Aiways

Electric vehiclesChina

New to Unitard

💀 Dead / Bankrupt

Peak $1.59 BillionToday

~-100%

from peak

🦄
Became a unicorn
2018
📈
Peak valuation
$1.59 Billion ’18
💔
Became a Unitard
2023
💸
Last valuation
Wiped out

Capital raised

$792M

Total raised

$336K/day

Raised per day

Total raised averaged per day over approximately 6.5 years from founding to bankruptcy or shutdown. This is not measured cash burn. Methodology

Funding: Crunchbase roster

Current status

Ceased China operations amid insolvency (2023–24); production halted, salaries unpaid, Shanghai HQ lease terminated

The rise & fall

6 moments · 2017–2024

The key moments.

Feb 2017

Founded in Shanghai

Another contender in China's EV gold rush, with Tencent, CATL and Didi eventually on the cap table.

CB Insights

2018

Unicorn out of the gate: ~$1.59B$1.59B

A year after founding, Aiways joins the unicorn club at what proves to be its all-time high.

CB Insights

Jan 2021

Chases $2B, comes up short

Reportedly seeks new money at a $2B valuation; despite roughly $1.4B raised over its life, real traction in China's brutal price war never comes.

Yicai

2023

Production halts — joins the Unitard Club 💔

Salaries go unpaid, the Shanghai headquarters lease is terminated, and what's left of the company retreats toward Europe.

Caixin

2024

On the brink of bankruptcy

By early 2024 Aiways is effectively finished — one more second-tier casualty of China's EV shakeout.

Caixin

$1.59Bof peak value erased · 6 years

How it happened

Aiways was a Tencent-, CATL- and Didi-backed Chinese EV startup that became a unicorn in 2018 at about $1.59B and was reportedly seeking funds at a $2B valuation in early 2021.

After raising roughly $1.4B it never gained real traction in China's brutal price war: production halted and salaries went unpaid in 2023, it terminated its Shanghai headquarters lease and retreated toward Europe, and by early 2024 it was on the brink of bankruptcy — effectively ceasing operations as one of the many second-tier casualties of China's EV shakeout.

Source: Caixin / Yicai / CB Insights (unicorn 2018 at ~$1.59B, sought $2B Jan 2021, raised ~$1.4B from Tencent/CATL/Didi; production halt and unpaid wages 2023, brink of bankruptcy 2024)

Founders

Fu Qiang
Co-Founder / President (later CEO)
No public profile matched
Gu Feng
co-founder & CEO (ex-CFO of SAIC Motor)
No public profile matched

Disclosed investors (7)

Historical funding participation; lists may be incomplete and do not establish current ownership or investor losses.

* Lead in a funding round · Crunchbase ↗ · 2026-10-13 · Methodology · Leaderboard