Nio has surpassed 550,000 units in cumulative production of its in-house developed automotive chips, marking a milestone in the Chinese electric vehicle maker’s push into semiconductors.
Founder, chairman, and CEO William Li disclosed the figure at a semiconductor industry summit in Shanghai on Thursday, underscoring the company’s progress in building internal chip capabilities.
The total production volume includes two key chips: the Yangjian LiDAR master control chip and the Shenji NX9031 smart driving processor. Shipments of the Yangjian chip, launched in 2023 and deployed from April 2024, have exceeded 400,000 units.
Meanwhile, the Shenji NX9031 chip—built on a 5-nanometre process—has recorded more than 150,000 units in shipments since its commercial rollout began with the ET9 sedan in March 2025.
Li said the development of proprietary chips has delivered cost advantages, noting that the Yangjian chip alone helps reduce vehicle costs by several hundred yuan per unit. He added that performance and quality improvements further support the company’s long-term strategy.
“The Yangjian chip helps Nio save hundreds of yuan per vehicle,” Li said, highlighting the trade-off between upfront research investment and future margin gains.
Nio’s semiconductor push comes as the automotive industry faces growing demand for artificial intelligence computing power, increasing complexity in chip architectures, and supply chain volatility, Li said.
To address these challenges, the company is focusing on optimizing performance and cost through customized chip development while also promoting standardization. Nio aims to limit its automotive chip portfolio to fewer than 400 specifications to improve scalability and system efficiency.
Li said the company expects domestic sourcing to account for 35% to 40% of its automotive semiconductors by 2027, reflecting a broader trend toward localization in China’s supply chain.
The milestone follows recent financing activity in Nio’s chip division. In February, its semiconductor unit Shenji raised more than 2.2 billion yuan ($320 million) in its first funding round, valuing the business at nearly 10 billion yuan.
Nio is also seeking to expand beyond internal use, with Shenji and its partner Axera promoting a newly developed M97 chip to other automakers, according to local media reports.
Source: CnEVPost