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Cailianshe News, August 9 (Reporter Xu Hao)After a half-year shutdown,HiPhiThere has been new progress in the road to "resurrection" of the main body Human Horizons.

Cailianshe reporter exclusively learned that the People's Court of Yancheng Economic and Technological Development Zone made a decision on August 8 to accept the pre-reorganization application of Human Horizons (Jiangsu) Technology Co., Ltd. The pre-reorganization period is six months from the date of the decision. If there are legitimate reasons, it can be extended for three months upon application by the pre-reorganization administrator.

"Strictly speaking, pre-reorganization is not a clear legal procedure. It is a new rescue mechanism for court reorganization." Xiong Chao, a partner lawyer at Beijing Jingshi Law Firm, told Cailianshe reporters, "Pre-reorganization mainly relies on market means. Generally, it is a limited judicial intervention in the restructuring value of troubled enterprises. It can reduce the cost of the restructuring system and rescue valuable troubled enterprises as soon as possible."

On July 1, HiPhi Auto's parent company Human Horizons (Jiangsu) Technology Co., Ltd. applied to the People's Court of Yancheng Economic and Technological Development Zone for reorganization of the company and pre-reorganization on the grounds that its assets could not repay all due debts, but had reorganization value and reorganization possibility. Prior to this, in May, the industry had revealed that HiPhi had established a reorganization working group and a joint operation working group. According to an internal announcement, the reorganization working group is mainly responsible for the reorganization of everything from equity to all operation-related activities, including but not limited to the handling of all debts. The working group has four subgroups under it: shareholder affairs, government affairs, supplier affairs, and employee affairs. The joint operation working group is mainly responsible for the company's daily decision-making and operations.

Almost at the same time when the establishment of the restructuring working group and the joint operation working group was revealed, Human Horizons and iAuto Group Inc. officially signed a comprehensive strategic cooperation agreement on May 16, local time in the United States. The scope includes: cooperation on the resumption of production to fulfill sales orders, cooperation related to equity restructuring and mergers and acquisitions, cooperation in technology, R&D, and engineering, integration of brands and domestic and overseas marketing, integration of supply chain and production manufacturing, etc.

According to the agreement, iAuto plans to invest more than US$1 billion in the first round of special funds to fully support the restructuring of Human Horizons HiPhi Auto. At the same time, both parties will do their best to complete the required compliance transaction procedures before the release of the 2024 semi-annual report.

It is worth noting that the aforementioned leader of the HiPhi restructuring team and Jack YEUNG, who is jointly responsible for the overall strategic planning with Chairman Ding Lei, is the CEO of iAuto. Before reaching a cooperation agreement with Human Horizons, iAuto was little known and only appeared in the September 2023 announcement of the Hong Kong-listed company Zhengdao Group. The announcement shows that iAuto is a clean energy vehicle company registered in Delaware, USA. Its core business is the research and development, production, integrated sales and operation of clean energy vehicles and key components. iAuto has strong technical reserves and multiple international patents in the field of clean energy vehicle chassis and motors. The announcement also shows that the ultimate beneficial owner of iAuto is Yang Rong, chairman of Zhengdao Group.

In the view of industry insiders, Human Horizons' entry into judicial pre-reorganization means that it is working hard to seek external resources to resume work and production as soon as possible in order to return to the new energy vehicle track.