(Yicai) Nov. 25 -- Haomo.AI, a Chinese autonomous driving startup backed by automaker Great Wall Motor, has reportedly suspended operations until further notice.

Haomo.AI notified employees on Nov. 22 that they will be on leave from yesterday, Red Star Media reported, citing staff members. The company did not specify the reason for the suspension, nor when operations will resume. The work group chats were muted.

Haomo.AI has nearly 300 employees based in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Baoding. The Beijing staff said in August that the firm had stopped paying salaries, with already two months of arrears.

The prevailing theory among employees about the sudden suspension is that Haomo.AI failed to meet performance targets set in a valuation adjustment mechanism agreement, and litigation resulted in the company's accounts being frozen, the staff members told Red Star Media.

Haomo.AI has not yet publicly responded to the report.

Haomo.AI, formerly a division of Great Wall Motor, was spun off from its Baoding-based parent in 2019. Its business covers passenger vehicles’ intelligent assisted driving, last-mile self-driving delivery vehicles, and smart hardware.

Along with Momenta, QCraft, and DeepRoute, Haomo.AI was among the first Chinese companies to mass-produce Level-2 and above autonomous driving systems.

Haomo.AI has completed seven financing rounds, with investors including Great Wall Motor, Shougang Fund, GL Ventures, and Jiuzhi Capital, reaching a valuation of over USD1 billion. Its most recent fundraiser was in December 2024. Haomo.AI's actual controller is Great Wall Motor’s Chairman Wei Jianjun, with a 37 percent stake.

In October last year, media reports claimed Haomo.AI had suspended its initial public offering plans, which the company denied at the time. One month later, Haomo.AI confirmed to Yicai rumors that it had let go of some employees, calling them normal adjustments to its organizational structure.

Editor: Futura Costaglione