NIO electric cars are lined up at the NIO Delivery Center in Shanghai on Monday. The delivery center is the first of its kind in Shanghai, where potential customers can view NIO SUV models. There is also a test drive area. The Tencent-backed electric car start-up successfully completed its initial public offering in the US on September 12, and has been described as Chinese rival to Tesla. Photo: VCG

Li Bin, also known as William Li, founder and CEO of Chinese electric vehicle startup NIO, said the average price of NIO vehicles has surpassed the average prices of Tesla, BMW and Audi, and can be counted as a high-end auto brand, financial data provider Tonghuashun reported on Sunday.

On the 2021 All-China Young Entrepreneurs Summit held in Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu Province on Sunday, Li said the average price of NIO vehicles was 434,700 yuan ($68,258.90), which had exceeded the average price of BMW and Audi, and is several hundred thousand yuan more than Tesla vehicles.

The official website of NIO showed that there are four series of electric cars are on sale currently. The price of top-configured ES8 reached 624,000 yuan, and the cheapest model is ES6 with a price tag of 358,000 yuan, according to the auto data provider AutoHome.

Li also revealed at the summit that NIO delivered 102,803 electric cars over the last three years by the end of this April. Tesla CEO Elon Musk congratulated NIO in April 10 for its 100,000th produced electric car and said "That is a tough milestone" for NIO on Twitter.

Global Times