This article is authorized reprint from Chuxingyike (WeChat Official Account ID: carcaijing), created by Transportation Industry Group of “Caijing” magazine, written by MaoMao Qu and Yu Guo, edited by Zhiliang Shi.
The first model car resembles a robot and is expected to be showcased at the Beijing Auto Show next year. It is a “near-production” car with an estimated investment of 50 billion yuan over the next five years.
“The Jidu ship has set sail.” On the afternoon of April 23, on the occasion of Baidu’s entry into the car manufacturing industry for 100 days, Jidu Auto CEO Xia Yiping said in an interview with Chuxingyike (ID: carcaijing).
Since the rumor of Baidu’s entry into the car manufacturing industry, it has attracted great attention from the market, and Baidu’s stock price has repeatedly soared as a result. On March 2, Baidu’s car manufacturing company was registered under the name “Jidu Automobile Co., Ltd.” with a registered capital of 2 billion yuan, and Xia Yiping was the legal representative.
Xia Yiping graduated from the School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, University of Essex, UK, and was the co-founder and CTO of Mobike before joining Jidu Auto. Prior to that, he was responsible for the intelligent connected car business unit in the Asia-Pacific region at Fiat Chrysler and had worked for Ford Asia-Pacific and North America for 5 years, responsible for the localization of Ford’s intelligent in-vehicle system, SYNC, in China.
“Jidu” means “the culmination of Baidu’s AI capabilities,” and Xia Yiping’s new journey in the automotive industry is about to begin. In the equity structure of Jidu Auto, Baidu’s wholly-owned Dazi County Bairui Xiang Venture Capital Management Co., Ltd. subscribed for 1.1 billion yuan, holding 55%, and Shanghai Huapu Automobile Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Geely Group, subscribed for 900 million yuan, holding 45%. Jidu Auto has a total of 5 board of directors members, including Xia Yiping, 3 directors from Baidu and 1 director from Geely.
It is not difficult to see that Baidu is the dominant party in Jidu Auto. However, Xia Yiping emphasized that Jidu Auto is an independent commercial company, with funding coming from both Baidu and external financing in the near future. Jidu Auto will also incorporate its own understanding of Baidu’s technology.
Since the end of 2020, many technology companies have launched a sprint towards the new car manufacturing industry. Currently, there are several competitive forces: first, foreign-funded enterprises and joint ventures represented by Tesla, Daimler, and Toyota; second, independent car companies represented by SAIC, BAIC, and BYD; third, emerging car manufacturing forces represented by NIO and XPeng. Beginning in the second half of 2020, technology companies represented by Apple, Baidu, and Xiaomi have emerged as the fourth force in car manufacturing industry.The market is curious about what Baidu’s first car will look like. “It will be targeted towards the younger market and have more of a robot feeling,” said Xia Yiping, outlining the prototype of Jidu Auto’s first car, which he has great confidence in. “We’re not just shouting a slogan. Our car is even the coolest item in today’s exhibition halls.”
Currently, the most important thing is recruitment. “Now that the team has been established, it’s time for brand strategy, product strategy, and even engineering initiation.”
Making cars is a heavy capital investment, and money means time, and even everything. Nio founder Li Bin once said that without RMB20 billion, don’t talk about making cars. Xiaomi founder, chairman and CEO Lei Jun also made a bold statement of spending $10 billion over 10 years on making cars and betting on all his accumulated reputation and accomplishments for Xiaomi.
This figure for Jidu Auto is RMB50 billion investment over 5 years. Xia Yiping needs to lead Jidu Auto on a long journey.
In the interview, Xia Yiping also talked about the current focus of work, Baidu’s first car, the relationship between Baidu and Geely, and the concept of competition. The following is an interview transcript, edited and compiled by Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing), with some content deleted.
Talking About People: The Top Priority is Recruitment
Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Baidu announced its plan to make cars 100 days ago. Where did you spend the most effort in these 100 days?
Xia Yiping: We spent the most effort on recruitment. Although we were officially registered on March 2nd, we didn’t stop before that. I hardly did any interviews in the past one or two months, and I estimate that I have interviewed two or three hundred people in the past two months.
I often spend 12 hours on weekends, from 9 am to 9 pm, interviewing candidates because we really have no one and no team yet. So I prefer to put a lot of effort into building the team.
Now our core team has basically been built, including the entire market brand user operation, car design, engineering design, technical engineering research and development, project management, etc.
Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): What kind of people do you want to build the car with you?
Xia Yiping: In principle, we want to find like-minded people from high-end talents, not the most talented or all talents. The premise of recruiting people is to value the person’s inherent spirit of adventure, because we believe that succeeding in this matter is not just about finding a professional manager to come over. If the culture cannot be integrated, you still cannot succeed.We attract talents in two ways, not only by money, but also by consensus on these things, on cognition and future goals. In fact, the communication is about what we want to do in the next 5-10 years and why this is more make sense for us to do.
So, I have interviewed two or three hundred people in the past, but in fact, only about 10%-15% of them were recruited.
Car News One (ID: carcaijing): How many people are there in the team now?
Xia Yiping: We have about 100 people in the team now. Our company is completely different from traditional car companies in terms of organizational structure. In addition to traditional car people, half of the people inside the company actually come from Internet and consumer electronics companies. We also hope to do two things well: one is to make these two groups of people more integrated in terms of ability and ideals; the other is from user operations, market operations, to products and after-sales systems, we hope to build Jidu Auto into a fully digital company.
Car News One (ID: carcaijing): What is the current recruitment progress and plan?
Xia Yiping: Basically, we are recruiting at a rate of about 15 people per day. What kind of talent we need depends on the specific stage, because entrepreneurship is like a battle. You need different types of soldiers and formations in different battlefields. Therefore, we recruit people oriented to strategic goals and continuously at different stages.
Car News One (ID: carcaijing): There are now more than 100 people, what is the plan for the scale of recruitment?
Xia Yiping: According to the current progress, there may be about 1000-1500 people by the end of this year. When the whole vehicle slowly starts to come out next year, and the sales system starts to be established, the number of people will start to increase again. The plan may be a total size of more 2000 to 3000 by the end of next year.
Talking about money: It is expected to invest 50 billion yuan in five years.
Car News One (ID: carcaijing): What roles do Baidu and Geely represent in Jidu Auto?
Xia Yiping: Jidu Auto is a completely independent and self-operating company. It is led by Baidu, and Geely is a strategic investor in it. In terms of cooperation, whether it is with Baidu Apollo or Geely, it is purely a commercial relationship, and only in terms of strategy, we have common goals and hope to make a very intelligent car product.
Car News One (ID: carcaijing): Will you use Geely’s electrification platform?Xia Yiping: The platform for Jidu’s first car is based on Geely Haohan’s open platform, but there are differences between Geely Haohan platform and our product requirements, so we still need to make some modifications to the entire Haohan platform based on our product requirements.
Jidu will work with Geely to make these modifications, but we will lead and implement the technological improvements ourselves.
Travel with One Passenger (ID: carcaijing): Can we understand that Geely is like the Foxconn of Baidu, similar to Apple and Foxconn?
Xia Yiping: First of all, we do not have the relationship of Apple and Foxconn, our cooperation with Geely is still relatively deep. I think in the era of electric vehicles, we should seek win-win situations more and should not play zero-sum games, which are detrimental to everyone.
Our cooperation with Geely, on the one hand, is a deep strategic cooperation, with Jidu using Geely’s platform. On the other hand, in terms of technology, we are relatively open and transparent. One of the main reasons why Baidu chose to cooperate with Geely is because Geely has advantages in the entire supply chain and quality system. We hope that both parties can use the best resources to develop a product that has excellent cost and quality control and can make significant breakthroughs in intelligent technology.
Travel with One Passenger (ID: carcaijing): Is the supply chain led by Geely?
Xia Yiping: Jidu will use Geely’s supply chain network because for a car company like us that has just started, developing our own supply chain will be very costly.
Travel with One Passenger (ID: carcaijing): How is the commercial cooperation relationship between Jidu and Baidu Apollo?
Xia Yiping: We have a certain degree of synergy in our strategic cooperation, but our commercial cooperation is entirely commercialized, and we have to pay them. Baidu Apollo is a TO B company, which will serve many car manufacturers and has a big market to explore.
As for the teams of both parties, because it is completely commercialized, there is no team that will come to our side. However, we are open to all Baidu employees. If Baidu employees want to join Jidu, they must leave Baidu because we are two completely independent companies.
Travel with One Passenger (ID: carcaijing): Making cars is a very capital-intensive track. What is Baidu’s plan for Jidu’s capital investment?
Xia Yiping: This matter can be divided into two dimensions. Let’s not talk about Baidu for now. When Jidu is planning car models, we are building a series of cars, not just one car. After the first car is launched, we will introduce a new model every 1 to 1.5 years.
Based on this plan and investment, our rough estimate is that we will invest about RMB 50 billion in five years.
Travel with One Passenger (ID: carcaijing): How does Jidu get funding support for its cars?# Xia Yiping: The capital of Jidu comes from two parts, one is continuous support from Baidu Group and the other is the participation of social capital as our external shareholders. Jidu will soon start financing.
Talking about the first car: More like a robot feeling
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): What kind of car is the first product?
Xia Yiping: Firstly, it’s our philosophy. We have been thinking about how to design a car for the future unmanned era. We don’t think of it as a car, we hope to design a feeling like a robot. Therefore, we have incorporated a lot of robot design feelings in many interactive designs and even in appearance.
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): What is the price range of the first car? What is your positioning of the consumer group?
Xia Yiping: The price cannot be revealed now, but it will definitely be announced at an appropriate time. The user group will definitely be mainly young people, and we will also take into account the needs of some female users.
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): How did Jidu think about selling cars through channels?
Xia Yiping: We will definitely build our own channels, because we will place our brand first. Now that the team has been established, we will slowly talk about the overall brand strategy, product strategy, and engineering start-up.
I think in the future market competition, products are certainly important, but brands and users are also very important. In the early stage, how to do some friendly operational activities for users, and in the later stage, we will cooperate with some brand stores to do some related channel and sales work.
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): Will Jidu’s first car model be a luxury car?
Xia Yiping: The word “luxury” is not suitable for young people.
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): Now the concept of being technology-oriented or young-oriented is too vague. Can you give us some specific examples?
Xia Yiping: Each designer’s understanding of technology is different. To understand the sense of technology, you need to find a designer who is very young and understands Chinese users among many designers, but such people are rare.
I can only say this to you. You can continue to participate in our subsequent brand launch events. You will feel completely different concepts.
Carcacaing (ID: carcaijing): Where is the differentiation of Jidu’s first car?
Xia Yiping: The competition of automotive products has two dimensions. One is the competition of product strength, and the other dimension is the competition in brand and user operations.Translated English Markdown text with HTML tags preserved:
So you can only see what our car looks like at the Beijing Auto Show in April 2021, but I think it will be an eye-catching car in today’s exhibition hall.
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Does the time for building the car at Jidu Motors get compressed, as you only launch a car every three years on average?
Xia Yiping: No, it’s not compressed. First of all, we are a start-up company, so many things are very fast. Secondly, it took nearly 1 year and 4 months from February this year to April next year to define and develop this car.
Talking about competition: not worried about Xiaomi
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Why did you start the company at the beginning of 2021? Was it early or late from the timeline?
Xia Yiping: From a planning perspective, it should have been a little earlier. I think the electric vehicle market is more in the popularization stage. After so many years, you will find that the electrification of the entire electric vehicle industry has reached a consensus, and everyone is beginning to turn to electric vehicles. When electric vehicles begin to become popular, it means that the possibility of autonomous driving becoming practical is becoming more reasonable.
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Are you worried about Xiaomi?
Xia Yiping: I’m not worried.
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): How do you view Huawei’s layout in the automobile market?
Xia Yiping: Huawei is in the TO B market. I don’t have any opinion on that. Everything is still based on reality.
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): This year’s Shanghai Auto Show is quite lively. From the observation of the auto show, what do you think is the biggest trend this year?
Xia Yiping: The big trend this year is that everyone has released L3 and L4 cars, but none of them are actually L3 or L4 cars.
Traveling with Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Baidu is a shareholder of WM Motor, and both parties jointly developed the W6. At the same time, Baidu cooperated with Geely to develop Jidu Motors. Baidu Apollo is an intelligent solution provider for many host factories. Within Baidu, are there any differences in the technology collaborations?
Xia Yiping: There is no difference in technology, but it depends on whether you have the ability to implement the technology. It’s still the same principle. How do you define this product, can you handle these technologies, and are you willing to do this? All of these are critical.
From Baidu’s perspective, it wants to do business outside of TO B, which is its own business. However, in terms of strategy, we hope to cooperate with Baidu to explore how to recognize higher technological heights.Baidu’s technology is like “Lego”, where you can build anything you want on your own. We don’t simply accept Baidu’s technology, but stand together with them to look at the trends for the next few years. I also have my own plans, so I came over to push Baidu to do this thing.
Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): What have you been thinking about the most in the 100 days since Jidu was established?
Xia Yiping: What I’ve been thinking about the most is how to get this big ship of Jidu up and running, as this is a very complex matter.
A really good brand should think about how to establish a strong connection between the brand and product during the design process from the very beginning. I hope to inject my brand concept into my product design, which is a very comprehensive design.
Therefore, at the beginning, I only focused on three things: brand design and product definition, and the next stage is service design, with more investment and important strategic partners to be introduced in the future.
Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): What is your view on Apple joining the competition and the current competitive environment?
Xia Yiping: Apple’s entry into the field of new energy and smart cars is a good thing, as it can accelerate technological advancement and product innovation among companies. Apple will also raise the competition in the entire industry to another level and accelerate the transformation and elimination of the entire industry. The future competition in the automotive industry will definitely be an ecological and organizational structure competition.
Carcaijing (ID: carcaijing): Does the company have a slogan?
Xia Yiping: Actually, we all hope to bring the best technology to the market with the lowest cost possible, so that more people can use it. The ultimate goal of doing technology is to make people’s lives better by allowing more people to use it, rather than creating a highly technological feature that cannot be used.
Based on this, our slogan is “Use technology to make people’s lives better.”
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.