China is the world’s most competitive market for electric vehicles. Startups and established carmakers are sparring on price, technology and, increasingly, design, as companies try to grab market share. Foreign visitors are often astounded by what Chinese EVs can do.
“The EV market, especially in China, is incredibly competitive,” says Kris Tomasson, vice president of design for Nio, one of China’s leading EV startups. To keep ahead of the competition, “design really has to be leading edge, always looking forward, very progressive. So we’re given the ability to really push on the design side.”
Being design-forward means being agile enough to pursue new ideas quickly—with a helping hand from digital technology. “Key decisions that maybe would take months at a traditional carmaker, we can make within hours through our digital tools,” Tomasson says.
Nio is now trying to use its design chops in releasing a new entry-level vehicle—dubbed “Firefly”—as it tries to break into the entry-level segment in both the Chinese and European car markets.
Battery swapping and Nio Houses
William Li founded Nio in 2014; the company debuted its first car in 2016. The startup has focused on high-end vehicles, competing with companies like Tesla and fellow Chinese EV maker Xpeng. Nio has delivered over 737,000 cars in total through the end of April.
Tomasson, who had previously worked at BMW, Ford, and Coca-Cola, was “one of the first 10 people brought on board, which made me realize how important design was going to be for this company going forward.”
Michael Tropper, cofounder of design agency Forpeople, was also brought into Nio early to work on “a once-in-a-career opportunity to build something from scratch.” He tried to focus on Nio’s offerings beyond the car itself, particularly the company’s battery-swapping stations.
“This is the main worry everybody has about EVs: How am I going to charge the car? What if I run out of power?” Tropper says. Nio has since made its sleek, minimalist battery-swapping stations a “cohesive part of the brand experience,” Tropper says.
The second unique aspect behind Nio are the “Nio Houses,” the company’s retail storefronts. The startup pitches these “houses” as community spaces for Nio drivers, including co-working spaces, libraries and cafes. “We took inspiration from private members clubs,” Tropper said. “I took William Li to Soho House here in London, and we really immersed ourselves into that world.”
Nio now has over 180 such spaces, mostly in China with a few in Europe and the Middle East. “A key element of differentiation for Nio is its service culture and care for the customer. We felt, very early, that a space where you host people is the best way to express that,” Tropper says. “The car industry can learn a lot from the hospitality industry.”
A new Nio venture: Firefly
Nio’s shares are down by almost 30% over the past 12 months, as investors continue to worry whether EV startups can survive in China’s fierce EV sector. The company generated $9 billion in revenue in 2024, yet reported a $3 billion loss for the year.
Dozens of Chinese EV startups have sprung up over the past decade, tapping into government subsidies. While that helped grow a globally competitive car industry, it’s also led to fierce competition as carmakers battle for market share. Many are likely to fail, unable to keep up with giants like BYD, Tesla, and Geely Auto.
Nio, for its part, has stumbled in trying to expand its product lineup. It unveiled Onvo, which targets the mass-market segment, last year. Yet sales have been slower than hoped, which executives blame on delayed deliveries.
The startup’s latest offering is “Firefly,” a more entry-level vehicle compared to its standard premium models.
The Chinese startup launched Firefly in the Chinese market in mid-April. The first model, a small Mini-like EV, retails for just under 120,000 Chinese yuan ($16,466). Nio has declined to disclose order numbers for the new brand, but founder William Li has suggested he hopes it will eventually make up 10% of the company’s sales.
Nio hopes to launch Firefly in Europe by the third quarter of the year. It’s a slight delay to the company’s original plan to launch by the summer; Nio admits it underestimated the challenges of selling in Europe.
When designing the car, Nio “distilled it down to three keywords: Vivid, thoughtful, and solid,” Tomasson says. That first characteristic—vividness—comes through in its “trio lights”: three small headlights on each side of the car’s front, which are mirrored on the back. “Nobody’s done that in the industry,” Tomasson explains. “It’s instantly recognizable.”
Thoughtfulness comes through in the car’s interior, which the company made “as efficient as possible” in order to maximize space. And finally, despite its more entry-level price tag, the car still needs to feel like a “premium, grown-up car.”
Tropper, too, embraced the idea of the “firefly” in developing the car’s brand image, choosing an “electric yellow, glowing color that offsets the cooler tones of the night.”
For Tropper, working on Firefly was a chance for the branding and design teams to work closely together, rather than in separate, siloed verticals. “The design DNA has to work for the brand as well as the cars,” he says.
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
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