Xiaomi To Manufacture Electric Vehicles In Collaboration With Great Wall Motor Co Ltd.

Xiaomi considers making electric vehicles and will use Great Wall Motor Co Ltd's factory for its operation. If the technology giant pursues its plans, it will be the latest tech company to join the bandwagon of the smart mobility race. 

China's Xiaomi Corporation's stock price rose as much as 6.71% in earlier Friday trade following Reuters' report of its plan. On the other hand, Great Wall's Hong Kong stock jumped more than 8%, and its Shanghai shares achieved more than 7%.

According to two people who have knowledge of the matter, the smartphone and gadget maker firm is negotiating to make one of the Great Wall's plants in China get utilized to make electric vehicles under its own brand. Xiaomi targets the public with its electric vehicles in accordance with the more expansive positioning of its electronics products.

Great Wall has not offered manufacturing services to other firms before. However, it will, this time, provide Xiaomi with engineering consultancy to help accelerate the said project. Both parties plan to publicize their partnership immediately after next week. Xiaomi plans to release its first EV sometime in 2023 and will empower its cars to connect with other devices. 

Meanwhile, Xiaomi will invest Rs100 crore in expanding its offline retail in India to double its upscale store count. The current 3,000 establishments will become more than 6,000 in the next two years. This will produce jobs for 10,000 people in its offline retail channel, the Xiaomi India MD Manu Kumar Jain. 

"We have earmarked a sum of Rs 100 crore to help these 3000 additional partners to come on board and provide support for renovating their stores, adding furniture, branding, installing IT systems and POS machines for billing as well as hiring promoters and buddies," Jain said

Likewise, it will launch the Mi Retail Academy to train and motivate budding businessmen in mobile phone retail and drive female involvement in the trade.