Sokon or Seres. Complicated path of the Zhangs
Chongqing Sokon Industry Group manufactures vehicles and components and strongly promotes its own electric vehicles. Sokon works for two countries, the USA and China, and distributes the products of its labor around the world. The family of founders and owners of Sokon is now headed by Zhang Xinghai, a powerful businessman and winner of many awards such as ‘Outstanding Builder of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics’. So what does the electric vehicle manufacturer Seres have to do with it? We have decided to take a closer look at the complicated path of the Zhangs and share everything we know with you.
SF Motors, an electric vehicle start-up owned by the Zhang Xinghai family that owns Sokon, is now known as a manufacturer of electric vehicles under the Seres brand.
Success story
Just like the majority of today’s Chinese automakers, Sokon started its journey with producing home appliances. The company was then called Chongqing Baxian Fenghuang. Next, the enterprising Zhang family switched from household appliances to the production of automobile and motorcycle shock absorbers for the Chinese and Japanese markets. Considering the fact that shock absorbers sold particularly well, the company, renamed Chongqing Yu’an Shock Absorber Company, focused solely on the production of these automotive components in 1996. With production volumes of more than 1 million shock absorbers per year, the company was renamed one more time to Chongqing Yu’an Innovation Technology (Group).
Sooner or later, Chongqing Yu’an had to move on to vehicle production. Every Chinese manufacturer does it. That moment came in 2002, when XGJAO Motorbyke was founded to produce motorcycles for not very rich young people. And in the same year, Chongqing Yu’an managed to conclude an agreement for the licensed assembly of the LCV of the powerful Suzuki brand in SKD format. In 2003, Chongqing Yu’an entered into a joint venture with Dongfeng, Dongfeng Yu’an Automobile, which launched its own Dongfeng Yu’an K-Series two years later.
In 2007, following the restructuring, the entire industrial group was named Chongqing Sokon Automobile Co., Ltd. TM Yu’an brand was dedicated only for the production of shock absorbers and components, whereas TM Dongfeng Sokon (DFSK) was focused solely on vehicle production. At the same time, the Zhangs, in a desperate attempt to conquer the United States, founded the electric vehicle startup SF Motors, bought out AM General, and opened two e-car development centers.
In 2018, Sokon bought DFSK from Dongfeng, becoming its sole owner, and Dongfeng bought a 26.01% stake in Sokon. Thus, the information indicating that Sokon is part of Dongfeng is unreliable. The cunning Zhangs keep control of their brainchild, and Dongfeng is the majority shareholder. However, Sokon electric vehicles may be promoted as those related to Dongfeng, since the Chinese auto giant is known to many, but who knows Seres? Speaking of Seres…
Zhangs and others
Founded in 2016 in the USA, SF Motors is now called Seres, headquartered in California, with the main production facility located in China, but there are also production facilities in the USA (by the way, the former Hummer plant), which makes Sokon unique among Chinese electric vehicle makers. In 2016, Tesla co-founder Martin Eberhard joined SF Motors as a strategic advisor. A year later, SF Motors announced the acquisition of InEVit Inc., an electric vehicle battery startup founded by Eberhard in 2016. Martin is a great engineer. He was the first CEO of Tesla and the developer of the general basic principles for creating electric vehicles.
But, as is often the case, he is known through the media as a troublemaker who has come into conflict with Elon Musk, who is a ‘king’ for a huge number of supporters of technological progress. And the media continue to exaggerate this legend when it comes to inviting Eberhard to Sokon. Well, it should be responsibly stated that the conflict between Eberhard and Musk has nothing to do with the Chinese company Sokon, since it ended in 2009, when Sokon was not involved with any electric vehicles. And Eberhard was hired by Sokon not because he is allegedly an opponent to Musk, but because he has a huge extraordinary experience in building electric vehicles. By the way, Eberhard remains a shareholder of Tesla and, on occasion, supports this brand in every possible way.
In addition to hiring outstanding American professionals, Sokon also works with leading Chinese companies, the most important of which for Sokon’s objectives is Huawei. An agreement with Huawei to develop information technology and software for electric vehicles was signed in 2019. Thanks to the experience of Eberhard, Seres introduced its two first electric vehicles in 2018: the SF5 (compact) and SF7 (mid-size) SUVs. In 2021, Seres released an updated SF5 (in collaboration with Huawei, so the car is sometimes listed as Seres Huawei). And in 2022, the manufacturer introduced another electric vehicle, the Seres 3 EV SUV.
