Firefly will surpass its October delivery record this month, the brand chief Daniel Jin said on Sunday, as the brand prepares to expand to 14 new markets within the next months.
“In November, our delivery numbers will be more than this. Rest assured,” Jin said during a media session in Shenzhen on Sunday attended by EV, while pointing to October’s record figures.
Firefly delivered 5,912 vehicles in October, representing a 2% increase from September’s 5,775 units, according to company data.
Jin’s comments suggest November deliveries will exceed 5,912 units, though he declined to provide specific guidance.
“Internally, we do sales projections week by week, but we don’t announce them publicly,” the executive said.
The brand announced on Friday at the Guangzhou Auto Show that it had reached 30,000 cumulative deliveries.
Beyond the near-term record, Jin outlined delivery targets anticipating market slowdown from policy changes.
The brand expects to reach monthly deliveries of 6,000 to 6,500 units following an anticipated first-quarter 2026 slowdown, he said.
“We set an internal target of trying to maintain a very stable delivery months of around 6,000 to 6,500. And this is our target, yes,” Jin stated.
The timeline suggests Firefly anticipates achieving that level by the second quarter of 2026, following what Jin described as a difficult period for Chinese competitors adjusting to halved tax incentives.
China will reduce its New Energy Vehicle (NEV) purchase tax exemption from 30,000 yuan ($4,220) to 15,000 yuan starting January 1, 2026, maintaining the lower level through 2027.
The current 10% vehicle purchase tax exemption, capped at 30,000 yuan, expires on December 31.
“Basically, we foresee that quarter one next year, gonna be hard for all the Chinese competitors because of the tax policy change, right?” Jin stated. “And so Q1 2026 will be tough, but after Q1 I think the market will rebound.”
“At Q1 next year, that’ll be tough. And we think from Q2—from March, April, and May, we should be able to climb to that number,” Jin added, referring to the 6,000-6,500 monthly delivery target.
In September, Jin said Firefly aims to reach 100,000 customers globally by the end of 2026.
Achieving that target would require the brand to deliver approximately 70,000 additional vehicles over the next 13 months, or 5,384 monthly on average.
Firefly delivered 3,680 units in May and 3,932 in June. Deliveries then plunged 40% to 2,366 in July before rebounding 84% to 4,346 in August.
The brand is priced at 119,800 to 125,800 yuan ($16,550-$17,380).
Beyond China, Firefly has started vehicle deliveries in the Netherlands, Norway, and Belgium.
The brand said deliveries in Denmark, Greece, Austria, and Portugal will start “soon” with plans to expand to a total of 17 countries.
Southeast Asian expansion is also underway. A distributor contract was already signed for Macau, Singapore and Thailand while the expansion to Hong Kong is being planned.
Jin also said that Firefly will adopt Nio‘s upcoming next-generation battery swap stations, departing from prior plans to integrate the brand into CATL’s Choco-Swap battery swap network.
CATL, the world’s largest battery manufacturer, is both a Nio investor and its primary battery supplier since the 2018 launch of Nio‘s first mass-production model, the ES8.
The two companies announced an extension of their collaboration to battery swap technology in March, representing the two largest companies betting on the technology, which allows drivers to replace vehicle batteries in 90 to 180 seconds.
Nio operates over 3,500 battery swap stations in China, while CATL aims to reach 1,000 facilities across the country by year-end 2025.
