Henan Derry New Energy Automobile, a Chinese maker of commercial new energy vehicles (NEVs), has secured 700 million yuan ($97.7 million) in a Series B funding round to finance its product development and market promotion, it announced on Wednesday.

The Series B round of the startup, also called Derry Auto, was led by domestic private equity (PE) firm Anshu Capital and Shenzhen-listed lithium battery developer Gotion High-Tech.

The funding was participated by investors such as Hong Kong-listed supply chain solutions provider Huitongda Network; Shanghai-based Classy Solid Asset Management; and Hongjing Drive, a Chinese autonomous driving solutions provider backed by Saudi Aramco’s venture capital (VC) arm Prosperity7 Ventures.

The new financing comes as Derry Auto, which develops, manufactures, and sells new energy-powered commercial vehicles like light-duty trucks and minibuses, is looking to launch a new electric truck model in the fourth quarter of 2023. Its upcoming D05 truck model is expected to offer a load capacity of up to 2,000 kg.

After the public listings of major Chinese consumer-facing NEV and electric vehicle (EV) brands in the past few years, venture investors have shifted their sights to the country’s still young, yet massive, commercial NEV market.

China sold a total of 338,000 commercial NEVs in 2022, up 78.9% from the previous year. The sales volume of NEV trucks last year, in particular, doubled from 2021, according to official data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), a self-regulatory industry body.

Derry Auto was founded in July 2017 with the goal to offer a suite of commercial NEVs dedicated to “fulfilling the last 50 km of deliveries” in the logistics market. The firm operates from its headquarters in Anyang City in central China’s Henan Province, with a manufacturing plant that has started production since early 2019.

Its latest NEV model D01, which was introduced to the market in late 2022, is a new energy minitruck with a maximum load capacity of 295 kg and a driving range of 120 km per charge. Derry Auto claimed that D01 was the best-selling commercial vehicle in China’s minitruck market in the first half of 2023, accounting for a market share of 49.8%.