Xiaomi released its first electric car model SU7 in early 2024. By the end of the year, diplomatic diplomats, investors and guests of other Chinese companies had already begun arriving at the company’s factory in Beijing for one-time trips, but the company has provided standardized experience to the public until 2025, and will not provide three participants for 2025.
But the tour proved very popular, and Xiaomi quickly began to arrange more locations. The company said in July it will offer a tour every weekday and six tours are offered on most weekends, which can accommodate more than 1,100 visitors in total. However, when registrations opened in July, more than 27,000 applications were flooded overnight, so the chances of rushing tickets were still slim, according to Xiaomi App.
Those lucky enough to ensure the attraction can be taken to the exhibition hall first to learn about the famous innovations in Xiaomi’s electric vehicles. Visitors then jumped on the bus and entered three of the six totals to observe the actions of workers and robots.
After that, they can test the ride model Xiaomi SU7 on the racecourse, where trained racing drivers demonstrate how the car accelerates from 0 to 60 mph in just a few seconds. “It feels awesome – quickly grabbed it.” Recently, Xiaomi has also started selling affordable meals on factories and souvenirs to complete the experience.
Another visitor noted that if the shuttle hinders the way the robot is, the shuttle is programmed to do the job with a strict schedule and is therefore more flexible than the human worker. Yuanyuan recalls that after the tour, her daughter said, “I need to study harder or I won’t be able to find a job in the future. It will be robots doing all the jobs.”
Xiaomi’s factory is a classic example of how Chinese companies can go from labor-intensive manufacturing to highly automated manufacturing, thanks to new advances in robotics and artificial intelligence. In recent years, the Chinese government has been vigorously promoting the idea of a “light-out factory” that does not require manual labor, which means machines can work in the dark without anyone turning on the lights. From Foxconn to home appliance giants, companies that have managed to achieve high levels of automation turn their factories into marketing opportunities, inviting humans to marvel at technology rather than work.
Nio is another leading electric vehicle manufacturer in China and has been publicly displaying one of its highly automated factories since the end of 2023. In 2024, 130,000 people visited the factory, and some of the production lines of the factory, such as the Body Shop, were 100% automated, according to a statement sent by the company. Zhang said participants were able to watch three of four production lines when her latest tour group visited Nio’s factory last month. (However, the automotive painting process is excluded from public access.)
