NIO's Li Bin: Very confident in achieving 40%-50% sales growth for the entire year

IT House, March 11 — Last night, NIO founder, chairman, and CEO Li Bin discussed during the earnings call that the Chinese passenger car market will face significant challenges in the first quarter, with a slight decline compared to last year. Meanwhile, pure electric vehicle sales are growing strongly, driven by pure electric models last year. This year, pure electric vehicles are expected to continue maintaining a relatively rapid growth rate.

Li Bin revealed NIO’s product plans for this year, including three new models: the Tech Executive Flagship SUV ES9, which will be launched in the second quarter; a new five-seat SUV based on the all-new ES8 platform, scheduled for third quarter; and the Leado L80, also launching in the second quarter.

Li Bin believes that these models, along with the Leado L90 and the all-new ES8, will form a lineup of five medium and large SUVs, laying a solid foundation for the company’s overall sales growth this year. “NIO’s current product development pace aligns with market trends, and we are very confident in achieving 40%-50% sales growth for the year.”

According to previous reports from IT House, NIO’s flagship SUV ES9 will hold a product and technology launch event on April 9. Additionally, NIO’s “5566 series” (including ET5, ET5T, ES6, and EC6) will undergo minor updates this year, adding assisted driving features like the small blue light, and ES6 and EC6 will offer optional zero-gravity driver’s seats.

NIO aims to achieve an operating profit of 1.25 billion yuan in Q4 2025, marking the company’s first quarterly profit. Its cash reserves in Q4 reached 45.9 billion yuan, a significant increase of nearly 10 billion yuan from the previous quarter. In the earnings report, NIO disclosed that its delivery guidance for Q1 2026 is 80,000 to 83,000 units, representing a year-over-year increase of 90.1% to 97.2%; revenue guidance is 24.48 billion to 25.18 billion yuan, up 103.4% to 109.2% year-over-year.

NIO delivered a total of 326,028 new vehicles in 2025, a year-over-year increase of 46.9%, setting a new record. Full-year revenue reached 87.49 billion yuan, up 33.1%, also a record high. The total gross profit for the year was 11.92 billion yuan, an 83.5% increase, reaching a new high. The full-year gross profit margin was 13.6%, up 3.7 percentage points from the previous year, the highest since 2022. The vehicle gross profit margin was 14.6%, up 2.3 percentage points year-over-year, also the highest since 2022.