Nio quietly dismantled its European management structure in February, splitting the region into six separate departments and shifting its sales operations toward a dealer and distributor model, according to an internal email seen by EV.
The reorganization, announced to staff on February 12 by the company’s HR department, came as the Chinese EV maker’s sales across its established European markets collapsed to their lowest levels since market entry.
As part of the restructuring, the company fired its head of German operations, as first reported by EV on Wednesday.
The email shows Nio Europe, previously a single top-level department overseeing all of the company’s operations on the continent, has been broken into six units.
Two of those units — Norway and a newly created Europe Sales & Network Development division — have been removed from Nio Europe entirely and transferred to the company’s Global Business department in China, headed by Chris Chen.
The remaining four departments stay under Thijs Meijling, who retains the title of Head of Nio Europe but now oversees a significantly narrower operation focused on vehicle and community management, power infrastructure, after-sales service and strategy.
The restructuring was announced less than four months after CEO William Li and co-founder Lihong Qin made a joint visit to Europe in early November, accompanied by Firefly brand President Daniel Jin and CFO Stanley Qu.
While visiting Nio House Oslo, the company’s first European showroom, Li told attendees that “user satisfaction and user service” were the company’s “top priority” in Europe and that Nio was “planning for the long term.”
He said the company did not “expect the volume to actually jump over the night,” while adding, “We focus more on serving our users well.”
Business Model Shift
The most consequential change is the creation of Europe Sales & Network Development, tasked with “expanding sales channels via General Distributors or Dealerships across Europe,” excluding Norway.
Daniel de Groot has been appointed to lead the unit, reporting directly to Chen in China rather than to the European leadership.
The language marks a formal departure from the direct-sales model Nio had pursued since entering Europe.
In Germany, where the company operates four flagship Nio Houses in Berlin, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf and Hamburg, Nio had sold vehicles exclusively through its own retail network.
The shift echoes a recommendation made publicly — if indirectly — by David Sultzer, Nio’s former general manager for Germany, who warned in a LinkedIn post on Tuesday that confusing retail presence with sales leads to volume through discounts that “damages positioning early on.”
Sultzer was fired in February, as EV reported on Wednesday, after the brand registered just one vehicle in Germany in January.
Norway Separated From Europe
Norway, Nio‘s first European market and its only profitable operation on the continent, has been carved out of Nio Europe and placed under Global Business.
An Ho continues as general manager of the Norwegian unit but now reports to Chen rather than Meijling.
The move effectively acknowledges what executives have said privately and publicly: that Norway, where Nio entered in 2021 with strong initial results, operates under fundamentally different market conditions than the rest of Europe.
The extra tariffs imposed by the European Commission in October 2024 do not include the Scandinavian country.
Executive Vice President Mark Zhou said in a podcast interview that the company made “fundamental miscalculations” when it assumed Norway’s success could be replicated across the EU.
February Sales Collapse
The restructuring coincided with the weakest month of European sales in Nio’s history across its established markets.
In the Netherlands, where Nio launched in late 2022, the company registered zero vehicles in February — a total shutout in a market where the brand had once maintained a visible presence.
Norway, the company’s strongest European market, recorded just 18 Nio-brand registrations in February, down from 30 in January. The Firefly sub-brand, which launched in the country earlier this year, added 38 units.
In Denmark, the Nio brand went unsold for a second consecutive month, with all seven of the group’s February registrations coming from Firefly, as reported by EV on Wednesday.
In Sweden, Nio registered just three vehicles in February.
German figures from the Federal Motor Transport Authority are expected later this week. Nio registered one vehicle in Germany in January.
Across its four original European markets — Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden — combined Nio-brand registrations in February fell to approximately 21 units, excluding Germany. Including the single January German registration as a reference point, the brand is tracking toward its lowest quarterly European total since launching on the continent.
New Appointments
The restructuring elevated several managers into newly created roles. Tristan Homelink was appointed Head of Europe Vehicle & Community Management, overseeing subscriptions, vehicle operations, Nio Houses and community management.
Paolo Cova was appointed Head of Europe Strategy & Project, a new department responsible for strategy planning and project management across the European market.
Kajsa Ivansson Sögnefur continues as Head of Europe Power Organization, overseeing battery swap and charging infrastructure. Onno Duimel continues as Head of Europe Service Operations, which was upgraded from a lower-tier team to a full department.
All four report to Meijling.
Germany Chiefs
The restructuring adds another layer of upheaval to Nio‘s German operations, which have cycled through four general managers since the company entered the market.
Ralph Kranz, a former Volvo executive, built the business from scratch beginning in March 2022 and oversaw the opening of the Berlin and Frankfurt Nio Houses.
He departed in early 2024 after the brand registered 1,263 vehicles in his only full year. Marius Hayler, who had previously led Nio’s Norwegian operations, replaced Kranz but left after roughly eight months for Polestar.
Sultzer, who joined Nio in September 2023 as regional manager for eastern Germany, was promoted to replace Hayler in June 2024 and presided over the sharpest sales decline in the brand’s European history — from 398 registrations in 2024 to 325 in 2025, and then to a single unit in January 2026.
Nio faces a 20.7% countervailing duty on top of the EU’s standard 10% import tariff, bringing total levies on its vehicles to 30.7%.
Every vehicle currently offered in European showrooms is a 2023 or 2024 model year, with the refreshed lineup that launched in China during the first half of 2025 yet to arrive.
The company signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Bosch last week during German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s visit to China, covering technologies across all three of its brands — Nio, Onvo and Firefly.
