We Drove a Chinese EV 1,200km Hands-Free — And the Future Is Already Here | China EVs & More Ep. 246

In this special on-the-road episode of China EVs & More, Tu Le and Lei Xing drive a Li Auto i6 from Beijing to Shanghai using Li Auto’s latest hands-free VLA intelligent driving system — experiencing firsthand how quickly China’s EV ecosystem is evolving.  

The trip comes immediately after the massive Beijing Auto Show, where over 1,400 vehicles, 180+ debuts, and dozens of new brands highlighted how intense and competitive China’s EV market has become.

Tu and Lei break down:

• Li Auto’s new VLA Driver Model and real-world NOA performance
• XPeng’s latest VLA 2.0 rollout and robotaxi ambitions
• BYD and CATL’s escalating battery and charging war
• Why large Chinese SUVs are now targeting North America’s most profitable segments
• The rise of Huawei-backed brands and the growing influence of Chinese tech suppliers
• How global automakers are increasingly relying on Chinese software, batteries, and ADAS systems to stay competitive

The episode also captures the realities of driving EVs in China today — ultra-fast charging, crowded charging stations, nonstop product launches, and a level of EV infrastructure that still feels years ahead of most global markets.

From autonomous driving and battery breakthroughs to the growing divide between China and the West, this episode offers a rare, firsthand look into the future of mobility — from inside the driver’s seat.

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🔑 SEO Keywords 

China EVs & More, Li Auto i6 review, Beijing Auto Show 2026, China EV road trip, hands free driving China, Li Auto VLA Driver Model, XPeng VLA 2.0, BYD flash charging, CATL battery technology, Huawei smart driving, robotaxi China, autonomous driving China, EV charging China, Chinese electric vehicles, future of mobility, Tu Le, Lei Xing, Sino Auto Insights

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⏱️ YouTube Chapter Timestamps

00:00 🔥 Hook: 800KM hands-free road trip
 00:30 Intro from inside the Li Auto i6
 02:00 Beijing → Shanghai EV road trip explained
 04:00 Li Auto VLA Driver Model hands-free demo
 07:00 Charging experience in China today
 10:00 Beijing Auto Show biggest takeaways
 14:00 XPeng VLA 2.0 and robotaxi future
 18:00 BYD vs CATL battery war
 22:00 Huawei’s massive presence at the show
 26:00 Why Chinese SUVs are targeting North America
 30:00 Tesla vs China EV ecosystem discussion
 34:00 EV infrastructure comparison: China vs West
 38:00 The future of autonomous driving
 42:00 Final thoughts from the road trip

Transcript

Tu (00:00)
Hi everyone and welcome to a special edition of China EVs and more. I'm sorry I'm not looking at the camera because I am supervising level 2 plus drive. the Li Auto i6 that we borrowed and are driving from Beijing to Shanghai last night. We spent the night in Huai'an which is about five and a half hours from Shanghai. We just topped off a little bit at a slow charger and about 70 kilometers from now we'll be hitting a Li Auto fast charger hopefully.
 
 filling up for the rest of the trip into Shanghai hopefully late afternoon. And my name is Tu Li, I'm the Management Director at Sino Auto Insights, a whole management consultancy that helps organizations with innovative and tech-focused products and services, transportation and mobility space. And my partner in crime and my co-pilot at this moment is Lei Xing. Lei, can you please introduce yourself, buddy?
 
 Lei (00:55)
 Welcome to a very very special movie. NOA, VLA, in a Li Auto i6. Going over from Beijing to Shanghai episode.
 
 Tu (01:09)
 And this
 
 is very different from some of the other episodes last year. We've done this two years in a row. This is third year. The other intelligent driving systems, we've had to have a hand on the wheel in order for the service to continue or the feature to continue. This one, they're just looking at our faces, our eyes, and I think our heads to make sure that we're paying attention and focused. So as you can see, my hands are here, and I'm still focused on the highway.
 
 Lei (01:36)
 Yeah, this is a hands-free system, Li Auto VLA. It's called the VLA Driver Model and we just actually had an update this morning where it was updated from 8.3.0 to 8.4.0. So actually a significant update basically optimizing the highway driving conditions and also some of the smart cockpit.
 
 So yes, this is Lei Xing, your co-host, former chief editor of China Auto Review and this is a special episode. I think the number is 246. Because I remember... We skipped a couple weeks. Yeah, we did 245 the last time when both of us were still in the US. Now we're just in a moving smart EV on the G2. This is currently the G2. We're just...
 
 Tu (02:23)
 G3
 
 Lei (02:28)
 We stayed last night at this third tier city called Huai An in northern Jiangsu province. we're let's just slightly less than 400 kilometers from Shanghai. And this Huai An is a third tier city, random city we picked. It's actually the home of former Chinese premier, Zhou Enlai. Nice hotel, 50 bucks with breakfast, large room, king bed.
 
 Now we're just hitting the rest of the trip to Shanghai and we can talk about this, we can talk about Beijing Auto Show So much to cover.
 
 Tu (03:07)
 Yeah, first things first, you and I both arrived last week, one Monday.
 
 Lei (03:13)
 first.
 
 Tu (03:14)
 arrived on Tuesday. So we both arrived on Tuesday. And me, I flew from Detroit to Shanghai. Took about a four hour layover in Pudong and went straight down to Guangzhou where I met you, Steve Levine, quite a number of other people that were visiting Explum at its new headquarters in Guangzhou.
 
 Lei (03:38)
 So basically this year the trip started out with a special program from XPeng which invited a bunch of global media for something called AI in Motion, physical AI immersive tour where we visited the EV factory, visited the headquarters, we had a...
 
 lunch at one of the cafeterias in the plant. canteen. The canteen, yeah. We visited the, a ridge, which is their flying car plant. And we saw a demo of the land aircraft carrier, at least the flying portion of it. So, and then once we got back to Beijing, I had a Beijing auto show, we had, we experienced XPeng's VLA 2.0, which is.
 
 Tu (04:27)
 We got hot off the
 
 presses VLA System
 
 Lei (04:29)
 the officers on
 
 their new P7s. They had they organized test drives. Yeah, well, there's the blue bullet train going by. Oh, yeah.
 
 Tu (04:35)
 That was really sick.
 
 One thing that we've seen along the last highway, this G2 highway, plenty of Xiaomi cars being delivered south to South China.
 
 Lei (04:52)
 Yeah, so one of the things, you know, during this type of trip, this is our third straight year, is not only to experience the kind of the, you know, the feel of the vehicle, the vibe of the ride handling, the charging experience, the cockpit, the autonomous driving, assisted driving features, but when you travel these roads, you kind of see, you know, it's...
 
 Tu (05:20)
 This year's in charging.
 
 Lei (05:21)
 It tells you about the EV market because we saw four or five transporters of Xiaomi EVs which means they must be doing well in terms of sales.
 
 Tu (05:33)
 take it a step further. We'll go back to the Xiaomi but I'll take it a step further. We just left the charging station. Slow charger, almost like a drip charger We are so spoiled because it was pulling 80, 90, 120.
 
 to us considered slow in China and if you want to understand the EV sector go to a charging station on a highway in China. saw Aito's, saw Xiaomi's, we saw what else did we see? We saw the Chery's ‚Åì we saw some Teslas and there was so many different brands that were in charging. There was actually a queue and we're on a random Thursday, No, Wednesday.
 
 Lei (06:14)
 Wednesday,
 
 Wednesday, Wednesday. Now important to note, this is couple of days before the May holidays. China has this holiday coming up, five day break, which those holiday days when you drive on expressways, tolls are free. So we can expect people lining up to charge their EVs. And we have some options. We have Li Auto, we have the NIO
 
 battery swap option for those that do have NIO's or Onvo's And yeah, I mean we started yesterday afternoon in Beijing and the first one, the stop, the first charging stop we charged at the Li Auto branded charging station with one stall that's gold.
 
 It's gold-plated stall, which is only available for the Li Auto BEVs So, the Mega the i8 and the i6. And it was pulling, what? 420. 420. And we had it charged. We went to the restroom, bought some food, had a quick meal, came back. It was over 91%. I Yeah, I got my tea. And you were...
 
 Tu (07:26)
 You got your tea.
 
 saw that
 
 it was at 91 percent, so you actually turned it off.
 
 Lei (07:33)
 Yes,
 
 I turned it off. I didn't want it to charge to 100%.
 
 Tu (07:37)
 was
 
 in the cafeteria buying food thinking okay we have some time to relax a little bit and eat and then you came back in with your tea glass and you were like it's done and I hadn't even opened my food up my Liang Mian and so we were rushed eating so we could get back on the road which is kind of the irony of
 
 driving electric vehicles to China right now for certain types of vehicles.
 
 Lei (08:08)
 especially when you can kind of touch upon some of the themes of the Beijing auto show and charging is definitely one because BYD had a exhibit at their BYD hall, a standalone flash charging stand where they had two kind of the, what do call them?
 
 know, yeah the charges they should know that the inside it's like a chamber. yeah cold chamber where there are two EVs with ice all over and the temperatures in those so is like
 
 Tu (08:44)
 within a booth with cars
 
 inside the booth but the booths were sub-zero booths to show you that they could charge quickly in sub-zero ‚Åì temperatures so the person inside was wearing winter clothes in this booth
 
 Lei (08:53)
 Double.
 
 Yup,
 
 down jackets and gloves and they were showing you know the flash charging at minus 32, 33 degrees from 10 % to 97 % in less than 12 minutes. I actually was at one of those demos and shot some videos and was incredible and just to make it fun they could have you wear a glove and
 
 on your hand and kind of feel the temperature inside it. Just to prove another way is they have this pot of hot water and they just pour it inside the chamber and it became like all steam and ice. Yeah.
 
 Tu (09:41)
 So hold on, on. I know we're talking about BYD at the show, but let's take this 50,000 foot level and then go deeper. So the show was in Beijing this year, hence we're coming from Beijing to Shanghai. And normally the Shanghai show is bigger than the Beijing show. This time, they...
 
 built another convention center next to the existing convention center. And this year, Beijing by far is the largest auto show, I can confidently say, in the world this year. Over some numbers.
 
 Lei (10:10)
 the largest auto show on the... ever.
 
 So let me give you some big numbers and I remember these very clear. 1451 vehicles on display.
 
 Tu (10:20)
 380,000 square meters.
 
 Lei (10:25)
 Let's get to the halls. There's total of 17 halls, 13 of which are dedicated to the OEM brands. The other four ones are suppliers.
 
 Tu (10:36)
 Two
 
 of which were each dedicated to an individual OEM. BYD had its own hall. Chery
 
 Lei (10:43)
 So 1,451 vehicles on display, 181 global and China premieres, 71 concepts, 219 press conferences in the first two press days, 30,000 plus reporters, including over 4,000 from overseas.
 
 Tu (11:03)
 of which I know many of you.
 
 Lei (11:05)
 Right, that's one of the big features of this year is we saw a lot of foreign faces, not only the industry people, the, you know, YouTubers, KOLs, and a lot of these, guess what, are invited by companies like XPeng companies like Xiaomi, NIO Great Wall Motor, Chery, and they organized programs for these global media expanding days. I think Xiaomi went even for almost a week.
 
 Tu (11:35)
 Chery invited people down to their factory. Xiaomi had a track day. And what's different this year from years past is that media days, especially the first media days, they would do the unveils, most major automakers would do unveils at the press conferences, like 20 minute windows. This year, Geely had an event before press days. XPeng had a big press event.
 
 and who else? CATL had a press event before media did.
 
 Lei (12:09)
 I always say
 
 this has happened since even before the pandemic, So I always say half of the orders are showing China is over before it begins because a lot of these brands they organize either brand days, product launches, pre-sales, reveals, tech talks, BMW, Mercedes, CATL you name it, right?
 
 Far in advance of before the show even began, today it just matters.
 
 Tu (12:38)
 And Lei
 
 I'm not a big FOMO guy, yeah, I was definitely kind of conflicted because we had committed to going to the XPeng event, so we missed the CATL event, we missed a couple of the other... I missed the Cadillac event, which I do have some friends that work at Cadillac, so I was disappointed. I wasn't able to attend some of these other events. We were!
 
 Lei (13:02)
 We were tied up
 
 with the XPeng so thank you XPeng.
 
 Tu (13:04)
 Yes, and Sarah, thank you for hospitality. know there's behind the scenes stuff that I had to deal with, my schedule is little bit jumbled. So Sarah, thank you. But anyway.
 
 Lei (13:17)
 This guy, lost his China phone, so he was without WeChat for a few days. So had to relay his message to other people.
 
 Tu (13:26)
 And then every time I go to the show and I see somebody, they're like, dude, I texted you, I WeChat'd you, and they're I'm...
 
 Lei (13:31)
 And
 
 then we had this escapade at the China mobile store. Took an hour and figured it out.
 
 Tu (13:38)
 Nothing happened, except I got a new phone and a new phone number.
 
 Lei (13:42)
 So these are all part of the experience when you come to China, which you don't have the perspective, don't, unless you're here, right? And you appreciate the luxury, you know, staying at the hotel last night, it's, right? You don't have that in the US.
 
 Tu (13:59)
 $50 is basically a four five star hotel and we bought breakfast. Breakfast was like $15 or something like that, $7, $8.
 
 Lei (14:08)
 No,
 
 I mean $50 a night including breakfast. Okay, and those breakfasts is not like just anyone eating breakfast.
 
 Tu (14:16)
 So if you think
 
 about it, if I buy coffee at Starbucks in China, a grande latte will be about five or six dollars. So to stay at a hotel and pay eight, nine dollars for breakfast makes a lot more sense because it's all you can drink coffee. I drank about five cups right this morning, so I'm a little bit wired.
 
 Lei (14:37)
 Yeah, speaking of thanking, we should also thank Windy and her team at Li Auto for providing the i6, which is currently in VLA, the NOA mode, which allows us to record this without having to... Well, we got to pay attention, but you know the car is...
 
 Tu (14:58)
 Right. ‚Åì
 
 Lei (14:59)
 The
 
 car is on this level 2++ mode, Highway NOA, which we've used yesterday pretty much 99 % of the We put it on NOA and just let it do its job.
 
 Tu (15:12)
 1 a.m. we didn't hit the hotel until 1 a.m.
 
 Lei (15:16)
 We
 
 left Beijing at 3pm and we got to the Battalion Fire Line at 1am. So, took us 10 hours. 800 kilometers. 800-850 kilometers and we have 400 to go remaining. yeah. you know, also probably full disclosure.
 
 We're not getting paid by anybody to do this. This is, we make it a point to be in China for an extended period of time to understand the vehicles, EVs, the whole process.
 
 Tu (15:49)
 These companies are kind enough to let us follow these calls. We are
 
 obligated. are not obligated to say anything. It's just that we specifically have had relationships with these companies since almost day one.
 
 Lei (16:04)
 I
 
 we even want to critique and give feedback to these companies. we do. They will love to hear. I'll say one bug right now for this highway NOA is several occurrences when it was trying to exit into the service area is doing it very late. And so at the very last minute, it makes this jerky
 
 Tu (16:26)
 It almost swerves.
 
 Lei (16:28)
 So Li Auto please optimize this to make it feel better. But other than that, rides like a magic car. The ride, the handling, the comfort.
 
 Tu (16:45)
 It makes you feel
 
 comfortable because other systems that I've ridden, level 2 plus systems, I won't say who, there is still an anxiety about it because you're not that confident in its capabilities yet. the Chinese systems, and remember Chinese roads are much more difficult and challenging than European and American.
 
 speaking we are currently going about 120 kilometers or 150 kilometers it's a little over 60 miles an hour and you know the highway isn't doesn't have a lot of traffic right now so this is pretty simple simple stuff for the level two systems of work but you know we've also taken it through the cities and it's really really well
 
 Lei (17:30)
 Yeah. You know, I have
 
 to talk about me being a consumer because I recently got a Model Y with FST. So this trip for me coming back, have a critique state of mind. have a, I bring a lot of skepticism of all the...
 
 Tu (17:51)
 You quickly
 
 become a true believer in FSD.
 
 Lei (17:55)
 FSD I
 
 think is the crown jewel of level 2++ and all the companies in China they're benchmarking against FSD whether it's Viotto, Nio, Xfam, Xiaomi, Huawei so I have a frame of reference of how these systems work compared to FSD and I'd say it's a nice pusher.
 
 I say there's still some gaps, but in certain instances, the systems in China work very well. So it's hard to have an apples to apples comparison, but I mean the highway NOA is just, it's pretty mature. mean, it's even doing better than when we had the XPeng G9 two years ago, which already had the highway NOA
 
 Tu (18:48)
 expect because the two years we take the systems.
 
 Lei (18:53)
 about that because this is actually one of the other themes at the this year's Beijing Auto show is wider application of VLA of these oral model and all of these companies all of these smart EV startups and these ADAS and robotaxi companies
 
 WeRide being a prime example, offering their WRD 3.0 on this GAC AION N60 that was just launched yesterday. And I talked to Tony Han there... Yup, right here. You probably can see from the video back here.
 
 Tu (19:25)
 another set of show me.
 
 I'm
 
 Lei (19:32)
 So to just ask the voice recognition, through voice recognition, ask Li Auto to turn on a seat massage.
 
 Tu (19:41)
 Hold on a second. How long will it take to get to Shanghai?
 
 Lei (19:49)
 282 kilometers from need to this
 
 Sure, it's about 280 to kilometers to Shanghai. Do you want me to set a destination? We have an extra guest today. ‚Åì It's classmate, Li Xiang OK, bye bye.
 
 Tu (19:59)
 We are also
 
 Lei (20:09)
 I was saying that I'm
 
 Tu (20:10)
 Toyota just
 
 got in front of us and is going very very slow.
 
 Lei (20:14)
 Yeah
 
 Tu (20:15)
 system
 
 handled it up. Lastly, you'll be able to see it in the video.
 
 Lei (20:18)
 was speaking to Tony Han, the founder of WeRide and I asked him about this WRD system on this vehicle and I said, how does it to FSD? Because I have FSD and he's like, well, I have FSD. When I go to the US, I drive FSD. He told me it'sÂ∑Ɖ∏ç§ö, which means it's very close. It's almost like FSD.
 
 Hopefully, maybe I'll get a chance to experience that because I'm staying a little bit longer with this and I've experienced VLA. We're now experienced Li Auto's NOA and we can be critiqued, we can offer our thoughts of how they're doing compared to FSD.
 
 It's a feature that's being pushed very much across all brands in order to sell, especially XPeng
 
 Tu (21:11)
 so many different themes going on at the show, but let me give you my...
 
 top two or three bullet points at the highest levels, kind of my observations. And with the backdrop of Trump coming in about two to three weeks, and Canada having just eliminated tariffs. And so that is playing a part, even if people aren't talking about it at the show. So the things that I saw, a bit of...
 
 from all the Chinese EV makers. Two or three years ago you see all these disparate products that don't have consistent branding from a design standpoint, from a feel standpoint. Now you see, you go to the Zeekr booth, you go to the BYD booth, it just looks like more mature. They kind of understand how a brand portfolio should be. And BYD, which again we mentioned earlier had a hall in and of itself, or by itself,
 
 Denza booth had a Yangwang booth had a Fangchengbao booth so they understood that we're just gonna highlight and not share the spotlight with anybody and you know this could this is on the heels of Stella Li doing the circuit with Bloomberg with CNN to talk about how their charging infrastructure is the difference maker for BYD okay and so I saw maturity in the brands in China
 
 Lei (22:41)
 Yeah,
 
 here's the thing we do these trips and then we compare What these companies say they've done? So what we did is actually try to find if we could charge at one of these megawatt charging stations I'll be honest. There's not that many along the way that's closer to where we are Right, so this is the grain of salt that we take
 
 Tu (23:02)
 They've certainly been stopped by...
 
 Lei (23:08)
 You know, there's marketing jargon, there's, right, but until we experience, we go through these trips, we, right, you don't have to.
 
 Tu (23:17)
 We
 
 had programmed the 5C or 4C charging station so we went to it and there were no
 
 Lei (23:24)
 wasn't
 
 ready. It was there, but it was still covered. The charger was still covered in wraps.
 
 Tu (23:30)
 So the maps acknowledge them, but they're just not online yet.
 
 Lei (23:34)
 Yeah,
 
 so that's one of the intricacies and caveats of seeing what's on the app versus actual what's available on the road. And you understand, okay...
 
 Tu (23:48)
 But an important distinction is that in Europe and the United States it's binary. There are no chargers, there are not enough chargers. Here, we're complaining about 120 kilowatt chargers versus 450 or 460 kilowatt chargers. So we're a little bit spoiled just in the last couple of days, but...
 
 It's no wonder that China's adoption rate is much higher because the charging infrastructure supports it.
 
 Lei (24:19)
 Yeah, I mean, when we set off in Beijing, we had this whole, Li Auto charging station, all by ourselves. And just now we had, I mean, all kinds of EVs and It was queue, right? And then going back to the show about this kind of booth, I wanted to...
 
 I touch upon some of my favorite booths. Today? Because I walked quite a bit. I really like how HIMA the Huawei Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance, had their booth. They had this kind of sphere. All five of their brands. Now Huawei has expanded into something called a 5 plus 3. So the 5. Aito, Luxeed, Stelatto, Maextro, and Shang Jie. That's the Jies
 
 the Yijing, Huajing and Qijing respectively, epic land, Huajing and Iceland. ‚Åì
 
 Tu (25:21)
 It's a lot.
 
 Lei (25:22)
 Huawei had a huge presence, not only of these brands but also their tech brands. for example, the Huawei Drive One powertrain brand, they had a separate booth. The Huawei qiankun ADAS they had a booth ‚Åì right? Did that just turn into a system? I don't know.
 
 Tu (25:45)
 So the thing that I took from the Huawei presence is that they want to dominate. Up and down. is like... Their whole was just...
 
 Lei (25:58)
 It
 
 showed. I think it's definitely Huawei inside, not only of these Chinese state-owned companies working with them, but all the A6L, e-tron, stuff that Huawei, you know, smart OS or cockpit, even some of the ADAS. The Freelander, by the way, that was at the Huawei qiankun booth, which is actually the first model going to be deployed with Huawei ADS 5.0.
 
 Tu (26:25)
 And what's important about the qiankun booth today is that there are multiple brands per se. Was that the qiankun It was a Huawei booth with multiple foreign brands being showcased at that booth.
 
 Lei (26:37)
 That's
 
 the big theme has been not at this year's Beijing Auto Show, but over the last three years since that shock in Shanghai three years ago is in China for China, in China for China. It's beaten to death by these foreign automakers.
 
 Tu (26:52)
 Okay, Huawei
 
 booth was impressive
 
 Lei (26:54)
 I really like Momenta. Not the
 
 booth, but the press conference where they have their four founders talk about the history of AI, what's physical AI, what they think it is, and how that brings into what they have done. They're in the process of IPOing. it feels like every single EV launch, Chinese or foreign, has Momenta ADAS as an inside.
 
 Tu (27:21)
 To our American viewers, just make sure to understand one of the beneficiaries of Momenta's IPO.
 
 Lei (27:24)
 One number.
 
 GM, Mercedes, they're all early investors.
 
 Tu (27:34)
 So
 
 GM is going to benefit from a Momenta IPO here.
 
 Lei (27:38)
 Yeah, now one number they review was at the last Shanghai Auto Show last year, they had 300,000 vehicles with their system. By this year's Beijing Auto Show, that number has ballooned to 800,000. That gives you a sense of how popular their systems are. And at the center of their booth, I thought this was a very jarring image that says 1,000 words. It's an electric GLC long-wheel base.
 
 with the Momenta logo in the back and the signage that says all the global brands now have Momenta. Something to that effect which I thought was... Yeah, which I thought was that one of the photos of the Beijing Auto Show. Horizon Robotics, I really like their booth because it's kind of funny they use this...
 
 Tu (28:16)
 Well, it in Chinese.
 
 Let's take step back.
 
 Horizon Robotics is a design company that Volkswagen has formally partnered with to work on its AI and intelligent driving stack.
 
 Lei (28:45)
 And one of Volkswagen's new vehicles ID-UINX-08 is actually the first one that uses China Electronic Architecture developed jointly with XPeng and the Carizon joint venture with ‚Åì Cariad and Horizon Robotics to support that vehicle's internal organs, let's say, or the brains. And that model is developed by him.
 
 Thanks.
 
 Tu (29:14)
 Not another we're talking about that night. One of the things that I did not see at all during my time in Beijing. NVIDIA logo, NVIDIA presence. In China at least, NVIDIA's not needed while driving.
 
 Lei (29:26)
 So.
 
 Yeah, but
 
 perhaps well, I mean I did see quite a few let's say these tech companies they did have the Media partner because they do use the Thor U and their domain control chips, but that's still needed. The ‚Åì other favorite booth and actually booth within the booth is Geely's
 
 EVA Cab purpose-built robotaxing concept which had a humanoid robot beside it that could talk to you in both Chinese and English. You can ask them any questions you want, Chinese, English, and it'll spit out answers. You can ask them about the EVA Cab. I really like the design of that concept. I think Geely over the years.
 
 It's a great leap in terms of their design feel. Whereas, you know, I'm gonna criticize BYD a bit because BYD, yeah, they're going premium, but I think their design and styling and the interior, it still has some kinks to be worked out. You know, it's not like this type of premium feel. It's got that...
 
 Tu (30:53)
 So Li Auto
 
 is here.
 
 Lei (30:54)
 Yeah, clean. BYD is a little bit over the top, over the kill.
 
 Tu (30:59)
 closest premium that I see for traditional premium that you and I would define as Zeekr and NIO ‚Åì
 
 Lei (31:08)
 NIO was right across from XPeng and they both had this long, I'd say over a hundred meter long, upstairs, And then downstairs they had that kind of NIO house where you can have coffee and meetings. And the first time NIO has one single stand with all of them with three brands.
 
 funny thing is I was at the XPeng interview with Brian and He Xiaopeng while the interview was going on, Li Bin was right across the booth doing his press conference so we couldn't We could hear but it was lower so was telling Sarah next time you gotta...
 
 up your mic and the speaker gave you. But it's one of those things, right? That it's difficult to... so many things going on at the same time. How do you...
 
 Yep, this just says it's preparing the battery for charging because we're about 12 kilometers away from Li Auto supercharging station at one of these west areas.
 
 Tu (32:12)
 You know one thing that also sticks out late, this is kind of a side of them for the other show is that... Li Bin has been live streaming, they had an event last night for the L.A.D. They tune live streams, they actively sell their own cars on social media and these guys are billionaires, they don't need to do that. But they're out there promoting their brands, like they're working overtime, they're grinding.
 
 see Jim Farley, you see a Mary Barra getting on social media saying hey buy Cadillac, buy Cadillac, look at what this thing can do. And honestly they're not coming off as used car salesmen. just, seems like they just, Lei Jun is a little bit salesman-y but.
 
 Lei (33:00)
 This is the cultural aspect of the Chinese smart EV industry because the commotion this year, you know, remember two years ago when Xiaomi launched the Su7, that entire hall where Xiaomi's booth was at was packed.
 
 Tu (33:23)
 What's up?
 
 Lei (33:24)
 G2 was right across from Xiaomi. They were actually happy because a lot of this cross coming. this year it was less of that commotion because Xiaomi is now mature. Already mature, they've already launched two products and one product already has refreshed. And Lei Jun was still walking over and visiting these CEOs, He Xiaopang, Bin, Wang Chuang, and gave them t-shirts with...
 
 Tu (33:46)
 Get the tea!
 
 Lei (33:50)
 ‚Åì slogans that these CEOs have said that went viral so one of them is ‰∏Ä˵∑Âä†Áîµ which is what Li Bin always says means to let's work together Âä†Ê≤π
 
 These things sometimes they take over the show and just the way the CEOs market themselves, their brands.
 
 Tu (34:09)
 And it should be noted that Xiaomi didn't unveil
 
 Lei (34:13)
 Vision Grand Turimso
 
 which was awesome and think one of my favorites as well. Just clean right and now they have a big team in Munich already preparing for the launch in 2027 so mark our words they will impact the European market like never before.
 
 Tu (34:18)
 Yes.
 
 Lei (34:35)
 no one else yeah because the leverage they have is many of these European customers they probably already have so many products at home so that brand is familiar with the brand it's just yeah
 
 Other, I think what I did was, you know, walking the show, you see these live streamers, right? You kind of see what they're doing. You see, you sit inside the vehicles and you listen to these Chinese consumers, how they're critiquing the features, the fit and finish, the design and styling. You get an understanding of what they want, right? But. They are.
 
 Tu (35:13)
 They're spoiled.
 
 So many choices. And so they can be picky. They can be very, very particular. And if at that very moment they're looking for a new car, you don't have what they need, they won't buy your product. They won't have to settle. There are number of products out there that check every single box and still don't get purchased.
 
 Lei (35:36)
 Here's the thing, right? Onvo launched the L80 at Y159,800 BAAS mode. Now the L80 is a direct competitor of this car. This car has a Y250,000...
 
 Tu (35:48)
 Which is about $35,000. So it has a 5C charging for $35,000.
 
 Lei (35:55)
 Yeah, so I think the way segmentation works in China is completely out of whack And then the big SUVs right we talked that Probably the biggest
 
 Tu (36:08)
 So that was the big thing. There's nine
 
 or ten. And when you're talking to two Americans here, so we talk large SUVs, we're talking the largest. We're not talking Range Rover, we're talking Tahoe, we're talking Expedition, we're talking suburban size.
 
 Lei (36:24)
 and
 
 you have everything let's say from the Leap Motor D19 large SUV that starts at ¬•219,800 which is $30,000 all the way up to Vistiq, the Cadillac Vistiq which is over half a million mmb. Everything in between there's the 9, Zeekr 8x, 9x, there's a way...
 
 No,
 
 Tu (36:49)
 GX,
 
 the secret 9X
 
 Lei (36:51)
 NIO ES9, XPeng GX, I'll say this, my favorite vehicle among all the foreign brands and probably the hottest commodity is the ID.ERA 9X. Because I was at the Volkswagen booth two days ago, they had the ID.ERA 9X, had the UNIX 08, they had the ID.ERA T6, all the crowds were...
 
 Because they were curious! around the 9X, the ERA 9X. This ID.ERA 9X has Robosense lidar. We know a lot of their friends, ‚Åì Robosense are friends of the show. Within one hour of launch, this vehicle got over 11,000... ‚Åì
 
 Tu (37:42)
 This
 
 is the car is getting over right now because it's to get off in about 1.8 kilometers so that's why you're hearing the noises.
 
 Lei (37:55)
 Every single brand, Chinese or foreign, has some kind of a large SUV at the boot. And the naming is even confusing. There's a 9X, there's a X9, there's a V9X, there's... 9, there's 8X.
 
 Tu (38:10)
 M9 because they want a larger size to come to match the ES9 they're making an M9L. Fail that.
 
 Lei (38:20)
 So we're about
 
 to get off the highway to charge it at this Li Auto charging supercharging station with 5c so we may still able to talk a little bit more but while it's charging so it'll be pretty cool but over the last 47 minutes or so that's been recording the car has been on NOA. it's yeah so we'll most likely take over
 
 Tu (38:40)
 It's taking itself off the highway as well. I'm supervising obviously.
 
 Lei (38:49)
 once it gets to this LiAuto 5C charging station.
 
 Tu (38:54)
 Because I can't really read Chinese so
 
 Lei (38:56)
 So once
 
 we top up here, we should be able to get to Shanghai without need to charge anymore.
 
 Tu (39:02)
 you
 
 Lei (39:03)
 versus.
 
 Tu (39:04)
 That's good.
 
 Lei (39:05)
 ‚Åì
 
 it's here, here, here.
 
 Tu (39:08)
 I just turned it off. So now I see the Li auto sign. There's one car.
 
 Lei (39:14)
 and you'll see the 5c charger that's gold plated yeah right here this one right here it's only available for the bed so the mega the i8 and the i6 which we're driving right now
 
 Tu (39:19)
 Both series.
 
 So we're gonna get some really, really good charging, charging.
 
 Lei (39:34)
 Yep.
 
 Tu (39:36)
 So for those of you, I'm looking at the rear view camera.
 
 Lei (39:39)
 This is our
 
 first ever episode where we're recording while the car is charging. We have some charging action. First ever in our 250 episodes that we've done this. All right, so we're just plugged in the Li Auto i6 into a 5C Li Auto branded charger and currently it's pulling 300 kilowatt.
 
 Tu (40:03)
 About 300. Which is
 
 disappointing because we had 420 yesterday. That's how spoiled we are. That's how spoiled we are. So right now we're at a 19, we're at a 30 % state of charge and it says it's going to take 15 minutes to get us to 100. Yeah, 100 % full charge.
 
 Lei (40:08)
 go off.
 
 is
 
 pretty fast yeah so maybe with the last few 15 10 15 minutes we can wrap up the show
 
 Tu (40:29)
 Sure.
 
 Well, we didn't even finish. We didn't even talk about. Yeah. We'll have to have a part two when we're back.
 
 Lei (40:37)
 Yeah, think yeah, I mean I think also By the way, I just want to repeat this 5c charging is the smoothest as close as you can get to Tesla supercharging plug it in Supercharger so all I did was scan and plug the car and start charging
 
 Tu (40:40)
 to us is a lotus lease.
 
 plug and try.
 
 That's
 
 what terrific UX means.
 
 Lei (41:01)
 Yes, whereas
 
 yesterday and this just now the non-Li Auto brand it took a little bit more time to scan to pay a pre-
 
 Tu (41:12)
 Don't do have to. Sorry,
 
 you can go through the WeChat.
 
 Lei (41:16)
 But you have to prepay some of it. have to prepay like 50 RMB 100 RMB. But this one, you just plug it in. Scan and plug it in, and it starts charging. Now it's already over 40 % from what? 16 %? Yeah.
 
 Tu (41:32)
 No, no, it was more than 16. Okay. A brief history lesson though, Li Auto originally started as an e-rev company. ‚Åì launched the Mega. There's a high-speed rail that's passing us by right now. They started with the Mega, which is this large MPV.
 
 Lei (41:49)
 I don't know
 
 you can see that this is on the app is saying it's 1.1 RMB per kilowatt hour
 
 Tu (41:56)
 So about 17 cents. they launched the i8, which is their first crossover. I wouldn't call it an SUV. I'd call it a crossover. The little brother of the i6 that we're in right now. So the 5C charging for Li Auto is still not widespread. But we were able to find one here. And as Lei mentioned, there's the gold ones, which are a lot different than the other ones.
 
 Lei (42:23)
 The gold ones are actually the 5Cs for the bevs.
 
 Tu (42:26)
 And I've never seen a charger in the United States pull 350, alone, 315, let alone 420 kilowatts.
 
 Lei (42:34)
 We talked about BYD's flash charging, we talked about CATL which announced their, you know, take that BYD kind of the updated Shenqing Qilin, Freevoy Naxtra Tex. I forget the number, it's what, 10 % to 90 % in six and some minutes? Something like that. Which is overkill.
 
 Tu (42:53)
 And you know, CATL,
 
 they are a battery company, but they're trying to diversify. Number one, by offering a broader lineup of products. know, the... ‚Åì
 
 The sodium ion is called the NAXTRA and they're really, really developing that for commercial vehicles and for ‚Åì lower price mass market vehicles. So look for sodium ion to be launched into like Southeast Asia, Latin America, where you want to stay with affordable vehicles and sodium ion can do that. And then the second thing is the Freevoy, which is their ‚Åì fast charging ‚Åì LFP. then the third is
 
 Lei (43:43)
 There's the... The Qilin condensed battery is the one that will allow you supposedly... Next time when that's available you can drive from Beijing to Shanghai without starting the charge in a sedan. ‚Åì
 
 Tu (43:55)
 Yeah,
 
 I'm getting confused. the Qilin and then the Freevoy is the dual chemistry battery. And so, CATL is diversifying in two ways. They're going international. We went to a private event. was pretty cool. Thanks Dylan and the CATL team. Forbidden City. There was a fireside chat with... And they had three or four executives that spoke openly.
 
 Lei (44:14)
 The view of the city in the evening.
 
 We should share the favorite answer of that evening. I asked the guy, you guys are doing this so fast, know, 10 % to 90%, six and a half minutes, seven minutes. How much faster can you go? And his answer was, what is your requirement? That was like the BEVs answer of this trip, you know, like.
 
 Tu (44:40)
 You
 
 This is the thing, You and I are, again, I'll reiterate, we're nerds, so we love learning more. But you have to be here. That's how fast the market changes. Unfortunately, I just did not see many Americans here.
 
 Lei (45:05)
 Well, they were the KOLs and the YouTubers.
 
 Tu (45:08)
 But I'm saying
 
 executives and stuff like that. ‚Åì
 
 Lei (45:11)
 Well, surprise visit would be, think actually one of the foreign companies that are tripling down is Hyundai. They announced the IONIQ, official entry of the IONIQ brand, Jose Munoz is here. have vehicle. Yeah, the IONIQ V, which is already a production vehicle. It's like 99 % production vehicle based on their IONIQ brand and a couple of concepts that were developed and led
 
 Tu (45:24)
 launch the new vehicle.
 
 Lei (45:38)
 by their Chinese local team so they're still doubling down even though Hyundai
 
 Tu (45:42)
 Hyundai Kia has struggled ‚Åì for several years.
 
 Lei (45:46)
 I
 
 visited Li Auto's plant in Beijing that was previously a Beijing Hyundai plant that I visited before. Besides that, think we talked about the booths. Porsche, Ford, Mazda, even Cadillac, their booths were relatively small compared to the BYDs and the Chery's.
 
 and the Great Walls.
 
 Tu (46:10)
 And we were talking about this over breakfast how times have changed because, you know, just 10 years ago, pre-COVID, it was Volkswagen having these large booths was BMW having these large, enormous booths in China during the show, dominating the headlines. Having when you saw their press conferences, the CEOs having all this confidence about the China market and how they were going to continue to be leaders in the market. That's not happening. And that was just five or six years
 
 that the shoe has completely been ‚Åì put on the other foot.
 
 Lei (46:46)
 You know, the other theme is what I call this year the foreign empire is striking back, right? The Volkswagen, Mercedes, BMW, with their all new China locally, with a lot of Chinese tech local content inside the vehicle. ‚Åì In China for China, vehicles launching.
 
 Tu (47:05)
 That's the only
 
 way they survive.
 
 Lei (47:08)
 They have
 
 a chance. If they don't do that, they have no chance. If they did this, they have a chance, but there's no guarantee for success.
 
 Tu (47:11)
 They have no chance.
 
 So we'll end it on this note. We are parked facing out in a charging station about 200km. That's what I was going to say. So there's probably 40, 50, Those are Mercedes, a Tesla, a Geely, a Volkswagen, a Zeekr a Denza, BYD, NIO, a Leap Motor, and the BYD. Eletre yeah, not at least. Eletre.
 
 Lei (47:24)
 Look at the varometers.
 
 There's a Lotus Eletre probably
 
 an L6.
 
 Tu (47:48)
 So, I mean, at the end of the day, I just named the diversity in how many repeats? There's two BYDs out of the group. There's one foreign car, or there's two foreign cars, three foreign cars. So, if you're not an alternate energy or clean energy vehicle maker, major vehicle maker in China, you're just not gonna win. It's not gonna be good for you. So, I still feel like we have so much to talk about.
 
 Lei (48:17)
 I'll
 
 just end on saying...
 
 We also, we often are fans and ‚Åì we talk about the positive things. There are negative things. Some of the negative things I saw, which I did not like, is the speed of these products that are just coming out, new brands. You can kind of tell which one spent effort and which ones are kind of just there, you know. Trying to keep up. Trying to keep up and.
 
 I really didn't like these new brands from Huawei, the Epic Land and the Iceland because the way the styling of their vehicles, you look at them, Porsche, right? It's actually backward, I think, in a market where China is innovating and leading. So that's something I did not like. And just sometimes the speed of things that are happening or the involution. ‚Åì
 
 Tu (49:16)
 But
 
 the outcomes of that will be that CATL and BYD will single-handedly bring clean energy vehicles to the mass market, international and emerging markets. is just they've done so much to speed up charging and to get back on the road. And as I say that, we are at 6 minutes 84.
 
 percent ‚Åì state of charge and it's pulling it's still pulling a hundred forty five kilowatt hours.
 
 Lei (49:49)
 And then the
 
 other thing that people may not realize is I believe the start of this year's Beijing Auto Show is actually the start of brand consolidation. I know we have many brands, but go just just watch.
 
 Tu (50:03)
 As you
 
 just mentioned, Huawei with Epic Land with all these new brands, right?
 
 Lei (50:07)
 Because
 
 Chang'an already announced they're integrating the Avatr and the Deepal Geely at the Geely night, it was about one Geely. I think expect a contraction of this brand movement.
 
 Tu (50:16)
 Geely
 
 I was really impressed with Geely because they did...
 
 Explained to us how each of the brands fits into the Geely auto portfolio or Geely group And so I didn't agree with with how they had it laid out a hundred percent, but you know, I'm that's just my opinion anyways We're about to finish charging here and get our way to Shanghai Hopefully this is going to be a very popular episode. We had a lot to say we gave you a lot to think about
 
 We will also circle back next week and talk about things that we weren't able to as a truck full of pigs.
 
 Lei (51:01)
 It's just these funny things you experience on these road trips make you appreciate us being here.
 
 Tu (51:07)
 Honestly dude,
 
 you know and like we still have dear friends here I had a soiree in Phoenix town that was super well attended I cheated a bunch of my friends came they just they just happened to be Covering the automotive space and so it's a great great event in my opinion. I thought it was a huge success We'll be doing it again next year. Anyways, everyone. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening I'm gonna try to get this out and it's up by by the weekend or next Monday at the latest and then
 
 Next Friday, hopefully, we'll have a live episode in our normal time and place.
 
 Lei (51:43)
 And now it's at 90%. So we're ready to go. Hit the road. Bye bye.