Xiaomi Auto (小米汽车) patent spat with county “laotoule” maker ends awkwardly — even a win feels odd

Tiny rival vs. rising star

Xiaomi Auto (小米汽车) found itself in an odd public tussle this month when a small Shandong firm, Shandong Yanlu New Energy Vehicles Co., Ltd. (山东燕鲁新能源车业有限公司, “燕鲁新能源”), filed to invalidate three of Xiaomi’s exterior design patents for bumpers and a headlamp on the SU7. It has been reported that the move came after Xiaomi sued Yanlu for alleged infringement — a familiar tit‑for‑tat seen in IP fights: you sue me, I try to pull the patent rug out from under you. Xiaomi’s SU7 is not a niche product: according to Xiaomi Group’s 2025 report, the company delivered over 410,000 cars last year and SU7 series sales briefly outpaced Tesla in the Chinese market above 200,000 RMB, so the stakes are high.

The legal chess move

Yanlu — listed on business databases with 1,000,000 RMB registered capital and only about 20 employees — makes low‑speed electric three‑wheelers commonly called “laotoule” (老头乐). These county‑market mini‑EVs often mimic luxury styling at a fraction of the cost. Reportedly the company’s factory shows signs of expansion and it holds several utility patents but no exterior design patents prior to this case. Patent specialists called the invalidation bid a defensive counterpunch; Beijing practitioners noted Xiaomi’s design patents had been carefully timed and protected, including what industry sources describe as a delayed or “submarine” publication strategy that concealed the headlamp filing until after market launch. Two days before the scheduled oral hearing Yanlu withdrew its request, issued a public apology and agreed to stop using the contested parts.

Bigger questions beyond the settlement

The episode closed quickly, but it leaves broader questions unresolved. Is this a genuine county‑level challenge, a pressure play to extract concessions, or just another symptom of China’s fraught “homage versus copy” debate in car design — think “Baoshimi” (保时米) and “Falami” (法拉米) memes comparing Xiaomi models to Porsche and Ferrari? It has been reported that experts view exterior‑design disputes as legally demanding and often decided on fine technical differences; internationally, IP scrutiny and trade optics matter increasingly as Chinese EVs push overseas. Even when a headline‑grabbing OEM wins in court or settlement, the cultural and commercial tensions around imitation, rapid productization and IP strategy in China’s fast‑moving auto industry remain alive. Who really set up whom — the county “laotoule” or the headlines — is the question that won’t go away.