Leap Motor reclaims the throne of new energy startups

Author | Chai Xuchen

Editor | Zhou Zhiyu

The first quarter is usually a slow season, and most new EV makers are still hovering in the 30,000–40,000 units range.

However, Leapmotor saw its March deliveries surge back to the top range, recording 50,029 units. In the first quarter alone, cumulative deliveries exceeded 110,000 units, putting it back on the throne of the new EV makers once again.

Break it down: the C and B series have been gradually gaining solid footing, the A series got off to a strong start, the flagship D series is building momentum, and overseas deliveries hit a historical high of 40,000 units in a single quarter. Only by pulling multiple fronts—products, the supply chain, and overseas routes—at the same time could it support this number.

In a time when industry differentiation is becoming more and more obvious, this kind of steady upward trajectory is becoming rare. Looking at it over a longer time horizon, Leapmotor’s growth certainty has not started from today; rather, it has been gradually accumulated through strategic execution over the past year.

Since August 2024, Chairman Zhu Jiangming and core shareholder Fu Liquan have repeatedly increased their holdings, with a cumulative value approaching HK$1.2 billion and a time span of more than half a year. The underlying implication is that the company has entered a new cycle node, and management is willing to run alongside the business with real money.

It looks like Leapmotor is running smoothly and steadily in the second half. But Zhu Jiangming told Wall Street Insights that there are currently 17 (existing) automakers in China that don’t add up to the full list—and the elimination round is still continuing. What Leapmotor can do is to do everything possible not to fall behind, and not to be the one who goes down first from the game table.

Regaining the “50,000-unit” high ground

After February’s traditional slow season, in March Leapmotor’s delivery volume returned to the 50,000-unit plateau, up about 80% month-over-month. Year over year, it also rose 35%. In terms of delivery volume, Leapmotor is still in the first tier among new EV makers.

You should know that in this year’s first quarter, Leapmotor’s monthly delivery volume fluctuated: January and February were 32,059 and 28,067 vehicles, respectively, and it was overtaken in January by Xiaomi Auto.

Just two months later, Leapmotor completed a bottoming-out and rebound. It didn’t need a price war, nor did it rely on a single model to drive volume. The B and C series warmed up across the board; after the A10 was launched, it caught fire immediately, setting the fastest record in Leapmotor’s history to reach 10,000 units in large-amount orders.

On March 30, Zhu Jiangming posted on his social feed the weekend order data from the previous week: 4,394 large-amount orders on Saturday and 4,692 on Sunday, totaling over 9,000 units across the two days.

This isn’t intent—it’s real large-amount order volume, basically equivalent to delivery data. A weekend with more than 9,000 units of large-amount orders means that starting in April, Leapmotor’s sales will enter a phase of explosive growth.

Industry insiders analyzing it say that if production capacity can keep up, Leapmotor’s deliveries in April will return to more than 60,000 units.

But this is only the beginning. Next, Leapmotor will roll out moves in quick succession to capture market share across multiple price bands. The Lafa5-Ultra version and the premium model D19 will both be launched in the second quarter, and the second A-series model, A05, is also already on the string.

As Zhu Jiangming revealed to Wall Street Insights, in the first half of the year Leapmotor will release a new car every month. After that, it will also release two additional cars from the C series and B series. By the first half of this year, it will complete new vehicle launches—“like a train timetable, the release of each car and its arrival are planned.”

Deliveries and product planning are only half the story; even more worth watching are the numbers from overseas.

In the first quarter, Leapmotor exported more than 40,000 vehicles—about 60% of last year’s full-year figure—setting a historical high. Zhu Jiangming said directly that it “far exceeded our expectations.” During the interview, Zhu went on to provide this year’s overseas sales KPI of 150,000 units, more than double last year.

The domestic market has already become a stock-based game. The incremental space overseas is becoming a key metric for measuring a new-energy automaker’s staying power. Leapmotor has clearly moved beyond the trial stage and is entering the channel for scaling up and going abroad.

With new vehicles ramping up sales combined with the overseas peak season, Leapmotor’s second-quarter sales are very likely to rise both year over year and month over month.

Where does the resilience come from for a brand that the market once questioned—“how far can low-end volume really go”? It’s not about a single breakout hit. It’s about a system that is already taking shape.

System-based warfare takes shape

A clear feature of Leapmotor’s growth over the past few years is this: the closer its products get to mainstream price bands, the more obvious its product advantages become. The C11 built a stable reputation in the 150,000 yuan segment; the C10 has been shipping steadily in the family-user market; and the B series formed scalable elasticity in the 100,000 yuan range.

But this year’s change is that products are no longer driven by a single line; instead, a matrix has formed. With the addition of the A10 and D19, the matrix is opening up completely for the first time. This kind of change is not common among China’s new-energy automakers, but it is often the key factor that determines who can enter the next stage of competition.

Right now, the new-energy vehicle industry has a common anxiety: the half-life of the new-car effect is getting shorter and shorter. Once a new car launches, the hype may last only two to three months; then you need the next new car to take over the momentum. As a result, the entire industry is pulled into a “new-car race”—constantly releasing new cars, constantly generating topics, and constantly using marketing budgets to maintain exposure.

A senior executive at a new EV maker pointed out to Wall Street Insights that the problem with this model is that it builds company growth on the premise of “there is always something new to publish.” Once the new-car cadence hits a gap, sales will drop immediately.

Leapmotor took a somewhat different route.

According to the value-for-money rankings from Jelan Road, in the most competitive 100,000 to 150,000 price band, Leapmotor has six models in the TOP 5 at the same time. Among them, the B and C series have been on the market for quite some time and still occupy top positions in their subsegments.

They have not been abandoned by users as time has passed since launch. Instead, they have continued to accumulate word-of-mouth and sales, becoming evergreen trees. This shows that Leapmotor’s products have formed a systemic differentiation effect.

Industry insiders told Wall Street Insights that evergreen trees are more difficult to make than blockbuster hits. “Blockbusters can be achieved through one accurate product definition, an outstanding launch event, and a wave of concentrated placement. But keeping a car at high heat even six months or a year after launch relies on the credibility buildup of product strength, the satisfaction of sales and service, and—most fundamentally—whether the value-for-money can truly stand the test of time.”

The industry often says, “viral influencer-style products are hard to last long.” Leapmotor’s path does the opposite. In Zhu Jiangming’s view, Leapmotor has never been a company that bets on growth by relying on blockbusters. Instead, it steadily climbs by product-curvature, and it reliably reduces costs with its in-house R&D system.

In the early stage, this model means heavier asset investment and a longer payback cycle. But once it runs, the cost advantages it brings are structural—not by squeezing suppliers’ profits to cut prices, but by lowering costs in the R&D and manufacturing process itself.

This explains why Leapmotor can release six cars simultaneously in the extremely competitive 100,000 to 150,000 price band, and why each one maintains a competitive value-for-money position. It isn’t doing a loss-making trade just to earn noise and attention. After technical investment reaches a certain stage, the cost advantage begins to