NIO unveils impressive autonomous electric car with massive battery pack

NIO today unveiled an impressive new electric car, the NIO ET7, with a massive battery and with the potential to be autonomous.

NIO

NIO is a Chinese company for electric vehicles that has grown rapidly over the past few years.

The electric vehicle business, often referred to as ‘the Tesla of China’, has achieved successful sales of electric sport utility vehicles in the growing Chinese market.

We also reported on them because they managed to achieve success where several other EV ventures failed; to make battery exchanges work.

Eventually, the company plans to expand beyond China.

NIO ET7 Electric Sedan

At NIO Day 2020 in Chengdu, NIO unveiled its next electric vehicle: the NIO ET7.

It is an electric sedan with a very impressive driving force.

The ET7 is equipped with a 480 kW twin-engine drive system and is powered by a battery that can move up to 150 kWh.

NIO describes the ET7’s electric drive:

“The ET7 inherited NIO’s high performance DNA with a permanent magnetic motor of 180 kW at the front and an induction motor of 300 kW at the rear. The maximum power is attributed to 480 kW and the torque is 850 N · m. The ET7 accelerates from 0 to 100 km / h in 3.9 seconds and has a braking distance of 100 km / h of 33.5 m. With a drag coefficient of 0.23 Cd and the application of the 2nd generation high-efficiency electric drive platform with silicon cemented carbide, the energy efficiency is further improved. With a 70 kWh battery pack, the ET7 has a NEDC range of more than 500 km, or more than 700 km with a 100 kWh battery. Combined with the new 150 kWh battery, the ET7 boasts a NEDC range of more than 1,000 km. ”

The 1,000 km (621 miles) range is based on the NEDC cycle, which is known to be rarely representative of actual driving.

With 150 kWh of energy capacity and an efficient design, the ET7 is likely to reach more than 500 miles on a single charge.

Apart from the drivetrain, the ET7 is also impressive for the extensive autonomous driving equipment.

NIO says the electric sedan is equipped with 33 sensors and 4 Nvidia Orin chips:

“NIO has built the NAD autonomous management capability with full stack, including perception algorithms, localization, control strategy and platform software. NIO Aquila Super Sensing features 33 high-performance sensor units, including 11 8MP high-resolution cameras, 1 ultra-expensive high-resolution LiDAR, 5 millimeter wave radars, 12 ultrasonic sensors, 2 high-precision positioning units, V2X and ADMS. Aquila can generate 8 GB of data per second. NIO Adam has 4 Nvidia Orin SoCs with a total computing power of 1,016 TOPS. ”

The company was able to integrate so many sensors neatly without affecting the design too much:

NIO unveils impressive autonomous electric car with a massive battery pack

The ET7 has a price range of RMB 448,000 (~ $ 69,000 USD) before EV incentives and is also offered under the NIO’s Battery-as-a-Service (BaaS) model, which offers a cheaper price and a monthly cost for battery pack.

Furthermore, NIO follows a Tesla-like approach when it comes to autonomous driving ability.

It offers security features that are enabled by their autonomous management technology as standard features, but it calls for autonomous management features, which are offered as a subscription.

Deliveries are expected to begin in Q1 2022.