Xpeng Motors Pilots a EV Battery Leasing Option to Make its Electric Vehicles More Affordable

resource from: Gasgoo   

The Xpeng Motors P7 smart sedan went on sale April. It's a strong rival to the Tesla Model S in China.

China's rising electric car company Xpeng Motors will offer an electric vehicle leasing option for its electric vehicle battery packs, following its rival NIO in China, China's news outlet Gasgoo reports. The leasing option will lower the cost of purchasing  a new Xpeng vehicle by not charging the customer for the price of the battery up front. An EV battery pack is a significant percentage of an electric vehicle's cost, adding thousands of dollars to the sticker price.

Instead of purchasing the battery in the vehicle, Xpeng's customers pay the battery usage fee in 84 installments on a monthly basis. After 7 years, the consumer can take ownership of the battery pack.

The newly-launched service will be available for Xpeng G3's 520 i series SUV and the company's new P7's sedan AWD high performance and RWD super-long range versions. 

The 520 i G3 comes with a 66.5 kWh lithium-ion battery pack supplied by Chinese battery maker CATL. The P7's battery pack is a 80.9 kWh Liquid-cooled lithium nickel cobalt manganese (LiNiCoMnO2) battery pack.

The Xpeng Motors G3 electric SUV.

According to China's Gasgoo, a customer can purchase the G3 without the battery for 122,800 RMB (US$17,966) instead of the 162,800 RMB (US$23,747). The battery leasing option costs 780 yuan (US$114) per month for the longer range battery pack.

Xpeng Motors offers a 30% down payment for consumers to get the battery-free vehicle, so a customer will only need a down payment of 36,840 yuan ($5,390) to drive the G3 520 i home.

Xpeng Motors designed a special plan for those customers that want just the standard range battery pack, with a lower monthly payment. Under this battery plan, a consumer needs to pay only 580 yuan ($85) per month to use the battery pack.

If consumers want to upgrade to the longer range battery in the future, they can get their vehicles upgraded from the standard range by paying the 780 yuan (US$114) per month fee. 

The battery leasing pilot program is set to be deployed in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Tianjin, Wuxi, Ningbo, Foshan, Dongguan, Wuhan and Chengdu.

The announcement comes after Xpeng Motors launched its U.S. initial public offering (IPO). The automaker increased the size of its IPO by more than a third to US$1.5 billion due to strong interest from investors. 

Xpeng IPO is the third major listing in New York by Chinese EV companies in the past two years, following NIO and Li Auto. 

Xpeng's IPO comes as investors pour money in electric vehicle startups, which also pushed Tesla's stock to record highs last month.

Tesla is now the world's most valuable automaker, but Xpeng Motors is emerging as a strong rival to Tesla in its home country of China, which is the world's biggest automarket. Xpeng's highly advanced EVs cost about half the price of Tesla models. Now with a battery leasing plan, Xpeng's vehicles cost even less up front.

resource from: Gasgoo

Eric Walz

Originally hailing from New Jersey, Eric is a automotive & technology reporter covering the high-tech industry here in Silicon Valley. He has over 15 years of automotive experience and a bachelors degree in computer science. These skills, combined with technical writing and news reporting, allows him to fully understand and identify new and innovative technologies in the auto industry and beyond. He has worked at Uber on self-driving cars and as a technical writer, helping people to understand and work with technology.