BYD Hits 503 km/h 🏎️ Aldi Targets 150 Stores 🛒 China Launches 18 Satellites 🚀

🚀 Headlines

BYD’s electric hypercar breaks 500 km/h in a single-direction run (link)

BYD’s Yangwang U9 Xtreme has become the first production car to exceed 500 km/h, hitting 503.17 km/h (312.66 mph) on a closed Abu Dhabi highway on November 1. The FIA and Guinness World Records recognised the run, which used a 7 km straight and followed overnight tweaks to the rear wing and tyre pressures. The all-electric hypercar delivers 2,220 kW, over 3,000 PS, from four motors, running on a 1,200-volt architecture. Only 30 will be built, with a reported price of roughly USD 3 million each. The record carries an asterisk: it was a single-direction run, whereas traditional top-speed records average two runs in opposite directions.

DeepSeek Flash hits 56 trillion weekly tokens on OpenRouter (link)

DeepSeek’s V4.1 Flash 1017 led OpenRouter’s weekly model rankings with 56 trillion tokens, up 17%. The same variant logged 48.1 trillion tokens last week. Its earlier Flash variant ranked second this week with 17.6 trillion tokens. Together they handled about 73.6 trillion tokens on the platform, with other open-weight models from Chinese developers also among the leaders. OpenRouter counts prompt and completion tokens, and ranks model variants separately. Its model leaderboard measures usage on OpenRouter, not the global AI market, the number of people using each model, or what customers spend.

Aldi doubles pace of China store openings, targeting 150 by year-end (link)

German discount retailer Aldi has doubled the pace of its China store openings, targeting 150 outlets by the end of 2026 after entering the market in 2019. The German discounter expects to open around 60 stores this year, roughly twice the number in previous years. It currently operates more than 70 stores in Shanghai and over 50 in Jiangsu. Aldi is investing heavily in supply chain infrastructure first, having just opened its third major East China warehouse in Nanjing. Its compact 1,000-square-metre neighbourhood stores carry about 2,000 SKUs, over 90% private-label, with a quarter to a third of products priced below RMB 10 (USD 1.49).

Boehringer licenses six cancer programmes from Sino Biopharmaceutical (link)

Boehringer Ingelheim has signed an option and license agreement with Sino Biopharmaceutical (SBP Group) covering six preclinical oncology programs built on antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) and T-cell engager (TCE) technologies. SBP will receive USD 358 million in upfront and near-term payments, with up to USD 7 billion in option-exercise, development, regulatory and commercial milestones, plus tiered royalties of up to double digits. Five programs originate from Shanghai-based LaNova Medicines, a wholly owned SBP subsidiary; the sixth comes from Beijing Tide Pharmaceutical. SBP will lead early development through global Phase 1. Boehringer may then exercise options for rights outside mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau for four programs, and worldwide for the remaining two. The deal is the companies’ second oncology partnership since April 2024.

Nvidia taps Wuji and Sharpa for humanoid robot hands (link)

Nvidia’s humanoid robot platforms use hardware from China and Singapore. Both of its reference platforms, announced May 31 and October 21, rely on hands from startups with ties to China. The first pairs a Unitree body with Sharpa hands, offering 25 degrees of freedom per hand; the second uses Agile Robots’ body and Wuji’s Hand 2. Google DeepMind’s research lead notes Sharpa’s hand is stronger, while Wuji’s is closer to human size but has the strength of a ten-year-old. Xiaomi is developing its own hand, and Meta has worked with China’s Fourier on a prototype. As hardware, especially hands, remains the bottleneck, Chinese suppliers are becoming indispensable.