BYD Co. Ltd. (BYDDF) is quietly building a new brand for a market that's exploding in China: ride-hailing fleets. The electric vehicle giant has apparently created Linghui, a sub-brand that takes existing BYD models and packages them specifically for fleet operators and ride-hailing companies.

A New Logo for Fleet Operators

The news surfaced Thursday in a regulatory catalog from China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, where four vehicles appeared sporting an unfamiliar logo and the "领汇" badge, which translates to Ling Hui. Think of it as BYD's way of keeping its consumer brand separate from the cars you'll see flooding ride-hailing services.

The lineup includes rebadged versions of BYD's popular models: the Linghui e5 (based on the Qin PLUS EV), Linghui e7 (Sealion 06 EV), Linghui e9 (Han sedan), and Linghui M9 (Xia MPV). These aren't new vehicles exactly, but they represent BYD's strategic decision to differentiate between cars sold to individual buyers and those destined for commercial fleets.

Why bother? Fleet operators have increasingly adopted BYD's vehicles, and the company apparently wants to maintain some brand separation. After all, there's a difference between someone choosing your car as their personal vehicle and seeing it everywhere as a taxi.

China's Robotaxi Expansion Heats Up

The timing makes sense when you look at what's happening in China's ride-hailing and autonomous driving sectors. Chinese companies are aggressively pushing into international markets, particularly with robotaxis. Baidu Inc. (BIDU)-backed Apollo Go recently partnered with Uber Technologies Inc. (UBER) and Lyft Inc. (LYFT) to bring robotaxis to London.

Apollo Go isn't messing around. The company has become a robotaxi leader, announcing it hit 250,000 rides per week. That's not a pilot program anymore; that's scale.

Meanwhile, Pony AI Inc. (PONY), another Chinese autonomous driving company, signed a deal with Michigan-based Stellantis NV (STLA) back in October to bring robotaxis to Europe through Stellantis's AV-Ready Platform, with deployment planned for next year.

BYD's Linghui brand positions the company to capture fleet demand as this market matures. Whether it's human drivers today or autonomous systems tomorrow, someone needs to supply the vehicles. BYD clearly wants that someone to be them.