Several senior members of Nio smart driving team have recently left the company as the Chinese electric vehicle maker undergoes a restructuring of its intelligent driving division, local media Yiu reported on Thursday.
Among the departures is Bai Yuli, head of Nio’s artificial intelligence (AI) platform, who left shortly before China’s National Day holiday, according to a report by Yiou. Bai joined Nio in August 2020, reporting to Ren Shaoqing, the company’s vice president of autonomous driving, and since March 2023 had also led Nio’s cloud engineering department as senior director. His responsibilities included building cloud infrastructure for smart driving research and development and providing data support for AI algorithm iterations.
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Yiou reported that other key figures, including Ma Ningning, head of the company’s world model project, and smart driving product lead Harry Wong, have also recently departed.
When asked for comment, Nio said it had restructured its smart driving department “to enhance absorption of cutting-edge general AI technologies and deliver smart driving experiences efficiently, rapidly, and with high quality.”
The restructuring follows a series of leadership and organizational changes in Nio’s autonomous driving division. In September, local outlet Leiphone reported that Ren had joined the AI laboratory at the University of Science and Technology of China while continuing to serve as vice president at Nio. Ren later confirmed the dual role, saying it would not affect his responsibilities at the company.
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A Nio representative told Yiou that the recent adjustments are intended to “better iterate the world model 2.0 version,” referring to the company’s next-generation intelligent driving system.
Nio unveiled its Nio World Model (NWM) during its Nio IN 2024 tech day in July, describing it as the world’s first “smart driving world model.” The system began rolling out to vehicles in May, featuring major upgrades to the company’s driver-assistance technology, including an industry-first autonomous parking lot navigation feature.