BYD Atto 2 EV SUV. (Photo by Sjoerd van der Wal/Getty Images)
BYD, the world’s biggest electric vehicle maker, plans to raise its market share in Europe by building factories there to avoid stiff tariffs while news of its latest technology breakthroughs might persuade doubting customers to embrace Chinese EVs.
BYD’s factory in Hungary will start production later this year with a capacity of 150,000 a year, rising to 300,000. A second one in Turkey with similar volume starts up next year, while the company has said a 3rd factory is on the cards but won’t say where. Somewhere in Germany is the current favorite to avoid the European Union’s extra 17% levy on China’s EVs on top of the regular 10% tariff.
Investment bank UBS said this decision is being debated within BYD because of Germany’s high labor and energy costs.
BYD has announced plans to open a fast-charging system in China, which it says can rival the refueling speed of pumps at gas stations. There was no word when this might be available in Europe. BYD was said to be a laggard in advanced driving assistance systems and autonomous software but recently announced this is now available on some of its cheapest models.
BYD is currently an also-ran in European sales, where SAIC and its MG and Maxus brands led the way with just under 70,000 last year. Geely with Polestar, Smart and Zeekr came second with close to 57,900, the BYD’s 41,000, according to Schmidt Automotive Research. Schmidt expects a big spurt this year with sales more than doubling to over 100,000.
A BYD owner charges his car battery at an EV charging station. (Photo by Lauren DeCicca/Getty … [+]
That compares with market leader Volkswagen’s 413,500 via its own brand, Audi, Skoda, Cupra/SEAT and Porsche, and a share of 21.4%. Tesla was second with 311,600 (16.1%), according to Schmidt.
BYD recently raised $5.6 billion selling shares on the Hong Kong stock market to fund its ambitious export program.
BYD Dolphin Mini EVs are expected to be launched in Europe this year. Photographer: Jeoffrey … [+]
The Financial Times Lex column quoted JPMorgan saying BYD sales in China will rise 30% compared with last year to 5.5 million.
“But its real test lies beyond China, as BYD has set an aggressive export target of 800,000, nearly double last year’s overseas sales – a goal that will require greater global buy-in to achieve,” Lex said.
Investment researcher Bernstein expects success for BYD’s foreign push.
“Overall, we find BYD’s rational for share placement reasonable. We have long been bullish on the company’s overseas potential, as supported by strong volume growth for its EVs and plug-in hybrids across Europe. Latin America and Asia, among other regions,” Bernstein said in a report.
BYD’s new fast-charging technology fills another gap in its portfolio with its ability to add 250 miles of range in 5 minutes, about the same as for an ICE vehicle.
“BYD unveiled its megawatt flash charging technology, that enables EV charging at the same speed as at a gas pump. The technology is based on the new “Super-E Platform” and with the 1,000V and 1,000A architecture, it is capable of a power output of 1,000kW,” Bernstein said.
“We are generally impressed by the fast charging capability, which is an area BYD previously lagged some of its peers. We consider BYD’s rapid, large-scale deployment of flash chargers to be a crucial area of focus, as that is a key enabler of the new charging technology,” according to Bernstein.
MG Cyberster EV two seater (Photo credit CFOTO/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
BYD didn’t say when or if it would be exporting these chargers to Europe.
This expected success in Europe would be bad news for local manufacturers, not least because of Chinese manufacturers’ alleged 30% advantage in efficiency. But it will be made worse by the expected stagnation in sales in 2025.
“We note that with a flattish European market, any market share gain by BYD and (other Chinese brands) implies market share losses for European manufacturers,” UBS said.
