Its CEO advances plans to beat current manufacturers

The launch of Xiaomi’s first car was the most talked about event in the automotive sector. It’s not every day that a true “newbie” in the sector manages to compete with the best, both in terms of performance and quality, as well as in terms of sales. And far from being satisfied with that, the company is already thinking about how to go further.

The sales of the Xiaomi SU7 show that Lei Jun’s bet was right. The company is already working to expand in the sector with a second electric car and a sports version of the Xiaomi SU7. And this is not the only planned expansion.

In addition to providing more details on the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra, Lei Jun took advantage of a broadcast on Chinese social networks to talk about Xiaomi’s future plans; and the goal is clear: to become one of the five largest automobile manufacturers in the world. It cannot be said that Lei Jun lacks ambition, that is clear.

Of course, Xiaomi isn’t even close to that goal right now. Even though forecasts have improved and Now it plans to deliver 120,000 units of the SU7 by the end of the year, this is only a tenth of what Toyota sells, for example. Xiaomi has drawbacks, and we are not only talking about production capacity; the main one is that, at the moment, the Xiaomi car is only sold in China.

For this reason, Lei Jun announced that Xiaomi is already focusing on the European market

for possible expansion in the future. The Xiaomi SU7 first appeared outside of China at the MWC in Barcelona and was recently presented in Paris for the Olympic Games. The huge interest the car has generated among the local public seems to have motivated Lei Jun to launch it globally, starting with Europe; even if it means losing even more money.

The Xiaomi SU7 is largely a personal project of Lei Jun, who decided to expand a brand that was previously best known for its Android phones. Following in the footsteps of his Apple idols, Lei Jun decided to invest billions of dollars in producing his own car from scratch; ironically, something that even Apple itself has not achieved.

However, such an initial investment means that the Xiaomi SU7 does not generate any revenue, quite the contrary; In the latest financial results presented by Xiaomi, the automotive division presented losses of 1.8 billion yuan (226 million dollars) and admitted that lost 60,000 yuan (7,500 dollars) for each unit sold from SU7.

But Lei Jun considers these initial losses as necessary to gain a foothold in the market, and the great success of the SU7 proves him right. Hence the need to expand to other markets, although Lei Jun issued a warning before imagining the SU7 circulating on Spanish roads: the priority is to cover demand in China before thinking about the rest of the world.