Electric car hopeful Nio closes California office amid layoffsElectric car hopeful Nio closes California office amid layoffs

Chinese electric-car startup Nio announced Thursday that it will close an office in California and lay off 70 workers, according to a report in The Verge.
The layoffs were filed with the California Employment Development Department.
After introducing two new SUVs alongside its high-performance electric sports car, Nio unveiled a new concept for its first sports sedan at the Shanghai auto show two weeks ago. 
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The company closed its office in San Francisco where it employed 20 people and the company also laid off 50 workers at its U.S. headquarters in San Jose.
Nio began trading on the New York Stock Exchange in September, where its stock saw an initial spike, but has since dropped back to below its IPO level.
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In March, it revealed new patented battery cooling technology that cools the bus-bars in the battery and the junction box during fast charging.
Currently, Nio is the only company operating a network of electric-car battery swapping stations in China.
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Nio had plans to build its own auto factory in China, but announced to investors in March that it had put those plans on hold in the face of “uncertainty” after the Chinese government cut subsidies on Chinese cars.  For now, at least, it will continue to have its cars built at a contract-manufacturing facility owned by JAC Motors.
In a statement to The Verge, a Nio spokesperson said, “After four years of rapid growth, we’ve set up a global organization. However, fast development has also posed issues like repetitive functional departments, undefined work tasks, unclear work responsibilities, and insufficient work for certain people. We would like to solve them by optimizing management efficiency this year.”
Correction: An earlier version misidentified the number and location of the job cuts. Those figures have been corrected.

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