Nio has secured the first customer for its in-house developed autonomous driving chip Shenji NX9031, licensing it to an automotive semiconductor company in the first deal of its kind for the Chinese electric vehicle maker, according to a report Wednesday by local media outlet LatePost.
The licensing deal represents Nio‘s first external chip commercialization since beginning development in 2021, coming as the company works toward profitability in the fourth quarter of 2025.
According to the company’s founder and CEO William Li.cthat costs the equivalent of building 1,000 battery swap stations to develop,
Based on per-station costs of 1.5 million to 3 million yuan ($210,000 to $420,000), total investment reached several billion yuan.
Since Nio started its two in-house developed chips, the Shanghai-headquartered EV maker has invested several billion yuan in research and development (R&D).
Nio has developed two in-house chips since launching its semiconductor effort in 2021: the Yangjian chip for LiDAR control and the Shenji NX9031 for autonomous driving. The company unveiled the Shenji chip in late 2023.
LatePost did not identify the automotive chip company receiving the license or disclose financial terms of the arrangement.
Contacted by EV, Nio did not comment on the report.
The report comes five days after Nio‘s chip subsidiary, Anhui Shenji Technology, established a joint venture with AXera Semiconductor and OmniVision Technologies.
William Li welcomed last March other companies to license Nio‘s chip at the China EV100 Forum, stating that the company’s chips and operating systems would be open to the industry.
“If you want to buy the best chips, you can come to Nio,” Li said at the time.
The Shenji NX9031 chip project was initiated in 2021 with a team exceeding 600 people covering front-end design, back-end design, verification and testing —approaching the scale of an independent chip company.
Chip Specifications
The Shenji NX9031 uses 5-nanometer automotive-grade process technology with actual computing power approximately four times that of Nvidia Corp.’s Orin-X chip, according to Zhang Danyu, Nio‘s chip division head.
Zhang said at a vehicle launch in May that development and testing took three years, with some specifications superior to industry-standard chips.
The chip currently powers Nio‘s ET9 sedan and updated versions of the ES6 and EC6 SUVs. The brand’s upcoming flagship SUV ES9 is also expected to feature the chip.
Li said it delivers approximately 10,000 yuan in cost optimization per vehicle for Nio‘s own operations.
Commercialization Structure
Nio established Anhui Shenji Technology as a separate legal entity in June to house its chip operations, which had previously functioned as an internal business unit.
The subsidiary was created to integrate chip R&D, mass production, licensing and other businesses while the EV maker maintains absolute control.
At the time, LatePost reported Nio was seeking strategic investors for a minority stake in the chip unit — a report the company denied as “speculative information.”
Last week, Anhui Shenji formed a joint venture with AXera Semiconductor and OmniVision with registered capital of 100 million yuan.
AXera holds a 36.4% stake as the largest shareholder, LatePost reported without confirming that AXera is Nio‘s customer for the chip.
