Crash Video of Ideal i8 Sparks Frenzy! Big Wave Car Crushes, and Ideal's Stock Price Plummets with Personal Brand Image Undermined

By | Xinhua News Agency

Recently, Big Wave Car released a series of posters responding to the Ideal i8 crash test event, not only drawing attention to the impact of this incident on the car company but also allowing traditional car companies with 71 years of history and 115,000 car users to "get out" of their usual circles.

As the event unfolded, Ideal's stock price continued to plummet, as of the time of publication, Ideal's Hong Kong-listed shares had fallen by more than 27.3% from this year's high point, causing Li Xiang, the founder of Ideal, to see his personal Douyin account "under attack" and become a battleground for netizens to argue.

A Crash Video Sparks Frenzy!

On July 29th, Ideal held a press conference to launch its first electric SUV, the Ideal i8. At the press conference, Ideal played a video of the Ideal i8 crashing into an 8-ton truck, trying to demonstrate the safety performance of the Ideal i8. The video was quite shocking: two cars collided at a speed of 100 km/h, and the 8-ton truck's four wheels lifted off after colliding with the ideal i8, causing the driver's seat to tilt and the rear cargo area to separate significantly.

In the initial video release, the logo on the steering wheel of the truck was clear and unobscured. This detail allowed netizens to quickly identify the truck as Big Wave Car, which later became a precursor to the subsequent events. As the video spread widely online, people began to wonder about the safety performance of Big Wave Car.

The next day, July 30th, Big Wave Car responded quickly on its official account, saying "we were taken for a ride, and smart people can see right through it." The company also stated that the legal department was handling this matter. Meanwhile, to counter Ideal's crash video, Big Wave Car released a video of its own driver's seat safety test, trying to demonstrate the safety performance of its products.

On July 31st, Ideal publicly responded, stating that the experiment was based on real-life traffic scenarios and was conducted by a professional third-party testing institution (China Automotive Research Institute). Ideal emphasized that the test site, equipment, and randomly purchased test truck were all provided by the testing institution, and Ideal itself did not intervene in any stage.

That day, Nine Financial News reached out to China Automotive Research Institute as an investor and questioned the testing process. The institute's securities department staff responded that the entire testing process was consistent with all regulations and standards and would not be affected by who was the client.

Subsequently, on July 31st, Dongfeng Liuji (the company that owns Big Wave Car) released a statement titled "About a certain brand's infringement of intellectual property rights." The statement clearly pointed out that the behavior of releasing a video of Ideal i8 crashing into an 8-ton truck by a certain car brand (Ideal) constituted serious infringement and far exceeded normal commercial competition. This behavior seriously misled and harmed the public's right to know, causing significant negative impact on Dongfeng Liuji's brand and business reputation.

The event continued to unfold...