Aug. 13 (NBD) -- Reports have emerged that Nio, a Chinese electric-vehicle startup backed by Tencent Holdings Ltd., will submit the S-1 file, the initial registration form for new securities required by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for public companies, in September this year, expecting to raise more than 2 billion U.S. dollars through the IPO. 

The carmaker, as always, declined to comment on the reports. 

Rumors about Nio's U.S. IPO began surfacing in December 2017. Two months later, word came that the company has hired investment banks including Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse Group, Citibank, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and Union Bank of Switzerland to prepare for its IPO. In April this year, the carmaker was said to have been in talks with Japan's SoftBank Group, and the Japanese conglomerate plans to buy 200 million U.S. dollars worth of shares in Nio's IPO. 

An insider with Nio once told NBD the startup will file for its U.S. IPO this year if everything goes well. 

Louis T. Hsieh, who joined the electric vehicle company in May 2017 as Chief Financial Officer (CFO), is responsible for the company's financing projects and listing-related matters, the insider added. Before joining Nio, Hsieh served as CFO of New Oriental Education & Technology Group and completed the education firm's IPO on the New York Securities Exchange in 2006.

Rumors that keep swirling around the IPO raise concerns about Nio's financial conditions.

A previous report by China Business Journal said the startup has raised more than 15 billion yuan (2.2 billion U.S. dollars) to date. Despite so, the company is predicted to see a loss of 5.1 billion yuan (743.1 million U.S. dollars) this year, due to its high R&D costs and extravagant expenditure in brand building and marketing, according to technology-centric media platform iyiou.

It seems IPO has been Nio's only way to tackle with the increasing capital stress. 

When contacted by NBD, the carmaker's co-founder Qin Lihong said they are doing fine financially. 

However, Tian Weidong, senior consultant in the new-energy industry at Guangzhou-based information technology company WAYS, held that capital is critical to guarantee the car manufacturing of startups like Nio. 

At the opening ceremony of Nio House Shenzhen in early August, Nio's Founder and Chairman Li Bin said the company will definitely be able to deliver 10,000 vehicles this year. This is a response to He Xiaopeng, CEO of another electric car startup Xiaopeng Motors, who said in late July no automotive startups in China could achieve the milestone this year.  

Li even made a bet on this, saying he would lose an ES8 SUV to He Xiaopeng if Nio couldn't reach that milestone.  

Email: lansuying@nbd.com.cn