On 19 July, Xiaomi held its CEO, Lei Jun’s fifth annual speech, themed “Courage.” During the event, Lei Jun detailed the journey of Xiaomi’s car manufacturing and introduced new products in the Xiaomi ecological chain. The event garnered significant attention, with 14.89 million people watching the livestream on Douyin, peaking at 510K viewers. On 23 July, another of Jun’s speeches on TikTok’s livestreaming room drew over 100K viewers within the first ten minutes.
Lei Jun dedicated half of his three-hour speech to discussing the story behind Xiaomi’s venture into car manufacturing. According to Jun, Xiaomi’s decision to enter the automotive industry was a strategic move to seek a breakthrough amid the 2021 United States sanctions crisis. Rejecting investment offers worth tens of billions of dollars, Lei Jun chose to self-fund the project, bearing all risks and focusing on developing a pure electric car. Over three years, he personally test-drove more than 170 cars and other vehicles, obtained a racing licence, and demonstrated his commitment by showcasing his drifting skills.
The grounded speech style resonated widely, making the Weibo topic #Lei Jun Annual Speech# amass nearly 10.44 billion views and sparking other popular topics like #Lei Jun Racing Licence# and #Lei Jun Drifting Video#.
During the conference, Lei Jun emphasised that Xiaomi’s SU7, is on track to meet its annual target of 100K units by November this year, thanks to recent capacity debugging and enhancements. The SU7 went from being relatively unknown to a phenomenal product in just six months. The Xiaomi SU7 Ultra prototype was also unveiled, set to challenge the world’s most difficult track, Nürburgring, and compete with top performance car companies globally.
Different platforms focused on various aspects of the Xiaomi launch and Lei Jun’s narrative. On Weibo, discussions centred on new products, examining everything from phone performance and product texture to pricing and design. Zhihu (China’s Quora equivalent) provided a more systematic and comprehensive analysis, focusing on sales, technology, product profitability, and cost-effectiveness. Douyin (China’s TikTok) and Bilibili (China’s YouTube equivalent) also showed interest in Xiaomi’s new products, with Douyin focusing on price wars and brand competition in the automotive ecosystem, while Bilibili was more concerned with Xiaomi’s intelligent ecosystem.
On Xiaohongshu (RED), content ranged from immersive test drive experiences to compilations of Lei Jun’s inspirational quotes, such as “The courage to break the boat is the key to breaking out of the enclosure.” Young people found these quotes to be valuable lessons for the workplace. Lei Jun’s dressing style also attracted attention, with netizens commenting on his gradient grey or sky-blue suits and casual white shoes, praising his stylish yet relaxed appearance.
At the end of the conference, Lei Jun announced that due to time constraints, there were still many stories left untold, hence the follow up livestream on 23 July. During which, he mentioned the book “Decisive Moments in History,” which inspired the theme of “courage” for his speech. According to statistics, in the first half of 2024, only six Douyin accounts gained over 10 million followers, with Lei Jun’s account being one of them.
Since 2020, Xiaomi’s CEO has given a public speech annually. Xiaomi’s branding aims to create an image of “serving the people,” aligning with Lei Jun’s persona of being sincere, grounded, reliable, and generous. With a precise target audience, well-defined products, and competitive pricing, Xiaomi is well-positioned to achieve strong sales results.
