Xiaomi Buys $116m Plot To Expand Bejing EV Factory

Beijing-based tech company Xiaomi has purchased a 842 million yuan ($116m, £90m) plot of land in the Chinese capital to expand its electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing operations following rapid sales of its first sedan launched earlier this year, Bloomberg reported.

The 53-hectare (131-acre) site is near Xiaomi’s existing EV plant in Beijing’s Yizhuang district according to filings with the Beijing Municipal Commission of Planning and Natural Resources.

The purchase was made through Xiaomi subsidiary Xiaomi Jingxi Technology for the “development of the high-end automobile and new energy intelligent vehicle industry”.

The company’s founder and chief executive, Lei Jun, said in a recent speech that Xiaomi’s addition to a US Defence Department blacklist in January 2021 was behind his decision to enter into China’s highly saturated electric vehicle market.

EV expansion

Xiaomi, which started off making low-cost smartphones, announced in March 2021 that it would launch an EV subsidiary, two months after being added to the blacklist.

The company launched its SU7 electric sedans in March of this year and has delivered 30,000 of the vehicles so far.

Lei said at the SU7 launch the cars were being sold at a loss with an aggressive starting price of 215,900 yuan.

In his speech he said the company turned down venture capital funding and instead put $10bn of its own funds into the business over 10 years.

That included the construction of the company’s initial 5.5bn yuan, 718,000 square metre EV factory in Beijing.

The factory went onto double shifts in June as it ramped to meet its maximum delivery target of 120,000 vehicles this year.

Sales growth

Xiaomi has said it is on track to meet its minimum delivery target for the year of 100,000 vehicles as early as November.

Tesla sold 603,664 vehicles in China last year by comparison.

The EV market in China is highly competitive with numerous start-ups and established companies vying for share.

Huawei, which has been under US sanctions since 2019, also started an EV venture called Aito with car manufacturing partner Seres and saw sales of its first offerings surge in the final quarter of last year.

Xiaomi last week showed a prototype hyper-sports version of its SU7 called the SU7 Ultra, offering some 1548 horsepower, or more than double the 673hp of the SU7 Max, its most powerful consumer model.