China EVs & More Episode #63 - April sales ..so far, China Autonomous Vehicle update, VW's Cariad China
Tu & Lei start out the pod with a discussion on how the current April sales numbers look to be shaping out. It doesn't look good for most of the legacy OEMs with the exception of BYD.
Tu gives a Covid update for Beijing and what he expects to see in the next few weeks.
Tu transitions the conversation over to the China autonomous vehicle update and they both share their thoughts on all of the announcements that came out last week from Pony.ai, Baidu Apollo, Momenta and WeRide, who partnered with Pony.ai for the latest investment round of OnTime, a mobility platform whose other major investor is GAC Group.
Tu shifts the discussion over to Volkswagen (VW) opening a China office for their software division, Cariad and moving over a Volkswagen veteran to over with strong ties to China to lead the group. Tu and Lei spend a few minutes debating the merits of the moves and the leadership appointed to launch the team in China with, surprise, Tu being a bit skeptical of the moves and whether or not it'll get VW where they need to be with SW development in the timeframe they need to do it in.
Tu wraps up the pod with a few quick updates on CATL's swapping station, BYD's substantial increase YoY from Q1 sales, and finally a comment on Elon's purchase of Twitter and whether he'll be pressured by the Chinese govt. to promote a more positive tone on the platform.
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