"Profit is King" Author | Wang Lei, Cao Tingting, and a unicorn listed in the United States are about to be born. Bloomberg has just revealed the news that WeRide has secretly launched an IPO and submitted an application for an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States, planning to raise the most money

500 million US dollars. This autonomous driving company is currently working with consultants and may go public as early as the first half of this year. As the autonomous driving star with the largest autonomous driving fleet, WeRide has accelerated its financing in the past two years, and it was launched in August last year.

It was revealed that WeRide had an intention to go public. At that time, WeRide responded by not commenting. In November last year, WeRide completed a new round of financing, led by CDB Manufacturing Transformation and Upgrading Fund. After the financing, the valuation was over 5 billion.

US dollars. However, the listing also faces uncertainty. People familiar with the matter said that the specific details of the IPO, including scale and time planning, may change. 01? Kaifu Li once praised WeRide, which was founded in 2017.

Headquartered in Guangzhou, it has branches in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and San Francisco, USA. It is an autonomous driving company positioned at the L4 level. Source: WeRide Zhixing Although it has not been established for a long time, its business covers a wide range of areas, including smart travel,

In terms of revenue, WeRide has generated hundreds of millions of yuan in multiple scenarios such as on-demand public transportation, smart logistics, smart sanitation, and high-end intelligent driving. Among them, the high-end intelligent driving solution jointly developed with Bosch.

It is expected to be mass-produced and launched in 2023. This is also one of the largest L2+/L3 commercial orders in China. The development of WeRide has a lot to do with its founder, Han Xu, before establishing WeRide.

, he is a tenured professor at the University of Missouri, mainly in the field of computer engineering. Source: Wenyuan Zhixing He is a visionary academic entrepreneur. In 2014, about a year after Baidu’s driverless project was launched, Han Xu gave

The then chief scientist of Baidu wrote a letter and then joined Baidu North America Research Institute. Two years later, Baidu decided to focus on autonomous driving, and Han Xu became the chief scientist of Baidu’s autonomous driving division.

The clear direction forward is only in the preliminary preparation stage. In 2017, Waymo, a subsidiary of Google, launched Robotaxi, a self-driving taxi service, and the self-driving industry has some development directions. Source: WeRide sees the future of self-driving.

After the future, Han Xu and Wang Jin, then general manager of Baidu's autonomous driving division, left Baidu and established Jingchi Technology, which was also the predecessor of WeRide. Soon after, Wang Jin was sued by Baidu for allegedly violating the non-competition agreement.

Resigning as CEO, Han Xu, as the co-founder, took over the CEO position, and Jingchi Technology also officially changed its name to WeRide ZhiXing. It was also at this time that WeRide ZhiXing ushered in its first round of financing, founded by Qiming.

The investment was led by Huachuang Capital and NVIDIA, and this round of financing reached US$52 million. Source: WeRide In October 2018, WeRide completed Series A financing. This investment was funded by the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance Alliance RNM strategy.

Leading the investment, this was also its first investment in the Chinese market. It is worth noting that He Xiaopeng, CEO of Xpeng Motors, was also among the list of investors at that time.

The fact that WeRide has received such attention is directly related to its business capabilities.

In June 2017, WeRide obtained a California road test license and announced at the end of the year that it would move back to the Guangzhou Development Zone in Huangpu District from Silicon Valley and establish a global headquarters.

It also announced that 500-1,000 driverless vehicles will be mass-produced globally starting from the first quarter of 2018.

Source: WeRide Therefore, the Series A financing at that time was also an important part of WeRide's efforts to connect upstream and downstream.

Starting from the Series B financing, WeRide has received more and more attention. In 2021, WeRide completed the Series B financing, with total financing reaching US$310 million, with Yutong Group as the strategic lead investor.