Can BYD really Build Your Dreams? E6 hits the market
Updated front grill for 2012
BYD’s e6 personal edition hit the market in Shenzhen on 26 October after a 17-month stint in the Shenzhen taxi fleet. If everything goes well, the e6 will become a milestone of electric cars the world over, because of its range of 300km, and BYD will successfully build our dream – BYD is short for Build Your Dream. But can everything go well?
BYD is (at least, was) famous for its cheap cloned cars. For instance, a Corolla-based F3 only costs 50,000 RMB (€5.6k), but this time, the e6 is priced extremely high – 369,800 RMB (€41.3k, $57.9k, £36.2k). With 370,000 RMB in China, you can buy an Audi A6 2.0 TFSI, or a Chevy Volt AND a Dodge Caliber in the US, or a Nissan Leaf AND a Nissan Juke in UK. Considering the poorer brand image, few people will choose this car, even if in some big cities, the buyers can obtain up to 120,000 RMB (€13.4k) subsidies from central government and local government.
Does BYD really want to compete against Audi and other luxury brands? Of course no, but consumers have to pay the price for the 300-km range. Although the unsearchable carmaker did not disclose the specific capacity of the battery, it is unlikely less than 45 kWh, which means the battery may costs about 150,000 RMB (€16.7k) alone. This is why all electric cars refused large battery and reasonable range, except some luxury sports cars, like Mercedes SLS E-Cell and Tesla Roadster.
BYD provides e6 with many leading intelligent equipments to increase e6’s whole value so that it also reduce the percentage of battery price, even remote control and telematics are included in the configuration table. BMW also provide i3 with carbon fiber cabin to increase the whole value, but BYD’s brand image should be improved first.
In a word, BYD e6 builds a good dream for us, but it is too expensive. It may be a milestone of electric cars, but cannot be a best seller like the F3 and S6.
More significantly, when can we buy a real e6? BYD F3DM was launched 3 years ago as world’s 1stextended range electric car (with a 1.0L engine), earlier than the Chevy Volt, but we still cannot buy one in most cities of China. The e6 has launched for the city of Shenzhen now, we hope it will be sold in more cities as soon as possible as there is a potential demand for electric cars all over China.
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Pretty obvious they priced themselves out of their own market and into a market they can’t compete in. Even with the discounts available there are much better cars and what Chinese person wants to spend that much to drive a BYD. We all know that for Chinese driving a BYD is below what is acceptable to anyone that can afford to buy this car.
you forget to mention the gas and maindenes savings so the cost will be 50% less and more
Most people are going to factor in the hassle of needing a place to plug it in. That easily wipes out thinking of any cost savings. Who worries much about how much fuel you are using once you are spending that much. Do you think anyone buying an Audi or BMW cares that much about fuel savings?
Launch was expected in August of 2010 but a report last December indicated a delay until June 2011 due to a lack of charging stations available. Now that they are finally out can we assume that charging stations are plentiful?
The planned launch of the e6 in California apparently has been delayed once again. Perhaps BYD wants to have a look at its track record in China first.
As for that costly battery, it weighs about 802kg(1764lb) for an overall 2273kg (5000lb) weight of the vehicle.
Actually, the battery size has been released. It is a 67.7kwh battery. Huge
Really？I did not see the official figure. 67.7 will be the largest for passenger cars in the world. It can drive a mid size bus!
My opinion of Chinese consumers based on my contact with them is that they are too brand conscious for their own good. They are only patriotic on the “media surface” but deep inside their souls (if they have any left, since communism erased most of them) they all wish to be foreigners (can’t blame them). Look at the Koreans (they kept the Confucian tradition); they will always buy Hyundais and KIAs even during time when these cars were simply garbage. Due to the sincere patriotic support from the Korean people, Korean companies like Hyundai and Samsung are now successful. They irony today is that foreigners (like Warren Buffet) believes in BYD more than the Chinese people themselves. How sad.
@ Falcon
> they will always buy Hyundais and KIAs even during time when these cars were simply garbage. Due to the sincere patriotic support from the Korean people, Korean companies like Hyundai and Samsung are now successful.
It wasn’t the consumer patriotism that led Korean consumers to buy Korean cars; it was the market protectionism that protected young Korean auto industry while they were weak. The protectionism was only lifted after the local automakers were strong enough to compete with foreign automakers directly.
This process will not be repeated in China because foreign automakers are already in China dominating over Chinese domestic market. Like the old saying, the best form of defense is offense, and the foreign automakers decided to protect themselves from the Chinese threat by bringing the war to China.
So blame it on the communist party for letting the foreign automakers take over Chinese domestic market.