There’s a certain irony in the fact that Xiaomi has now gone ahead and hired the person who helped build that system in the first place. Kong Yanshuang, former General Manager of Tesla China and one of the key architects of Tesla’s sales and brand expansion strategy in the country, joined Xiaomi in early March. She’ll be replacing Li Xiaorui as head of Xiaomi Auto’s sales division, currently navigating a transitional period.
As Regional General Manager, she oversaw the expansion of service centers across Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and lower-tier markets, engaged regularly with media on Tesla’s performance and strategic milestones, and played a central role in shaping the kind of structured, data-driven retail culture that China’s EV market now treats as the gold standard. In May 2024, following an internal reshuffle at Tesla, she transitioned to lead sales for the Shanghai region.
The timing matters. Xiaomi spent its first years obsessing over product and brand, which is fine until you realize that someone still has to actually sell the cars. A senior Xiaomi dealer told Jiemian News that the front-line sales team suffered from high turnover.
That started changing in November, when the first wave of Tesla alumni arrived. The shift toward process, data, and structured people management reportedly produced a measurable improvement in front-line sales performance. Kong’s appointment is the logical next step, bringing in the person who ran the entire operation rather than just parts of it.
The commercial backdrop gives this move real urgency. The new Xiaomi SU7 cleared 15,000 orders in 34 minutes at launch and surpassed 30,000 confirmed orders by March 23rd. Explosive demand is a good problem to have, right up until the initial surge flattens and the business needs a repeatable sales engine rather than a viral moment.
Building that engine, it turns out, requires someone who’s already built one before. Tesla’s loss, Xiaomi’s gain, and a reminder that in China’s EV war, the talent market is its own kind of battleground.
