Shanghai (ZXZC)- Nio, a Chinese electric vehicle startup, has hired eight banks to work on its initial public offering in the United States this year as planned, according to Reuters.

The IPO is expected to be worth up to 2 billion dollars and to finance the company’s expansion and investments in autonomous driving and battery technologies. The banks are reportedly Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan and UBS.

As a response to the report, Nio said that the company is concentrating its efforts on the production, delivery and customer service. The company will not comment or help confirm the IPO report.

Last December, Nio has already been reported to have a plan for IPO in the United States in 2018. At that time, the company is also said to sell its part of business in the United States with 300 to 400 million dollars. But the report also stated that Nio hadn’t made final decision on IPO or the sale.

On December 16, ES8, Nio’s first mass-production vehicle, was officially launched. The vehicle is a 7-seat high-performance electric SUV with a length of 5022mm. Powered by two electric motors, one for the front wheel and one for the rear, the model is claimed to have a NEDC range of 355Km. According to William Li, founder and CEO of NIO, ES8 can reach the speed of 100km per hour in 4.4 seconds.