Chinese EV start-up Lixiang acquires $530 million in Series C funding

China based EV maker, Lixiang Automotive (formerly CHJ Automotive), has raised a fresh funding amounting to $530 million as a part of its Series C funding. This news was announced by Plum Ventures, one of its early investors.

Post this investment round, the EV start-up is being valued at around $2.93 billion. As of date, the company has raised a total investment of $1.58 billion.

The recent Series of investment was led by Wang Xing, Founder and CEO Meituan-Dianping, a company working in the online services space. It is being reported that Xing helped raise around $300 million during the investment round. Tiktok operator ByteDance, also invested $30-million in the EV start-up. Other existing investors who participated in the funding round include Matrix Partners China, Bluerun Ventures and Future Capital. Founder of Lixiang Automotive, Li Xiang, also put around $100 million into the company.

Lixiang Automotive is expected to begin mass production of its first hybrid SUV, the Li One, in October. The vehicle will go on sale the following month. The SUV is said to sport a battery capacity of 160kWh which will provide adequate electric range for the local customers. The car is likely to be priced at CNY328,000 ($46,500).

With this fresh round of funding, Lixiang's valuation is closing in with its biggest rival in the domestic market, NIO. The EV start-up NIO is listed on New York Stock Exchange with an overall market cap of $3.1 billion.