The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has just publicly issued the "Notice on Overseas Offering and Listing Registration of MOMENTA GLOBAL LIMITED (Mengteng Zhijia Global Co., Ltd.)". According to the document, Momenta has submitted its application through its domestic operating entity, Momenta (Suzhou) Technology Co., Ltd., with plans to issue no more than 43,754,060 ordinary shares for an overseas listing, specifically on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Other companies that received approval in the same batch include Luxshare Precision, ESWIN Computing, and Stellar Data Technology.

For a Chinese company aiming to list on the Hong Kong stock market, obtaining this registration notice from the CSRC's International Department is a prerequisite for the Hong Kong stock exchange hearing. Securing this approval means Momenta has successfully navigated domestic regulatory scrutiny, leaving only the exchange hearing and the timing of the share issuance before it can officially go public.

Initially, Momenta had set its sights on a U.S. listing. In June 2024, it received CSRC approval to issue no more than 63.3529 million shares on either the Nasdaq or the New York Stock Exchange. However, this approval was never utilized and expired in July 2025.

The strategic shift occurred in the latter half of the previous year. Following the expiration of its U.S. listing permit in June, the company began reassessing its listing options around September. By December, Reuters reported that Momenta had confidentially submitted its application to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. In March of this year, LatePost Auto projected that Momenta's valuation would surpass RMB 100 billion, with plans to list in Hong Kong by 2026. Today's approval transforms the 'listing within the year' from mere speculation into a tangible reality.

This time around, Momenta is positioning itself as the 'pioneer in physical AI stocks'. CEO Cao Xudong has characterized the company as a builder of foundational models for physical AI, leveraging world models to provide a spatiotemporal foundation for this emerging field. In April, its R7 world model achieved mass production and was first unveiled to the public.

However, the competition for this title is intense. In January of this year, when the Beijing Haidian District Financial Bureau announced the listed companies within its jurisdiction for 2025, the accolade of 'pioneer in physical AI stocks' was bestowed upon 51WORLD.

In terms of scale, the majority of intelligent driving companies involve the integration of embodied intelligence and AI. For instance, XPeng and Li Auto have both proposed the fusion of the physical world with AI. Whether Momenta can truly secure investor recognition as the 'pioneer in physical AI stocks' remains an open question.

According to the "2025 Urban NOA Automotive Assisted Driving Research Report" released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers in January this year, from January to November 2025, Momenta deployed urban NOA in 414,400 vehicles, accounting for approximately 61.06% of third-party suppliers and ranking ahead of Huawei's Hi mode. At the SAIC Volkswagen ID.ERA launch event in March, Cao Xudong announced that Momenta's technology had been deployed in nearly 700,000 vehicles and had secured design wins for over 170 models. Its shareholder list is equally impressive, featuring SAIC as its largest automaker investor, along with Toyota, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, Bosch, Tencent, and Shunwei Capital. In 2025, it was also reported to have completed a $1 billion Pre-IPO financing round. In terms of scale, Momenta clearly holds certain advantages.

In contrast, Pony.ai and WeRide, both operating in the same sector, went public but experienced a lackluster debut, with their stock prices continuing to face downward pressure thereafter. The secondary market remains wary of the profitability prospects of autonomous driving companies. Automakers are increasingly utilizing suppliers' technologies while ramping up their in-house R&D efforts, thereby diminishing the pricing power of third-party solution providers. Momenta's financial data in its prospectus has yet to be publicly disclosed, and the full extent of its revenue and losses will only become apparent in the official documents following the hearing.

Cao Xudong's early assertion still looms large over the company: "There are no $10 billion companies in autonomous driving"—either it reaches $100 billion, or it's out. With the Hong Kong stock market gateway now open, the market will ultimately decide its valuation within the year.