of the ultimate speed, the overall positioning has indeed approached the Porsche Taycan, if it can be kept at about 300,000 in price, it is indeed quite a cost-effective choice, "the first Paramela for young people" is not a dream.
In short, it is also a mid-to-high-end coupe, Xiaomi SU7 will benchmark Tesla Model S and Porsche Taycan in configuration and performance, but it is Weilai, Zhijie, and Zeekrypton that are competing in price. It is also a cost-effective route, but Xiaomi is taking the "cost-effective high-end products".
Porsche Taycan, photo source NetEase Auto
The market situation facing Xiaomi is undoubtedly grim. On the one hand, the window period of new energy vehicles has passed, and this is not the best period to enter the game, both in terms of consumption policy and market share, there is a lack of certain advantages; on the other hand, there are Tesla, Wei Xiaoli, Zeekr, BYD, Huawei, Baidu, and many opponents. In 2023 alone, Huawei will release three brands: Wenjie, AVATAR, and Zhijie, and the market is getting smaller and smaller, and whether it can establish product advantages through intelligent driving needs to be a question mark.
But Xiaomi also has its own confidence, in addition to strong group capital, Xiaomi has a lot of advantages in user training, intelligent ecosystem, marketing system and other fields.
In terms of user training,From the Xiaomi 1 era established"Rice flour faith"Needless to say,Through Xiaomi home、The user ecology established by Xiaomi smart products is more worthy of attention,Under the accumulation of the past ten years,Xiaomi users have developed unique consumption habits,The car is an important part of the whole link of Xiaomi。
In the field of ecology,With the release of the surging OS,Xiaomi ecosystem has also entered a new stage of development,Lei Jun also said at the press conference,Xiaomi's future goal is"People, cars, and home ecology",When Xiaomi mobile phones、Xiaomi digital products and Mi home intelligence、Xiaomi cars can achieve all-round linkage,This kind of ecological convenience、Experience will surely bring users a new experience。 Let's ask, which rice fan can refuse the temptation of "Xiao Ai's classmate to open smart driving"?
The other part is the cliché topic, when it comes to marketing channels, Xiaomi hardly needs to worry. Whether it is Lei Jun, who has a huge traffic, or Xiaomi has always had a high degree of discussion, Xiaomi cars do not need to worry about publicity, and in offline channels, thousands of Xiaomi stores can also provide convenience for the display and sales of cars.
It is worth noting that Xiaomi's wholly-owned model has an important impact on brand building. At the beginning of the announcement of the car, Lei Jun decided to operate a wholly-owned automobile company by Xiaomi, which can avoid external capital affecting the development direction of Xiaomi Automobile, and on the other hand, in terms of brand building, Xiaomi Auto has a unique advantage.
Taking Internet companies such as Huawei and Baidu as examples, brands such as Wenjie, AVATAR, Zhijie, and Jiyue are facing certain brand building problems, and ordinary consumers lack understanding of the automobile market. Xiaomi will reduce this part of the investment, "Beijing Xiaomi" not only directly shows the genes behind the brand, but also endorses the product through the Xiaomi Group itself.
Of course, everything needs to fall back to the product itself, only Xiaomi cars are good enough, cost-effective enough, in order to fight a bloody way in this extreme new energy vehicle field. All this we still need to be patient and wait for the moment when the Xiaomi car is officially released.
Presumably at that time, many rice fans will recall the press conference in 2011: when Lei Jun pressed the remote control, the moment the "1999 yuan" behind him fell, the audience shouted and shook the sky. In the next ten years, the mobile phone circle has changed, and Xiaomi, which has gone through a lot of hardships, has finally become the world's first-class mobile phone manufacturer.