Written by Cláudio Afonso | [email protected] | LinkedIn | Twitter
The Chinese joint-venture between the PHEV maker Li Auto and Didi that aimed to produce electric vehicles filed for bankruptcy to Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court on Thursday, Reuters reports citing official filings.
The company was 51% owned by the ride-hailing firm Didi and 49% owned by the Plug-in Hybrid EV maker Li Auto and was among a series of partnerships Didi struck with major automakers including Volkswagen, Toyota, and BYD.
The company was planning to partner with major OEMs in order to adopt more EVs with autonomous driving technologies in its fleets. Didi and BYD launched “a co-developed EV model D1 in 2020” although the other collaborations with automakers made little progress, Reuters reports.
In 2019, the automaker Toyota announced an agreement with Didi to expand collaboration in Mobility as a Service (MaaS) in China. As part of this agreement, Toyota invested invest 600 million U.S. dollars in DiDi and a joint venture, which the two companies will establish with GAC Toyota Motor Co., Ltd.for vehicle-related services for ride-hailing drivers.
In January 2019, also Beijing Electric Vehicle, a unit of state-owned Chinese automaker BAIC Motor Group, established a JV with Didi to develop customized EVs and connected car systems for Didi’s ride-hailing fleet.
Written by Cláudio Afonso | [email protected] | LinkedIn | Twitter
