It wasn’t long ago that Xiaomi was best known for flogging bargain smartphones with suspiciously Apple-like vibes. Fast-forward to 2023 and the Chinese tech giant has suddenly decided it’s a car company – and not just any car company. Nope, Xiaomi wants to be one of the world’s top five carmakers. Bold, considering it’s only built two cars so far. But in China, the brand is already on a tear: more than 80,000 deliveries last quarter, a near-200% annual jump, and a backlog so long you’d be forgiven for thinking they were Birkin handbags, not SUVs.

At the centre of this hype is the SU7 saloon, Xiaomi’s first proper EV – and one benchmarked not against budget runabouts, but the Porsche Taycan and Tesla Model S. Because why start small when you can shoot straight for the Nürburgring? In fact, the company even went ahead and built a 1527bhp “Ultra” version that’s already broken EV lap records there. So, yes, Xiaomi is serious.

Then came the YU7 SUV, which looks like a Tesla Model Y on steroids and is racking up waiting lists north of a year. Orders? A staggering 240,000 within 18 hours of launch. That’s the population of Southampton. And people wonder why the factory in Beijing is creaking like an overworked espresso machine.

The scale of demand is so overwhelming that CEO Lei Jun had to tell customers who couldn’t bear the wait to… well, go buy someone else’s car. Not just any someone, either. He actually recommended the Tesla Model Y and rival Chinese EVs like the Xpeng G7 and Li Auto i8. Imagine Mercedes telling you to go buy a BMW if you can’t wait six months.

Still, the money is rolling in – Xiaomi’s EV division pulled in over £2 billion last quarter – though after a £3 billion splurge to get the thing off the ground, profitability remains more of a concept than a reality.

And now? Now comes the ambitious bit: Xiaomi Auto is eyeing up Europe. By 2027, the SU7 and YU7 are expected to land on our shores, likely with a shinier, more premium price tag to match their Taycan-rivalling specs. The SU7 already offers up to 664bhp and nearly 500 miles of claimed range, while the YU7 SUV stretches that to an eyebrow-raising 519 miles (CLTC, so pinch of salt required). Rear- or twin-motor layouts, various battery sizes, all the digital bells and whistles you’d expect from a tech company turned carmaker – Xiaomi’s recipe is clear: lure in gadget-loving petrolheads who can no longer afford petrol.

But here’s the real kicker. Europe may also get the SU7 Ultra, the fire-breathing, Nürburgring-shredding 1527bhp super-saloon that exists solely to melt tyres and terrify Taycans. Think of it as Xiaomi’s iPhone X moment – pure halo, pure hype.

What about Xiaomi’s next car, the YU9 SUV with its range-extender engine? Don’t hold your breath. The brand seems more interested in dazzling Europe with its pure EVs before wheeling out something that smells faintly of petrol.

So, is Xiaomi about to storm Europe the way it did the smartphone market? Well, it has the numbers, the tech, and apparently the Nürburgring lap times. What it doesn’t quite have yet is the production capacity to keep up. And unlike phones, you can’t just queue online at midnight and have DHL drop off 1.8 tonnes of aluminium and lithium on your doorstep the next day.

Still, when the SU7 finally does roll up in Europe, Porsche and Tesla might find themselves with an entirely new rival – one that once upon a time just made cheap chargers and earbuds. And that, frankly, is properly brilliant.

Source: Xiaomi