The first appearance of the all-new “Alps” has apparently surfaced online. The new EV brand is evolved to take NIO mainstream, placing itself in order to compete with automakers players like Toyota and Volkswagen in the mass-market segment.
NIO’s new Alps mass-market EV brand
NIO CEO William Li stated that the company would bring a new mass-market brand in August 2021. During the company’s Q2 2021 earnings call, he said, “We’ll enter the mass market with a new brand. The quoting of the new brand has been assembled, marking the first step of the strategic initiative of NIO.”
On the other side, one of the local media outlets 36kr revealed in July 2021 that NIO had been considering a sub-brand initially called “TV” for Toyota and Volkswagen. Meanwhile, the codename also got changed to “Alps” in order to avoid complications.
As per the report, both Toyota and VW are the maximum-selling automakers. Whereas the Alps are Europe’s tallest mountain range.
In addition to this, NIO’s leader makes a comparative relationship between NIO and the new brand to Volkswagen and Audi or Lexus with Toyota. He also stated that this is more about the positioning of the brands. Since the brand will differentiate itself instead of using a strategy like Tesla with the Model 3, Model Y, Model S, and Model X.
Presently, the NIO focuses on the $50,000 to $100,000 market segment. Also, its new targeted EV brand would cost around $30,000 to $50,000. The new brand will be based on NIO’s new tech platform 3.0. This is along with on-house batteries developed for the mass market models. Moving ahead, Li mentioned that the company believes the Alps brand can “sell probably 50,000 units per month” with one model.
Freshly, on the company’s first-quarter earnings. Li specified that NIO is still thinking to launch the Alps EV brand in the second half of 2024. Although the focus was on moving models to the new NT 2.0 platform and promising a smooth launch.
