BYD's electric hypercar can jump on its own – but why?

BYD has released a new marketing video showing off the technological prowess of its new hypercar, but it’s difficult to differentiate its practical benefits from its tricks and gimmicks.

The U9 electric hypercar, sold in China under BYD’s upscale Yangwang brand, has been shown off performing its unique party piece – the ability to jump.

While the car has previously been seen ‘hopping’ in place and comfortably trundling along on three wheels, this latest video shows it jumping over various obstacles at speed while relying solely on its autonomous driving tech with no one behind the wheel.

The video, reposted to YouTube by American-based outlet Carscoops, can be viewed below.

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The U9 is seen to be tackling a straight course dotted with three obstacles. Shots of the car’s interior reveal both front seats are vacant, and its front end then squats before the car quickly accelerates to 120km/h towards the first hurdle 200 metres ahead.

It first approaches a water-filled pothole 2.5m in length, and upon its arrival the car begins its jump by first compressing and springing off at the front, followed by the rear.

Once clearing the pothole the wheels extend down to meet the ground, providing a soft landing after six metres of airborne travel. Those with a keen eye may notice the U9 seems to barely clear the hole with its front wheels, but nevertheless it powers on ahead.

180m later it comes across a set of tyre-popping spikes, each measuring 3.5cm in height. Once again the U9 pops up and comfortably over the obstacle, and a shot of the rear suspension strut compressing is briefly shown.

The car’s final challenge is a four-metre patch of what appears to be coloured dust, which again it clears before leaving a rainbow-coloured cloud behind.

It all looks very impressive, and if nothing else it’s a demonstration of what BYD’s advanced DiSus-X body control system and autonomous driving tech are supposedly capable of.

The result is the U9’s ability to perform a brief vertical jump, though the car is also capable of other manoeuvres like adjusting its own ground clearance at each corner to perform a kind of ‘dance’.

In a car like the U9 any advanced suspension tech almost seems like a non-negotiable, given its quad-motor, 960kW setup is a lot to wrangle. Unsurprisingly, BYD quotes a 0-100km/h time of 2.36 seconds and a quarter-mile drag time of less than 10 seconds.

But beyond the neat party trick and flashy promotional content, the advantage of the tech is difficult to discern beyond being to limp home if you happened to lose a wheel, or clear carpark speed bumps.

For one, the U9 recorded a lap time of seven minutes and 17.9 seconds at the notorious Nürburgring in November last year, but was unable to topple the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra’s outright fastest electric lap of 6:46.87, or the Rimac Nevera’s production electric car record of 7:00.03.

Though the U9’s onboard lap seems to have a limited top speed of less than 280km/h, the extremely advanced suspension doesn’t seem to have provided as much of an advantage for the ¥1.68 million (~A$370,000) hypercar as may have been expected.

It’s not the first time one of BYD’s cars has been packaged with a unique trait. The U8 SUV, which was recently spied in Australia, has the ability to float in deep water for up to 30 minutes despite a hefty kerb weight of 3460kg.

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