(Yicai) Sept. 2 -- Leapmotor ranked as the best-selling Chinese electric vehicle startup for the sixth consecutive month in August, but remains off track of its annual sales target.

Leapmotor delivered 57,066 cars last month, up 14 percent from July, according to figures released by several EV startups yesterday. Zeekr, the premium electric vehicle unit of Geely Automobile Holdings, ranked second after its deliveries rose 1.5 percent to 44,843 units.

Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance, the smart car alliance under Huawei Technologies that includes Aito with Seres Group, Luxeed with Chery Auto, Stelato with BAIC BluePark Energy Technology, and Maextro with JAC Motors, saw deliveries drop 6.6 percent to 44,579 vehicles, ranking it third.

Xpeng Motors was fourth after its deliveries climbed 2.7 percent to 37,709 autos. Nio followed in fifth with 31,305 units, a significant increase of nearly 49 percent, surpassing Li Auto for the first time in 34 months, which saw its numbers fall 7.2 percent to 28,529 units, ranking it seventh. Xiaomi took the sixth spot after delivering over 30,000 cars.

Nio topped Li Auto mainly thanks to the release of its large pure electric sport utility vehicle, the Onvo L90, on July 31. Deliveries of the new auto, which start at under CNY200,000 (USD27,995), reached 10,575 units in its first month.

Most Chinese automakers will face challenges in hitting their annual targets. Xpeng is the most likely to achieve its goal after delivering 271,600 vehicles from January to last month, which is more than 71 percent of its target, meaning that it needs to deliver on average 33,800 units a month by the end of this year.

Leapmotor, which delivered 328,900 vehicles in the eight months ended Aug. 31, is at 57 percent of its annual target. However, the company needs to deliver 62,800 cars in each of the last four months of the year to hit the goal, which is higher than its monthly average so far this year.

Due to the lack of detailed delivery data, Xiaomi is conservatively estimated to have achieved about half of its annual target so far, while the figures for the remaining carmakers are all below 50 percent.

Editor: Martin Kadiev