On January 9, NIO Day 2020 was officially held in Chengdu. The previously announced NIO’s first pure electric car ET7, a new generation of autonomous driving technology, a new 150kWh battery pack, and the second generation of power station technology were officially released.
NIO ET7
As NIO’s first pure electric sedan, ET7 retains the family-style features, but naturally integrates high-performance autonomous driving sensors into the body lines, defining the appearance design of the autonomous driving era. The length, width and height of the ET7 are 5098/1987/1505mm respectively, and the wheelbase is 3060mm. Equipped with far and near beam integrated LED headlights, double-dash daytime running lights and three-dimensional and transparent bar-type taillights, the vehicle has smooth lines and a sense of technology.
NIO ET7 applies the second-generation digital cockpit technology, and is equipped with the third-generation digital cockpit computing platform of Qualcomm, which has stronger in-vehicle mobile internet and communication capabilities. NIO’s in-vehicle artificial intelligence system NOMI has also evolved. The new car is equipped with 23 speakers as standard, with an output power of 1,000 watts, forming a 7.1.4 in-vehicle immersive sound system.
In terms of power, NIO ET7 has a 0-100km acceleration in 3.9 seconds, and has a braking distance of 33.5 meters from 100-0km. The drag coefficient is as low as 0.23Cd. With the second-generation high-efficiency electric drive platform using silicon carbide power modules, the overall energy efficiency level is improved. Models equipped with a 70kWh battery pack have a NEDC range of over 500km, models equipped with a 100kW battery pack have a range of over 700km, and models equipped with a 150kWh battery pack have a range of over 1,000km.
ET7 accelerates from zero to 100 kilometers in 3.9 seconds, the system maximum power is 480kW, the maximum torque is 850N.m, and the braking distance from 100 kilometers to zero is 33.5m; the drag coefficient is as low as 0.23Cd, and the second-generation high-efficiency electric drive platform using silicon carbide power modules, the overall energy efficiency level is improved. All new cars are equipped with air suspension and 4D intelligent body control as standard. The 4D dynamic body control system fused with high-precision maps and sensors can detect road bumps in advance and actively adjust the suspension.
The starting price of the ET7 before subsidy is 448,000 yuan (~USD69,171), the starting price of the BaaS program is 378,000 yuan (~USD58,363) before the subsidy; the First Edition is priced at 526,000 yuan(~81,214) before the subsidy, and the BaaS program is priced at 398,000 yuan before the subsidy. Pre-orders are now open on the NIO App. Delivery is expected to start in the first quarter of 2022.
Next-generation autonomous driving platform
Also released along with ET7 is the latest NIO Autonomous Driving technology, NAD (NIO Autonomous Driving). ET7 is the first model to be equipped with NAD. The NIO super-sensing system Aquila is equipped with 33 high-performance sensing hardware, including 11 8-megapixel high-definition cameras and 1 ultra-long-distance high-precision lidar.
The NIO supercomputing platform Adam is equipped with four NVIDIA DRIVE Orin chips and has a computing power of 1016TOPS, which is 7 times that of Tesla‘s FSD. It is by far the most powerful mass-produced mobile computing platform. NIO has established full-stack autonomous driving technology capabilities, and will gradually realize easy and safe point-to-point autonomous driving experience in scenarios such as high-speed, urban areas, parking, and power-up.
NIO NAD comes standard with all autopilot hardware, but adopts the subscription model ADaaS (AD as a Service). The complete functions of NAD will adopt the “monthly activation and monthly payment” model, and the service fee is 680 yuan per month.
150kWh brand new battery pack
This time, NIO Day, NIO released a 150kWh battery pack. The battery pack uses advanced mass-produced solid-state battery technology to achieve an ultra-high energy density of 360Wh/kg, and all NIO models can be upgraded. Equipped with a 150kWh battery pack, all NIO models will have ultra-long NEDC range. The 2018 ES8 exceeds 730km, the new ES8 exceeds 850km, ES6 and EC6 exceeds 900km, and ET7 exceeds 1,000km.
Second-generation power swapping station
NIO also officially released the second-generation power swapping station at the press conference. The second-generation power station has a single-day service capacity of 312 times/vehicles. Vehicles can be automatically parked. Users do not need to get off the car, user can start self-service battery swaps with one button. NIO will speed up the layout of power swapping station, and plans to reach 500 power stations nationwide by the end of 2021.
