Seres and Huawei Renew Five-Year Cooperation, Jointly Forming Dedicated AITO Team
nashnova research
Seres and Huawei signed a new five-year cooperation agreement, adding a jointly built dedicated team and exclusive retail model for AITO. This means → AITO is carving itself out of HarmonyOS Smart Mobility's multi-brand system to concentrate resources on sales efficiency.
What exactly is new in this renewal?
The signing took place in Shenzhen on September 30. Yu Chengdong (Huawei's Managing Director and Consumer BG Chairman) and Zhang Xinghai (Seres Chairman) both attended.
The key addition: a jointly built team dedicated to AITO, plus an exclusive retail model for the brand.
However, people familiar with the matter say the team's exact structure still needs to be worked out — the framework is set, the details are not.
Why go exclusive? Where is the money going?
HarmonyOS Smart Mobility runs a multi-brand shared system, but sources close to the platform say well over half of revenue and foot traffic comes from AITO — yet AITO's share of sales resources doesn't match. In plain terms = AITO earns the most but doesn't get the most floor space or headcount.
Dedicated stores can channel showroom space, sales leads, and staff attention squarely onto AITO products. AITO already operates over 400 user centers across more than 200 cities, with delivery and after-sales led by Seres — the retail footprint for exclusivity is already in place.
The pressure on sales-spending efficiency is visible in the numbers: Seres' 2025 selling expenses hit RMB 24.19 billion, up 26.12% year-on-year — outpacing revenue growth of 13.69%. This means → each additional yuan of revenue is costing a rising share of sales spending.
What happened to Seres' profit?
In H1 this year, Seres swung from a net profit of RMB 2.94 billion in the year-ago period to a net loss of RMB 1.72 billion.
The company cited four factors: shifts in product-sales mix, flagship model transitions, rising costs for batteries and chips, and asset impairment charges.
This reflects a reality where AITO's units are moving, but cost-side and expense-side pressure is squeezing margins at the same time.
Is Huawei's technology still in the picture?
Seres holds a 10% stake in Yinwang — Huawei's smart-vehicle solutions platform. AITO will continue to receive Huawei's technology, products, and supply support.
Yinwang provides the intelligent-driving stack, while Huawei's consumer unit participates in product definition, marketing, and retail — two separate layers of cooperation, with the technology layer unchanged.
An earlier adjustment to the partnership model had triggered buyer hesitation: consumers planning to order the AITO M8 and M9 began to waver, worried about Huawei's ongoing R&D commitment and future upgrade support. The new five-year agreement provides a clearer framework on that front.
Does this agreement actually solve the problem?
Just two weeks earlier, the two sides announced that product definition, design, marketing, channels, and service would be led by Seres, with Huawei's consumer unit playing a supporting role. Yu Chengdong also said he would redirect more resources to the other "four worlds" brands.
The new five-year deal adds the dedicated-team arrangement on top of that. In plain terms = Seres takes the wheel but also gets a co-built team with Huawei — a compromise of "letting go and staying tied" at the same time.
Whether the exclusive model can actually lift customer-acquisition efficiency and fix the profit structure remains to be proven by sales data — the framework is signed, execution is what matters.
市场有风险，内容仅供研究参考，不构成投资建议。