Made In China EV Player Aims To Become The Next Tesla

Last year, overall car sales plummeted 20% but EV sales jumped 43% with plenty of more room to run. Tesla Inc TSLA is without a doubt one of the world's most exciting car makers that made going green a new norm in this competitive industry. Its modern design has become an industry standard as Tesla single-handedly made EVs cool, and fueled a dramatic rise in this burgeoning market since its debut. But, it's no longer alone on the electric playing field and its influence hasn't been ignored overseas. Besides Europe, China also answered to Tesla's dominance.

Nio Inc NIO used to be an outlier in the EV market but keeping its balance sheet in line paid off in a big way. It has seen its share price soar from $3.24 at the start of 2020 to a high of $50 earlier this year before going back to its current price of $38. Back in November, NIO unveiled a pair of vehicles that would make even the biggest Tesla fans question their brand loyalty. The vehicles that are meant to compete with Tesla's Model could be exactly what the company needs to take control of its domestic market. But, there's another emerging Tesla rival that Wall Street views as an early leader in autonomous driving.

See also: How to Buy Electric Vehicle (EV) Stocks

XPeng

Founded half a decade ago, an EV startup is giving Tesla a run for its money with its "smart EVs" featuring highly autonomous driving, among other tech features. Xpeng Inc XPEV already sells two EVs, the G3 SUV and the P7 sedan, mainly in China. Along with its Chinese EV peers, Nio and Li Auto Inc. LI, Xpeng scored blowout EV sales last year and it just revealed its newest model.

The P5

On Wednesday, P5 was revealed as the world's first mass-produced EV equipped with lidar sensors. This particular EV marks the Chinese EV startup's third production vehicle and second electric sedan. It is "the world's first production smart EV equipped with automotive-grade LIDAR technology". Each new Xpeng model aims for a new high in technology, and the P5 is the company's most advanced and technically ambitious model to date. It will be shown at Auto Shanghai 2021 on April 19^th. It will be priced lower than the P7 and it should be available to Chinese customers during this year's third or fourth quarter, according to CNBC.

Semiconductors

In an effort to stay ahead of competitors, a top executive at the company told CNBC that the company is also looking into making its own semiconductors for autonomous driving. Xinzhou Wu, vice president in charge of autonomous driving, said the company is exploring various options technologies, including autonomous driving chips. The P5 uses chips from NVIDIA Corporation NVDA for autonomous driving and QUALCOMM, Inc. QCOM for its in-car digital cockpit.

Outlook

There's no reason to doubt that XPeng will continue to expand within China. The company announced to Reuters to expect a lineup of seven to eight models by 2024 which will inevitably lead to further improvement of its top-line performance. One thing is for sure, Tesla's dominance is no longer a given.

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