Collate | Hua Wei

In the early morning of October 18, Pony Wisdom (Pony.ai) officially submitted its IPO prospectus to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and planned to be listed on the Nasdaq with the stock code "PONY", with Goldman Sachs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank and Huatai Securities as its main underwriters. As an "emerging growth company", Pony Wisdom intends to issue no more than 98.1495 million ordinary shares.

The funds raised by the IPO will be used in three areas: large-scale commercialization and market development of autonomous travel services and freight services, including production, sales, marketing, customer service and industry collaboration; Continuous development and investment in autonomous driving technology; Potential strategic investments and acquisitions to enhance the company's technical capabilities and build industrial chain ecology.

Public data show that so far, Pony Wisdom has completed seven rounds of financing, with a cumulative financing of more than $1.2 billion (about 8.6 billion yuan), and its valuation has exceeded $8.5 billion (about 60 billion yuan).

Moreover, the capital behind Pony Wisdom is rich in background, not only Sequoia China, IDG Capital, Five sources Capital, Kunlun Capital, CPE Yuanfeng, Fidelity Capital, Carlyle Investment Group and other investment institutions, but also Toyota Motor, FAW Group and other auto companies, China Merchants Capital and other central enterprises. As well as Saudi New Future City, Canada's Ontario Teachers' Retirement Fund, Brunei's sovereign wealth fund Brunei Investment Authority and so on.

According to the prospectus, before the IPO, Pony Zhixing's largest shareholder was Peng Jun, with a stake of 18.9%, while Toyota, as the second largest shareholder, had a stake of 13.4%.

Two teams, $1.2 billion in three years

In the past three years, Pony Wisdom's revenue has maintained year-on-year growth. The prospectus shows that from 2022 to June 30, 2024, Pony Wisdom has total revenue of more than $165 million (about 1.2 billion yuan). Among them, the operating income in 2022 was $68.386 million and $71.899 million in 2023, an increase of 5.1%. For the first half of the year ended June 30, 2024, operating income approximately doubled year-over-year to $24.72 million.

Source: Pony Zhixing prospectus

According to the prospectus, Pony Wisdom's revenue mainly comes from three parts: Robotaxi self-driving taxi service, Robotruck self-driving freight service, and technology licensing and application services.

Currently, Pony Wisdom operates a fleet of more than 250 autonomous taxis that have accumulated more than 33.5 million autonomous kilometers, including more than 3.9 million autonomous kilometers. In the six months ended June 30, 2024, Pony Wisdom recorded an average of more than 15 daily orders per self-driving taxi.

In addition, Pony Wisdom also operates a fleet of more than 190 robotic trucks, both independently and in cooperation with Sinotrans. Over the course of its commercial operations, Pony Wisdom's fleet of robotic trucks provides long-haul hub-to-hub freight in China, with a cumulative freight volume of more than 767 million tonne-kilometers. At the same time, Pony Wisdom is also working with Chinese truck manufacturer Sanyi Wisdom Forklift to jointly develop level 4 robot trucks.

Pony Wisdom's total operating expenses have been declining in recent years. Its total operating expenses for 2023 were approximately $160 million, down 21% from approximately $200 million in 2022. Total operating expenses for the first half of the year were $74,304,000, down 4.4% from the same period last year.

Source: Pony Zhixing prospectus

In terms of research and development investment, Pony Wisdom has invested $154 million (about 1.1 billion yuan) in 2022, $123 million (about 880 million yuan) in 2023, and $58.725 million (about 420 million yuan) before June 30, 2024.

It is understood that Pony Wisdom, founded in 2016, has set up research and development centers in Silicon Valley, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, while laying out three major businesses: autonomous travel services, autonomous trucks and intelligent driving of passenger cars.

In terms of net loss, Pony Wisdom's cumulative net loss in the first half of 2022 to 2024 was $324 million (about 2.317 billion yuan). In 2023, Pony Wisdom made a net loss of about $125 million, narrowing by 15.5%, and a net loss of $51.775 million in the first half of this year, narrowing by 25.6%.

Starting from Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, it will promote paid robotaxis around the world

In its prospectus, Pony cited data from business consulting firm Frost & Sullivan as saying it was "the first company in China to obtain a license to operate driverless robotaxis in all four first-tier cities, It is also the only self-driving tech company that has received all the regulatory approvals needed to offer a public-facing Robotaxi service in these first-tier cities."

From road testing to on-road operation, Pony Wisdom's self-driving unmanned travel passenger service has now covered four super first-tier cities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and has begun Robotaxi unmanned commercial charges in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen. In June this year, Pony Zhixing announced the opening of Daxing Airport automatic driving connection fee services, using a "price" mechanism, referring to the pricing rules used in urban services, users do not need to pay additional high-speed tolls.

In July this year, Pony Wisdom was the first to obtain the Shanghai driverless intelligent connected car demonstration application permit, on the 205 km route in Pudong, the central city of Shanghai, passengers can book a Robotaxi without a driver through the "pony Wisdom" mobile phone software of the same name.

In addition to constantly improving its own taxi service platform "PonyPilot", Ponypilot is also actively cooperating with travel service platforms to lay the foundation for the roll-out of autonomous Robotaxi products to the city level. On October 14, autonomous driving company Pony Wisdom and travel technology enterprise Autonavi announced a cooperation, pony wisdom self-driving vehicles have been connected to Autonavi integrated travel platform.

Autonavi map App and related small programs first access Pony Wisdom running in Guangzhou Nansha intelligent network car hybrid pilot area of the autonomous driving fleet, when the passenger's travel needs and automatic driving service area timely match, users can check and call the travel service provided by pony wisdom according to their wishes. And the two sides plan to open more cities and regions in the future.

At present, users can experience Pony Wisdom through the mobile software application "Pony Wisdom" and the eponymous Alipay and wechat mini programs, Autonavi map, such as Qi travel and Jinjiang travel public account entrance.

At the same time, Pony Wisdom is constantly pushing its autonomous driving technology and applications to the sea. At present, Pony Wisdom has carried out autonomous driving R&D layout and fleet operation cooperation in many places in China, the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and South Korea. On July 31, Pony Smart also announced a strategic partnership with ComfortDelGro Corporation, a global multi-modal transport operator.

articulation

The pony wisdom to submit the prospectus to the United States, less than a week from the release of Tesla Robotaxi, it can be seen that the global Robotaxi industry is hot. If it can be successfully listed, Pony Wisdom is expected to become the "world's first Robotaxi share."

In August this year, Peng Jun, CEO of Pony Zhixing, introduced its IPO process to Southern Finance in this way: "R&d companies actually need capital support, financing is a win-win situation with the capital market, with the support of capital companies can do better, create more and better products, with better products can get more investor support, this is a positive cycle." We have some approvals and processes for the IPO, and the whole process is also related to the capital environment."

As Peng Jun said, the heat of the autonomous driving industry in the capital market seems to be rising again. Not long ago, Wen Yuan Zhixing, Horizon, Black Sesame and other autonomous driving companies have also opened ipos or ushered in listings.

Reference link:

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1969302/000110465924109475/tm2310344-12_f1.htm