Lidar sensor maker Hesai rakes in record quarterly revenue as China’s EV makers accelerate autonomous-driving adoption

Name: Baidu wins permits to offer fully driverless robotaxi service in Beijing
Uploaded: 2023-05-24T11:15:08.000Z
Duration: 3 min 49 s
Description: Baidu wins permits to offer fully driverless robotaxi service in Beijing

Deliveries of the company’s lidar sensors for cars with autonomous-driving capabilities surged more than 12,000 per cent from a year ago

Up to 15 per cent of all new EVs in China will have at least partial automation within the next three years, according to Baidu

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A Hesai Group booth at an auto-industry trade show. Photo: Handout

Daniel Renin Shanghai

Published: 7:15pm, 24 May 2023

Hesai Group, the world’s sixth-largest maker of sensors for smart cars, raked in record revenue in the first quarter of this year, benefiting from Chinese carmakers’ stepped up efforts to make their electric vehicles more intelligent capable of autonomous driving.

The Shanghai-based company reported revenue of 429.9 million yuan (US$61 million) for the three months ended March 31, up 73 per cent year on year, according to the earnings report it filed to the Nasdaq after the market close on Tuesday.

Hesai said it shipped 28,195 advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) lidar (light detection and ranging) sensors – key components in vehicles with preliminary autonomous driving technology – between January and March, a 12,600 per cent increase compared to 222 units in the same period last year.

But Hesai, which counts Li Auto, Jidu and Lotus as clients, posted a net loss of 118.9 million yuan for the quarter due to high research-and-development costs, which jumped 99.2 per cent to 208.5 million yuan.

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Baidu wins permits to offer fully driverless robotaxi service in Beijing

The company said it had secured orders for its lidar sensors from 11 car assemblers and it expects deliveries for use in smart vehicles to climb 40 per cent in the second quarter, compared with the first quarter.

“Smart vehicles, particularly smart electric cars, with autonomous driving technology and digital cockpits, represent the trend of the automotive industry,” said Gao Shen, an independent analyst in Shanghai. “Customers can benefit from lower cost of the sensors when a large volume of the products are made by lidar makers.”

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