Shanghai (ZXZC)- Li Xiang, founder and CEO of China's electric vehicle (EV) startup CHJ Automotive (hereinafter, CHJ), confirmed recently that the company has halted SEV (small electric vehicle) program which had been developed for 2 years.

On March 22, CHJ announced that it had completed RMB 3 billion Series B round and will co-build a joint venture with the China's ride-hailing giant Didi to conduct deep cooperation in sharing travelling, large-scale application of autonomous driving technologies. Li Xiang stated in an interview that the company thinks the collaboration with Didi will receive much better effects than developing SEV program.

The SEV, positioned as a low-speed EV model, has been put into trial production in August last year. In December 2017, the startup initiated the SEV timesharing rental business in Paris and San Francisco ahead of in China because the domestic laws and regulations over low-speed EV had not come out yet. As the partnership with Didi is coming, CHJ stopped the SEV program and shelved its travelling business in Paris and San Francisco.

Reportedly, CHJ's vehicle plant in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province has currently been rebuilding its SEV production lines to befit the manufacturing of a middle-large SUV model. 

The startup's upcoming product is positioned as a 7-seat luxury middle-large SUV. The first batch of engineer prototypes will be off production line in April this year and will be officially launched in the second half of this year before it goes on sale in 2019.