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Starting from 2020, Lei Jun, CEO of Xiaomi, has given a public speech every year, and this is the fifth year now. What is different from the past is that on the evening of July 19, in the 3-hour speech, Lei Jun spent more than half of the time for the first time to reveal the "Three-year Road to Car Manufacturing of Xiaomi".

Lei Jun said that three years ago, before Xiaomi decided to build a car, it conducted 85 surveys, interviewed more than 200 people, and held four executive meetings. During the survey, Li Bin and He Xiaopeng, CEOs of NIO and Xpeng, urged him to build a car.

When Xiaomi decided to build cars, the capital market's new energy track had not yet cooled down. Several VCs offered Xiaomi Auto a valuation of $10 billion, but Lei Jun rejected it. "The car-building cycle is very long, and it is almost impossible to agree with the investors. If Xiaomi builds cars internally, a large number of talents and technologies can be used directly." Lei Jun said. So Xiaomi decided to do it all by itself.

Internet people cross over to car manufacturing, starting with crazy driving. Lei Jun said that he test-drove more than 170 cars in three years, and even learned racing in the summer, passed the racing driver's license, and learned drifting.

Xiaomi's first car is SU7, which was launched on March 28 this year. Lei Jun said that the annual sales target of 100,000 SU7s is expected to be completed ahead of schedule in early November.

With orders pouring in, car company CEOs will face a "sweet trouble" - production capacity pressure. Seven years ago, Tesla went through a production capacity hell phase. Now, whether it can withstand the production capacity pressure and deliver smoothly has become a key challenge for Xiaomi SU7 to achieve its goals.

Xiaomi’s second car SU8, which was much anticipated by the outside world, did not appear, and Lei Jun responded that "SU8 is not true."

In this speech, Lei Jun unveiled the high-performance version of Xiaomi SU7 - Xiaomi SU7 Ultra. Just as Mercedes-Benz has AMG models, BMW has M Power, and Audi has RS series, Xiaomi SU7 Ultra aims to become the "fastest four-door electric car in the Nürburgring" within ten years.

After three years of car manufacturing, Xiaomi has already squeezed into the table. But squeezing into the table is only the first step, and the fierce battle of the game has just begun.

Smoothly served

"As a newcomer, as long as Xiaomi can successfully get on the table, it will be a huge success," Lei Jun said in his speech.

Before the Xiaomi SU7 was launched, industry experts estimated that the monthly sales of the car would be 3,000 units, with an annual production of only 36,000 units. However, Lei Jun set the annual production of SU7 at 76,000 units.

The outside world's doubts were defeated by real data. According to Xiaomi Auto's official data, it took only 43 days for Xiaomi SU7 to reach the milestone of 10,000 units delivered since its official delivery on April 3. It took 87 days for AITO's first model, the M5, to achieve this result.

In May 2023, Xiaomi adjusted the delivery target of Xiaomi SU7: to deliver 100,000 units this year and strive for 120,000 units. However, in this speech, Lei Jun brought forward the delivery target, saying that the annual target of 100,000 units of Xiaomi SU7 is expected to be completed ahead of schedule in early November.

Among them, Xiaomi SU7 is expected to deliver more than 10,000 units in July this year.

As a dark horse in the Chinese auto market in 2024, Xiaomi SU7 has been attracting a lot of traffic since its launch, thanks to Xiaomi's marketing. However, along with the traffic, there are also doubts about Xiaomi's smart driving. Xiaomi is also facing difficulties such as insufficient production capacity, supply chain problems and sales channel construction.

Among them, the biggest pressure is the production capacity and delivery issues. According to media reports, in order to ensure supply, the Xiaomi SU7 standard version uses Fudi batteries and also adds CATL batteries. In addition, Xiaomi Auto is also increasing its production capacity by expanding the factory area and adding production lines. The second phase of Xiaomi Auto's factory is under construction.

In terms of channels, as of July, Xiaomi has 30 delivery centers, 93 sales stores and 57 service stores. By December this year, Xiaomi will have 53 delivery centers, 220 sales stores and 135 service stores.

This is far less than other new car-making forces. The financial report shows that as of the first quarter of 2024, the number of stores of Xiaopeng and Ideal were 574 and 474 respectively.

"Challenging Porsche is our Xiaomi dream." At this press conference, Lei Jun used a Xiaomi SU7 Ultra prototype car to challenge Porsche.

He said that Xiaomi SU7 Ultra will strive to become the fastest four-door tram in the Nürburgring within ten years.

It is reported that the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra is equipped with a V8s Xiaomi super motor with a peak torque of 635N·m. It is also equipped with a track-specific CATL Kirin II battery pack with a maximum discharge power of 1330kW and a 0-100 acceleration of 1.97 seconds.

Lei Jun also announced Xiaomi's plan to challenge the Nürburgring Nordschleife: In October this year, the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra prototype will challenge the Nürburgring non-production lap time list. In 2025, the Xiaomi SU7 production car will officially challenge the Nürburgring production lap time list.

At present, Xiaomi SU7 is responsible for sales volume, and Xiaomi SU7 Ultra is responsible for demonstrating technical strength and establishing brand image, but before achieving the goal, smooth mass production is the first step.

This is very "Lei Jun"

Every major event after Xiaomi "comes to the table" reflects Lei Jun's strong personal style at all times.

As the "number one" of Xiaomi, Lei Jun often participates in the trivial matters done by grassroots employees, even trivial matters that have nothing to do with the company's business. Lei Jun personally participates in the summer testing of cars. He recalled that during the summer testing in Turpan, the competing car was exposed to the sun for two hours, and the seats were very hot. He jumped up as soon as he got in, and the seat temperature could reach 90°. He found that the local watermelon was 30 cents per kilogram, and couldn't help but buy a few to send back to Beijing, but found that the shipping cost was 100 times the price of the watermelon. Behind the trivial matters, a people-friendly image is vividly portrayed.

Lei Jun has never concealed his ambition to build cars. Just like Xiaomi phones are benchmarked against iPhones, Lei Jun has never concealed in public that Model 3 is the benchmark model of SU7. Lei Jun once said on Weibo that the configuration of Xiaomi SU7 standard version far exceeds that of Model 3.

At the new product launch conference, he also said that "challenging Porsche is our Xiaomi's dream", responding to the title of Xiaomi SU7 "Mi Shijie".

Lei Jun, who came from the Internet industry, is well versed in the rules of Internet communication and operation. In a previous live broadcast, Lei Jun once said: "I think the most important thing for a person is not to take himself too seriously and not to be pretentious."

As early as 2020, Lei Jun had already started his first live broadcast to sell goods. A week before the launch of Xiaomi SU7, Lei Jun even posted 30 Weibo posts in a row to promote Xiaomi SU7.

On May 18 this year, Lei Jun conducted a three-and-a-half-hour uninterrupted live broadcast, during which he launched the SU7 Pro model debut and used Xiaomi's city NOA (automatic assisted navigation driving) function throughout the whole process, demonstrating Xiaomi's latest achievements in intelligent driving.

At this year's Beijing Auto Show, Lei Jun's arrival turned the show into a competition for traffic among CEOs of major auto companies.

From behind the scenes to the front stage, car company bosses have also begun to follow Lei Jun's example and personally come on stage to endorse their own products. On April 14, Yin Tongyue, chairman of Chery, launched his first live broadcast and said frankly: "This live broadcast is also using new Internet thinking to learn from Yu Chengdong and Lei Jun, how to personally explain and introduce (cars)."

"Automobiles are a century-old industry," Lei Jun mentioned in his speech. Since Xiaomi officially announced its car manufacturing, it has developed its own batteries, created the hit SU7, built the Xiaomi Auto Super Factory, and obtained car manufacturing qualifications... These are the first steps to successfully "get on the table". In the future when the industry is accelerating its clearance, how Xiaomi can withstand the test of industry competition has become a focus that deserves more attention besides marketing.