GWM-backed Haomo.AI closes new funding round, with Meituan as investor

Beijing (Gasgoo)- Haomo Intelligent Mobility (Haomo.AI), formerly the Intelligent Driving Foresight Division of the Great Wall Motor Technology Center, has reportedly closed a RMB300 million funding round. Launched in the second half of 2020, the pre-A round counted Shougang Group, Meituan and Hillhouse Capital as investors.

Photo credit: Great Wall Motor

The startup was established in November 2019. Despite a short history, it boasts nearly ten years of experience in intelligent driving segment as a part of Great Wall Motor when it was responsible for the automaker’s research and development in ADAS.

Focusing on the development of automatic driving system, Haomo.AI has formed a double-product-line strategy for the passenger cars and low-speed terminal logistics market.

Photo credit: Great Wall Motor

In the passenger car segment, Haomo.AI aims to offer highly-safe and diverse products and solutions to accelerate the penetration of autonomous driving technologies. Taking a step-by-step approach, the company will finally develop its own chips with an investment of about RMB2 billion at the early stage. What’s more, it can also make use of resources of Great Wall Motors to create industrial synergies and improve the assembly rate of autonomous driving system.

As for the logistics vehicle platform, Haomo.AI wants to provide products with high safety and intelligence and lower the entry threshold of high-level autonomous driving industry. Facing customers with different demands, the company can freely customize the combination of drive-by-wire chassis, sensors, domain controllers and driverless algorithms to meet diversified market demands.

Haomo.AI has begun to deliver orders for the unmanned logistics vehicles researched and developed independently by itself. Its customers in this field can be categorized into two kinds, companies with software and algorithm capabilities, and logistics companies. Specifically, it has formed business relationship with Ali and Meituan. According to its plan, the company will become profitable in 2022 before it goes public in the Science and Technology Innovation board in 2023.

On February 22, Great Wall Motor also announced that Gu Weihao, former general manager of Baidu Intelligent Vehicle Division, joined Haomo.AI as its CEO. Together with Zhang Kai, head of Intelligent Driving, Great Wall Motor, and Zhen Longbao, Director of Intelligent Driving, Great Wall Motor, the new CEO will be responsible for the R&D of the automaker’s intelligent driving solutions.

Mr. Gu joined Baidu in 2003 and left the internet giant at the end of 2019. During his 16 years in Baidu, Mr. Gu was once taking roles in autonomous driving, connected vehicle and mapping businesses.