Still essentially in its launch phase, Aion still has big ambitions. We asked Lee if he could give us a brief overview of Aion's UK fleet plans for the rest of this year?

Giddings said: “My role here is to support both retail and fleet channels. I think that's quite important, because if we think about how fleet sits in the marketplace, it's probably quite blurred. So if you take Motability, if you take Salary Sacrifice, take Personal Contract Hire, actually, that's quite a retail mentality, that you're looking at there.

“So from our side, we're not overly fussed around specific sales channels. The key thing for us, and the ethos across the business, our retail network, and the teams, is that we want to ensure we treat all customers fairly, regardless of their funding option.

“Ultimately, all fleet choices, are a funding option. So, we're heavily involved in ensuring it's a sublime customer journey, for anyone that walks in our showroom, or has a car delivered from one of our retailers, or whether we direct supply a car. We want that experience to be exactly the same - via any funding channel.

“For us, we're going to be in every area possible. So, Public Sector, and we’ll be engaged in the broker market as well. You can't ignore the broker market; it’s still an important channel - particularly for awareness and customers looking to go down that journey.

“Salary Sacrifice is of course, a huge opportunity for us, which will naturally engage with. For us, I think it's about awareness at the moment, and building that awareness. We've got a National Leasing Manager in place already, we've also got two regional sales managers. Interestingly, those roles have been created to have a hybrid focus on retail and fleet - which aligns to what I was alluding to earlier, in terms of the whole business is set up to not really focus on one particular sales channel.

“So, I don't have a particular sales target for fleet or retail at the moment. We'll support any channel, but the key thing for us is that customer experience, first of foremost.

“We've seen it in the past: customers leasing through a major funder get a worse showroom experience than private buyers. That's what I'm trying to change. I think it's really important that all our retailers, ensure a completely sublime experience, for the customer.

“We've got our relatively small network at the moment. That will continue to grow throughout the rest of this year, and massively into next year as well. So, it's about having those key local relationships - those key local fleet relationships as well. We have a considerable handing fee payment for our retailers, and that again is just to support that handover message with the customer - which is hugely important, as you can tell.”

With other established Chinese brands already in the UK market, I ask Lee where he sees Aion's fleet opportunity?

Giddings said: “We're going be directly linked with our competitors, maybe the newer brands that we all know of. However, we are a different brand. What we want to do, is ensure we're a sustainable brand, and profitable brand. Moving forward, we also want to protect our residual values, which is going to be incredibly important to us moving forward.

“We've obviously supported by our ‘Great 8 Promise.’ Which is eight-years warranty, both on the car and the battery, eight-years servicing, eight-years roadside assistance, and eight-years MOT cover, as well. So it's that peace of mind, and recognising that we've got absolute trust in our product. Therefore, our customers should, as well.

“That’s our vision, we’ve got to plan up until 2030 at the moment - in terms of the product lineup that we've got coming through, and it's a sensible approach. There are ways to obtain market share, but we don't want to do anything that stresses the product, or the brand.”

We moved on to ask Lee, how he’s going to get the Aion message out to potential fleet customers?

Giddings said: We've attended two or three events already, and we’re continuing to build ride and drive ventures with all the key funders throughout the year.

"We've got a demonstrator programme in place for fleet customers. But, I think the key thing for us, is that awareness piece, and ensuring people experience the product. I’m very confident, once people experience the product, they will be extremely keen.

“That's just part of the role of our National Fleet Manager, myself, and the rest of the team, to deliver that message. We'll be as visible as possible, for the remainder of the year. That will upscale next year as well, with the new product launches that we'll have coming."