Vietnam EV pioneer VinFast gets $1.23 bln from parent company, chairman

Vietnam’s first electric vehicle (EV) maker VinFast said Thursday that it has received VND30 trillion ($1.23 billion) in Jan-Sept 2023 from parent company Vingroup and its chairman Pham Nhat Vuong.

The automaker said in its Q3 financial statement that of this amount, VND23 trillion ($942.6 million) was disbursed by Vingroup and VND7 trillion ($286.9 million) donated by the group’s billionaire chairman Vuong.

The disbursement was part of the funds committed to VinFast in April by Vingroup and its chairman. Vuong pledged to donate $1 billion and said Vingroup would provide a non-refundable grant of $500 million and a $1 billion loan for a maximum period of five years.

VinFast, listed on the U.S.’s tech-heavy Nasdaq as VFS, also disclosed that in the next six months, it expected an additional VND12 trillion ($492.3 million) in non-refundable funding from Vingroup.

Per a recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), two Vingroup shareholders owned by Vuong - Asian Star Trading & Investment and Vietnam Investment Group (VIG) – will donate all net proceeds from selling 46 million VFS shares to the automaker.

VinFast thus expects to receive at least VND29 trillion ($1.19 billion) in the next six months.

The company’s EV deliveries have skyrocketed since the second quarter of this year. In the third quarter, it delivered 10,027 electric cars and 28,220 electric motorbikes, up 5% and 177% quarter-on-quarter, respectively.

The automaker also recorded more positive sales in September in the North American market, especially Canada.

In its Q2 filing with the SEC dated September 21, VinFast revealed that its largest buyer was Green and Smart Mobility (GSM) – a provider of EV rental and electric taxi services founded by tycoon Vuong in March this year.

GSM had received about 7,100 electric cars from VinFast by the end of the second quarter. It also signed an agreement to buy 200,000 electric motorbikes and 30,000 electric cars from the automaker.

VinFast's total Q3 revenues topped VND8.25 trillion ($342.7 million), up 4% from Q2 and 159% over the same period last year. EV sales accounted for VND7.7 trillion.

The automaker reported a gross loss of VND2.47 trillion ($102.4 million) in Q3, for a gross profit margin of minus 30%, an improvement from the previous quarter.

In its Q3 financial statement, VinFast also announced plans to expand operations to at least 50 new markets globally by the end of 2024. In particular, it will build an EV assembly factory in India, the world's third largest automobile market, with an expected investment capital of about $150-200 million and a capacity of 50,000 vehicles per year in the first phase.

In the U.S., as of September 30, VinFast had received letters of interest or applications from 27 dealers with more than 100 sales points across states such as Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Virginia, New Jersey and Arkansas.

Also in Q3, the automaker added 10,000 charging stations in the North American market, bringing the total charging ports for VinFast vehicles there to more than 107,000.

"We have many big plans and ambitions to build a green future for humanity. The successes achieved in the last two quarters are just the first step. The board of directors has come up with a feasible action plan for every step forward so that VinFast can accelerate as quickly as possible to become a global company," said Le Thi Thu Thuy, Global CEO of VinFast.

VFS shares closed Wednesday’s session at $8.05, corresponding to the EV maker’s market cap of nearly $18.8 billion.