Chinese language electrical automobile corporate WM Motor, or Weltmeister, filed Wednesday to head public in Hong Kong. Pictured right here is likely one of the corporate’s automobiles in a shopping center in Shanghai.
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BEIJING — Chinese language electrical automobile start-up WM Motor filed Wednesday to head public at the Hong Kong Inventory Alternate.
Sometimes called Weltmeister, the electrical automobile corporate disclosed its annual losses doubled over the past 3 years to eight.2 billion yuan ($1.2 billion), whilst earnings greater than doubled all over that point, emerging by means of about 170% to 4.7 billion yuan in 2021.
The general public model of the submitting didn’t come with pricing data.
Despite the fact that China’s electrical automobile marketplace is the biggest globally and a fast-growing one, automakers reminiscent of BYD and Tesla dominate gross sales. Chinese language start-ups reminiscent of Nio and Xpeng — each indexed within the U.S. and Hong Kong — have made headlines, however nonetheless have a small portion of the marketplace.
WM Motor has offered even fewer automobiles. The corporate mentioned within the submitting that as of Dec. 31, it has offered 83,495 electrical automobiles since its first style introduced in September 2018.
Xpeng introduced its first style round the similar time, and mentioned its cumulative deliveries reached 137,953 as of the top of December. Nio mentioned its cumulative deliveries totaled 167,070 as of the top of December, even if it introduced its first automobile a couple of yr sooner than its start-up opponents.
WM Motor CEO Freeman Shen instructed CNBC in January he anticipated call for for electrical cars in China this yr to just about double from final yr. He mentioned, alternatively, chip shortages and Covid-related provide chain disruptions would building up prices for firms making the automobiles.
WM Motor’s SUVs and sedans promote in a worth vary of about 160,800 yuan to 280,000 yuan, the submitting confirmed. That is very similar to Xpeng’s worth vary.
The corporate mentioned in Wednesday’s submitting its aggressive benefits come with a focal point at the mainstream marketplace, self-owned production amenities and robust analysis and construction functions.
As of the top of final yr, the submitting confirmed WM Motor spent 20.7% of earnings on analysis and construction, whilst Xpeng reported it spent 19.6% of earnings on such analysis.
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Then again, Xpeng has greater than triple the headcount at 13,978 workers as opposed to WM Motor’s 3,952, filings confirmed for the top of final yr.
WM Motor mentioned it had 1,141 workers in analysis and construction, or 28.9% of a complete headcount. Production staff accounted for the best percentage, at 54.1%.
For comparability, Xpeng mentioned its gross sales and advertising and marketing workforce accounted for the best percentage of its workers, at 45%. A complete of five,271 analysis and construction workers accounted for 38% of headcount.