SHANGHAI/SINGAPORE, May 15 (Reuters) - Chinese electric

vehicle maker Nio on Wednesday launched the first

vehicle in its new lower-priced brand Onvo which aims to compete

there with Tesla's Model Y, the world's best-selling

EV.

Nio unveiled the Onvo L60 SUV with a sticker price starting

from 219,900 yuan ($30,476), 12% below the price of Tesla's

Model Y which starts at 249,900 yuan in China. Nio plans to

start delivery of the Onvo L60 in September.

Chief executive William Li introduced the Onvo L60 SUV in

Shanghai, saying the company also aimed to take on Toyota

Motor's ( TM ) RAV4 by providing family cars that balance

customer experience and ownership costs.

"RAV4 and Model Y were the benchmark for family cars in their

time. With technologies evolving and people's understanding in

smart EVs deepening, today it's time for us to redefine the new

standards for family cars," Li said at the event.

The vehicle is more spacious than Tesla's Model Y, he added.

With a lower price tag, the Onvo brand could also help Nio

expand outside China, although branching out into Europe is

overshadowed by an ongoing anti-subsidy probe the EU has

launched into EV imports from China.

The Onvo L60 is equipped with Nio's self-developed 900-volt

fast-charging system and has an average energy consumption of

12.1 kilowatt-hours (kwh) per 100 kilometers, slightly lower

than Tesla's Model Y, said Ai Tiecheng, president of the Onvo

brand.

The Onvo cars will have access to more than 1,000 battery

swapping stations and 25,000 public chargers belonging to Nio,

Ai added.

Li said previously that the bill of materials of the Onvo

car would be 10% lower than that of Tesla's Model Y, according

to Chinese media. Its lower cost, together with Nio's EV battery

rental programme, would allow it to better compete at a lower

price.

Reuters reported last week that Nio has struck a deal to

source batteries from BYD for the Onvo lineup, as it

abandoned plans to produce batteries in-house as part of the

efforts to reduce costs amid a bruising price war in China's

ultra-competitive EV market.

Nio, whose namesake lineup is priced from 298,900 yuan

($41,200), around 30% higher than the Model 3 in China, sold

45,673 EVs in the first four months of this year, accounting for

3% of China's overall EV sales.

By contrast, Tesla delivered 163,841 units in China to take

an 11.4% market share, according to data from the China

Passenger Car Association.

($1 = 7.2155 Chinese yuan renminbi)