Xiaomi is a Chinese company known for its rice cookers, robot vacuums, air purifiers and smartphones. Now, it has pulled off what Apple, its longtime rival, couldn’t: Make an electric car and bring it to market.
And it did it in three years.
To save on time and costs, the company adopted practices from Tesla and other automakers, mined its own product-development know-how and plugged into China’s fast-moving car supply chain. Years of honing laptops, blenders and petcams helped it develop features tailored to a fickle consumer base, including a detachable panel of physical buttons that magnetically clips on below the 16.1-inch center screen for those who don’t like to control their volume or seat via touch screen.
Xiaomi brought on some 6,000 people to work on the car project, Lei said. Some were recruited from foreign carmakers such as Porsche and BMW; others were transferred from other departments, said Ma Yingbo, a member of Xiaomi’s marketing team. Among the cars Xiaomi looked to for inspiration was Tesla’s Model 3.
To simplify development and reduce costs, Xiaomi adopted Tesla’s process of “gigacasting,” which employs large-scale, high-pressure aluminum die-casting to create the car’s frame. The process combines hundreds of manufacturing steps into one, saving on components, weight, cost and time
Maybe it’s time we start working with our “enemies” rather than demonizing, criticizing, and sanctioning them like school yard adolescents?
After stumbling on the trade concept of “comparative advantage” in Econ 101 I have never stopped being impressed.
The Chinese have done their home work.
Just look at any new car or SUV from any Chinese automaker. It is full of innovation, something we used to expect from the US or Germany or France or Italy.
Now China has done innovation at warp speed, and there is no way an automaker in the West will have resources at the labor rates prevalent in China to compete on a global scale.
Not only is the Xiaomi fantastic, just look at the new Jetour SUV. You can buy the same style and looks as a Land Rover which costs three times more, and has the quality record of a 1980's Yugo
"There is no way an automaker in the West will have resources at the labor rates prevalent in China to compete on a global scale."
Labour costs are only 15% of the price of a car, and wages in China are climbing at 9% a year, so you are overstating the cost advantage.
The car in this profile is cheap because it is being sold at a loss, as the article clearly states. As it also says, 9/10 of the new Chinese entrants are expected to go out of business. And "global competition" will be limited. The US is applying 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs and the EU is about to bring in tariffs of its own.
It is not accurate to claim "Apple couldn't".
Apple made the right decision to not invest the capital as it would not yield an acceptable return.
@Int3grityTruffleGreen3wks3W
Coal powered electric vehicles. Basically moving the tail pipe from the rear of the car to the place electricity is being produced.
@WorriedFishPatriot3wks3W
Easy to jump-start the design practice when you can wholesale rob the rest of the world of its IP. I'm sure they were very careful to respect Tesla's patent rights while replicating the gigacasting process. Despite this, I wouldn't be caught dead with one of these in my garage. Having been involved in R&D and product development, there's no way they adequately reviewed this design, produced enough prototype iterations, and appropriately tested those revisions in 3 years. This is an alpha product, and you'll be lucky if the worst it does to you is strand you away from home. I really wouldn't b...
@MandateSaltNo Labels3wks3W
The USA's behavior is a sign of weakness and, above all, of dwindling influence. That is why more and more sanctions are being imposed instead of letting the market play its role. What a banana republic the USA has become.
hahaha these cars are a supreme safety hazard.
Making cheap EV'S isn't a wise strategy for profitability. It just shows how heavily subsidies Chinese companies are. In a fair market Xiaomi would have been bankrupt.
@ISIDEWITH3wks3W
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