Chehejia (CHJ Auto), Lixiang One

Lifan-Chehejia arrangement

Lifan Auto's Changzhou office and Chehejia have entered into an agreement where Lifan will lease the plant complex in Changzhou from Jiangsu Chehejia Automobile Co., Ltd., set up the requisite manufacturing equipment for a 100,000 units/p.a. capacity, and produce range-extended electric SUVs for Chehejia, likely from August of next year.

http://www.evzhidao.com/news-105564222.html
http://auto.gasgoo.com/News/2018/09/041058205820I70060901C501.shtml

This is a rather roundabout way of utilizing a manufacturing license. Instead of the conventional methods where Chehejia should have used an existing Lifan plant to make its vehicles, or have entered into a JV agreement to set up a new plant (a la JAC-NIO), or even have purchased an idle company with production qualification and transferred the license to the new plant (reverse merger), in this case the plant belongs to Chehejia but Lifan will rent it (as if to make a Lifan car), get type approval for the car (as a Lifan vehicle) and then deliver it to Chehejia. Maybe Lifan's manufacturing fee will be adjusted against the lease payments due to Chehejia.

With reports of EV manufacturing rules getting more stringent from this year, I am not sure if this sort of scheme will pass muster with NDRC/MIIT.

Leading Ideal ONE unveiling

The ONE was unveiled a little while ago. Although the interior was not revealed live, official photos of the interior have been published. The car, which somewhat resembles the Volvo XC90 in character, is an extended-range electric vehicle where a 1.2T 3-cylinder engine provides supplementary power to the electric motor as well as for recharging the main 40.6 kWh battery pack when charge is depleted (the engine does not drive the wheels directly). It has a dual motor setup, driving front and rear wheels (4WD), and combined output from the motors is 326 hp. Battery-only range is 180 km; with the RE in action, range can go up to 700 km. It should come with driver assist, active safety and other "intelligent" connectivity features with periodic OTA updates. Three-row, six- or seven-seat layouts will be available. The dash is an aggregation of four large screens.

Official photo:


http://news.bitauto.com/xinchexiaoxi/20181018/2008558149.html
https://www.autohome.com.cn/news/201810/923774.html

https://car.autohome.com.cn/pic/series/4974.html

Chehejia acquires Chongqing Lifan Automobile Co.

No, not what you think!

Chongqing Xinfan Machinery Equipment Co., Ltd., a company controlled by Chehejia, has agreed to pay 650 mn RMB (approx. 94 mn USD) to acquire 100% of the equity in Chongqing Lifan Automobile Co., Ltd. from its parent Lifan Industrial (Group) Co., Ltd. This is really to lay hands on the production qualification of Chongqing Lifan Auto, which currently operates Lifan's Beibei Dt. plant in Chongqing (for SUVs and MPVs). Chehejia will need this license to produce and sell the LI ONE and subsequent vehicles, going forward.

Lifan is not giving up on making cars though as another Lifan group company, Chongqing Lifan Passenger Vehicle Co., Ltd., operates the Yubei Dt. (Beibu New Area) plant in Chongqing (mainly sedans, some SUVs) which is unaffected by this transaction.

https://www.d1ev.com/news/qiye/84158

Further terms of the deal are not published, so it is not clear if any underlying physical assets are going to be transferred. Anyway, Lifan has already been offered compensation by the Chongqing government to vacate its Yubei Dt. plant site (in order to preserve a residential and scenic part of town); moreover, it is redeveloping the land around its Beibei dt. plant for new real estate projects. With this cash flow, Lifan has decided to construct a new 150,000 units/p.a. production base somewhere within the Liangjiang New Area (an economic zone covering Jiangbei, Yubei and Beibei districts). This capacity is adequate for the company as Lifan has produced only about 25,000 passenger vehicles this year (79,000 in 2017).

In August, Chehejia itself agreed with the Chongqing authorities to set up a large "new smart vehicle industrial park" (for 200,000 units/p.a. x 2 phases) with an investment outlay of 11 billion RMB in the Liangjiang New Area by 2021.

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P.S.: In light of the above, the leasing arrangement reported in September no longer makes sense, so one may ignore post #2.

Re: Chehejia (CHJ Auto), LI One

Lawrence said:

I wonder how the above sale of the Lifan NEV branch will affect Lifan's joint venture with The Chinese Academy of Sciences CAS, called Lifan Electric Vehicle Corporation established around 2009.... or are they one in the same? http://ev.lifan.com

and how about the fate of that Lifan Electrical Car Industrialization Project, established in Huhehot, Inner Mongolia back in 2008?

Click to expand...

Lifan's NEV branch is in Jiyuan, Henan, not Chongqing. Here, electric conversion of Chongqing-made cars takes place, as well as the production of the smaller electric vehicles such as the 330-derived products and other LSEVs. This branch is outside the purview of the above sale.

Lifan's EV R&D center is in Shanghai, under Shanghai Zhongke Lifan Electric Vehicle Co. Ltd., which is the JV with CAS and a few other companies. See http://www.zklf-ev.com/

Lifan's joint venture in Hohhot (Huhehaote) with the Nyren Group and Jinchuang Holdings was for a parts complex initially, which would have been upgraded to a complete vehicle plant later. Reportedly Lifan abandoned this project in 2013 (details). I am not aware of any electric vehicle venture here, maybe Erik can shed some light?
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Chehejia's purchase of Chongqing Lifan Auto is chiefly to utilize its production license, which one must have inferred by now, and additionally some intellectual property and machinery, not really for such physical assets like the plant which anyway is going to be redeveloped commercially. Remember, Chehejia is planning a greenfield smart vehicle industrial park in Chongqing, after the Changzhou unit is up and running, and Chongqing Lifan Auto (now Chongqing Lixiang Zhizao Auto) will be best placed to handle this project then.

Lixiang One

Price has been announced and the ONE can be reserved by buyers. Deliveries will begin towards the close of the year.

Presentation:
https://www.autohome.com.cn/advice/201904/932950.html
http://news.bitauto.com/xinchexiaoxi/20190410/1209347727.html

https://car.autohome.com.cn/pic/series/4974.html
https://car.autohome.com.cn/pic/series-s36214/4974.html

http://photo.bitauto.com/photo/model_5486_sale_True/#photoanchor

Chongqing Lixiang Automobile Co., Ltd. (重庆理想汽车有限公司), a new company established in October 2019 and owned directly by Beijing Chehejia Information Technology Co., Ltd., has replaced Chongqing Lixiang Zhizao Automobile Co., Ltd. (重庆理想智造汽车有限公司) as the licensed manufacturer of Lixiang ONE cars. Chongqing Lixiang Automobile Co., Ltd. is registered at the same address as its predecessor in Beibei District of Chongqing, with the plant in Changzhou being designated now as Chongqing Lixiang Automobile Co., Ltd. Changzhou Branch (instead of Chongqing Lixiang Zhizao Automobile Co., Ltd. Changzhou Branch).

Chongqing Lixiang Zhizao Automobile Co., Ltd., formerly Chongqing Lifan Automobile Co., Ltd., had been transferred back to the Lifan group [i.e. Chongqing Lifan Holdings Co., Ltd.] as a "shell" company in December 2019, which then transferred the company to another entity called Chongqing Manwang Machinery Parts Sales Co., Ltd. in March 2020. Manwang Machinery Parts Sales Co. is a privately owned company which reportedly provides after-sales services for Lifan motorcycles and is not connected to Chehejia/Lixiang.