According to Huxiu, Aito and Huawei's car business are entering a looser arrangement. On 15 September, Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance (HIMA) and Aito both issued statements clarifying their new co-operation model: Aito remains part of HIMA and Huawei will keep supplying technology, but Seres, the brand's manufacturing partner, now leads product definition, design, marketing, sales channels and service. Existing customer benefits and after-sales service are unchanged, the companies said.
The retail change is concrete. Citing a person close to Seres, the National Business Daily reported that from 1 January Huawei-owned showrooms will be split into two types: stores dedicated to Aito and stores selling the other four HIMA brands together. The 21st Century Business Herald's auto channel quoted insiders as saying Huawei terminal China president Xu Qinsong told staff internally that the authorised operating entity of some Huawei mall stores would switch from Huawei to Seres.
Why the split is being debated
Huawei has four co-operation models with carmakers: a components model; the Huawei Inside (HI) model, which supplies a full hardware and software stack while the carmaker keeps brand and sales; a variant known as the Jing series, with deeper Huawei involvement; and the smart-selection model, now rebranded as HIMA, in which Huawei also takes on product definition, design, marketing and retail. Aito was the first brand built on the smart-selection formula and has often been described informally as a "Huawei car".
Under the new arrangement, Aito stays in HIMA but responsibility shifts back to Seres, a structure closer to the HI model. That has reignited discussion about how much "Huawei content" the brand will retain. One social media post quoted by Huxiu compared the split to "a divorce where the couple still lives together", while another said the two were "separated, but not officially divorced". Comments such as "Aito has fallen out of favour" and "the other four brands are the favourites" have also circulated.
Huxiu notes the controversy is understandable because the market still ties Huawei and Aito together tightly. A Jielan Road study on new-energy brand health found that 66.8% of respondents named Aito when asked which new-energy vehicle brands they associate with Huawei, and 58.4% named it first. The other HIMA brands each scored around 20%, while one of them, Shangjie, scored 10.6%. Among first-batch buyers of the new Aito M9, intelligent driving was cited as a purchase reason by 52.4%, and brand and smart cabin by 43.5% each.
What Seres says
Seres executive Kang Bo stepped in to reassure the market that "Aito will have Huawei's latest, best and most practical technology, products and supply guarantee". For Seres, the new model gives it more autonomy over product and business decisions, while Huawei can concentrate resources on the other four HIMA brands. Still, the public back-and-forth suggests the explanation has not fully settled the debate.
With 1.2 million Aito users, the stakes are high. Huxiu's report, published 36 hours after the announcements, also talked to two owners - one who bought an Aito M6 in August and another who moved from an M5 to an M9 in consecutive years - to gauge whether the changes worry the existing customer base. The fact that both Seres and HIMA have issued public assurances suggests the market needs time to adapt to the new model.
