The state-backed mobility platform has national scale and a rare profit, but its razor-thin margins and heavy reliance on aggregators could scare off some investors

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Key Takeaways:

  • Lingxing Technology has filed for a Hong Kong IPO, reporting it generated 17.1 billion yuan in revenue last year but just 7.4 million yuan in profit
  • The company is China's third largest ride-hailing platform by order volume, but most of its business comes from aggregators such as Amap and Tencent Mobility Services

Nanjing Lingxing Technology is driving into an increasingly crowded capital market for ride-hailing companies with its new Hong Kong listing application, as the sector's easy-growth days move increasingly into the rear-view mirror. Its filing last week follows a run of similar listings and applications by names including Dida (2559.HK) and Chenqi (9680.HK) in 2024, CaoCao (2643.HK) last year, and a pending application from Xiangdao, also known as EnjoyGo, which is backed by auto giant SAIC Motor.

And, of course, there's DiDi Global, the industry heavyweight that dwarfs all of these smaller players, which briefly flirted with a Wall Street listing and is widely expected to throw its hat into the Hong Kong pool at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Despite its late arrival to the Hong Kong listing lane, Lingxing, which operates the T3 Chuxing ride-hailing platform, has a pedigree that few Chinese ride-hailing companies can match. The company was founded in 2019 by three major state automakers — FAW, Dongfeng Motor and Changan Auto. It's also backed by internet giants Tencent and Alibaba, and is now China's third largest smart mobility platform by order volume, according to its listing document.

It was operating in 194 cities at the end of last year, had 234.5 million registered riders and 1.4 million registered vehicles. And it handled 797.2 million orders in 2025, with 18.9 billion yuan in gross transaction value (GTV).

But the IPO filing also shows why investors may balk at this latest ride-hailing listing. Lingxing's revenue rose to 17.1 billion yuan ($2.5 billion) last year, but its profit was just a tiny fraction of that at 7.4 million yuan, implying a razor-thin net margin of just 0.04%. That works out to less than 0.01 yuan in profit per ride, based on its 2025 order volume.

The real threat: aggregator power

The bigger question is whether Lingxing's powerful backers translate into a durable edge in a market still dominated by DiDi and increasingly shaped by aggregating platforms. These platforms include Alibaba's Amap and Tencent Mobility Services, which field ride requests across multiple operators.

Aggregators can help second-tier platforms like Lingxing reach users without the heavy costs of building up and promoting their own apps. But they also weaken direct customer relationships and add another layer of fees. Lingxing's filing shows aggregator orders were already high at 61.5% of its total in 2023 and rose even higher to 85.9% in 2025. In practical terms, that means Lingxing has built up a large operation, but most riders now reach it through someone else's front door.

That dependence has a clear price tag. The company's sales and distribution expenses rose 20.4% last year to 1.53 billion yuan, with channel service fees paid to aggregators making up the overwhelming majority of that. The company warns its margins could suffer if aggregator platforms become more concentrated or raise commissions — a blunt admission that its key growth channel is also a key financial risk.

Regulation threat

There is also a shareholder overlap that is at once advantageous but also awkward. Tencent and Alibaba remain investors in Lingxing, while their ride aggregating platforms are major gateways for its ride orders. That means the same internet giants that helped Lingxing reach its current scale are also a key part of its business model, creating a lucrative but also uneasy relationship.

The uneasiness owes to the potential for government intervention in this cutthroat sector where both private and state-run companies vie for business. Regulators are paying closer attention to aggregators and their relationships with operators on their platforms, including the fares they charge, driver income, order tracing and handling of emergencies. In the current climate where combating anti-competitive behavior is a high government priority, regulators could also look into unfair advantages companies like Lingxing may receive due to its relationships with Tencent and Alibaba.

DiDi remains the industry benchmark that makes Lingxing – and just about everyone else in China's ride hailing sector – look small by comparison. DiDi's China mobility business handled 13.7 billion transactions and generated 333.8 billion yuan in GTV in 2025 — more than 17 times Lingxing's order volume and GTV.

That gap suggests Lingxing's real challenge is less about catching DiDi and more about proving there's room for a profitable "second tier" of companies beneath the industry giant.

A more relevant publicly traded comparison is CaoCao, the Geely-backed ride-hailing platform that listed in Hong Kong last year. CaoCao's revenue grew 38% last year to 20.2 billion yuan — far faster than Lingxing's 6.2% growth. Yet CaoCao still posted a 613.6 million yuan net loss, even though its adjusted profit turned positive in the fourth quarter.

These two companies offer investors two versions of the same uphill story. CaoCao looks more aggressive, with faster growth and a clearer strategy of operating its own vehicle fleet. Lingxing looks more disciplined, having reached the full-year profit milestone first. But its initial profits are so thin that higher incentives, compliance spending or technology investment could easily push it back into the red.

Riding into robotaxis

Robotaxis feature prominently in Lingxing's prospectus, reflecting the reality that traditional ride-hailing remains a low-margin business and robotaxis offer the potential for greater profitability due to far lower labor costs. The company says more than 300 robotaxis were connected to its platform at the end of 2025, with road tests taking place in Nanjing and Suzhou. It also highlights its Lingxing Qianmo vertical large model and a dispatch system designed to coordinate human-driven vehicles and robotaxis.

But Lingxing is hardly the only ride hailing company with a robotaxi story. CaoCao is leaning on its Geely's connections to develop purpose-built robotaxis, and DiDi has its own autonomous-driving program. Then there are pure-play robotaxi operators like Baidu's (NASDAQ:BIDU) (9888.HK) Apollo Go, Pony AI (NASDAQ:PONY) (2026.HK) and WeRide (NASDAQ:WRD) (0800.HK), which increasingly look like direct competitors to the traditional ride hailing companies.

Lingxing's edge

Lingxing's edge may lie in its national scale, elite shareholders, newly profitable status and clear place among China's largest ride-hailing platforms. But it is still far smaller than DiDi, growing more slowly than CaoCao, increasingly dependent on aggregators, and still searching for a technology story to truly differentiate itself from its peers.

For investors, the key question is not whether Lingxing can process hundreds of millions of rides — it already can. Instead, the question is how the company will fare in the face of its near-total reliance on aggregators, tightening regulatory oversight, income pressure from its drivers, and high costs associated with a robotaxi future that everyone is chasing.

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Benzinga Disclaimer: This article is from an unpaid external contributor. It does not represent Benzinga’s reporting and has not been edited for content or accuracy.