Robotaxi maker Pony.ai sees Trump's trade war hitting sentiment, overseas expansion plans
[SHANGHAI] China-based robotaxi developer Pony.ai said on Thursday (Apr 24) that US President Donald Trump's trade war with China was likely to dampen its international expansion plans, but it anticipated little direct impact on its supply chain.
The Toyota-backed company has been exploring the deployment of its autonomous driving business in South Korea, Luxembourg, the Middle East and other countries after raising US$260 million from listing on the Nasdaq in November.
Trump's move to impose a blanket 10 per cent tariff on all other US imports and a higher 145 per cent levies on Chinese products has roiled markets and forced companies to reassess plans. On Thursday, however, the Trump administration signalled an openness to de-escalating the trade war with China.
Asked about the tariffs, Pony.Ai's CEO James Peng said on the sidelines of the Shanghai auto show that his company did not foresee a direct impact.
'On the supply side, we always try to have alternatives and backups,' he told Reuters. 'But I think sentimentally of course this is going to affect us, especially on our plan for international expansion.'
The company uses Nvidia's autonomous-grade Orin-X chips and would likely go on to use its newer Drive Thor chips that are not restricted from being sold in China, Peng said.
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'It's very hard to imagine those chips will be on restriction. Alternatively of course, we also have some backup suppliers from the Chinese domestic chip manufacturers,' he said.
Founded in Silicon Valley in 2016, Pony.ai has research centres in China, the United States and Luxembourg.
Asked about whether the company might explore a secondary listing in Hong Kong, Peng said it was a potential option but that its focus was on starting production of its 7th generation of vehicles. Pony.ai currently has robotaxi service licences in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen and is seeking to launch the services in Hong Kong.
'Currently all the assembly line has been modified for the mass production. Our target is that for this year we'll reach close to 1,000 vehicles,' he said.
'For the next few years, we are going to actually very rapidly expand the offering and mass production once we have the assembly line all tooled up. I think now is the matter of the demand. We definitely are going to go beyond tens of thousands very soon.' REUTERS
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