BYD’s CEO and one of China’s richest men, in a recent interview with China’s Securities Report put forth his belief that BYD are in the progress of catching their second breath in the Chinese market owing to their improved technology, quality and green technology.
At the 2013 Shanghai Auto Show BYD are expected to launch a new generation of green…
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China’s BYD is going out an all out assault on the world EV market, the Shenzhen based company has already spread its fingers out into several key markets but…
The BYD Su Rui Sedan seems to be BYD’s game changing vehicle, the Su Rui was unveiled at the Beijing Auto Show in April this year and launched shortly afterwards with pricing starting at 80,000RMB and topping out at around 120,000RMB. The Su Rui has now become known as the BYD G5 for overseas markets and will soon be exported out of China. In the meantime,…
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Beijing Auto’s B40 SUV has been spotted out many times, it was initially expected to launch towards the end of 2011 but was effectively delayed until the the launch of the company’s own Shen Bao brand late last month at the Guangzhou Auto Show. Shen Bao will be housing an entirely new range of vehicles all of which are thought to be launching within…
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FAW-VW have announced the extension of the joint venture between the two companies ahead of time. The original agreement was due to expire in 2016 but as a show of confidence in the joint venture both Volkswagen and First Automobile Works hammered out a new deal at the recent FAW-Volkswagen advisory board meeting in Foshan, China.
The talks also…
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Reuters automotive reports Fang Yan and Kazunori Takada have dished out the dirt on Chery and their loss making ways. The two reporters discovered that Chery is essentially being kept…
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The three way…
BYD’s Su Rui sedan has a cousin in the BYD Si Rui. The name is similar, and the exterior looks similar too, so what are the differences? We’re not entirely clear if this model is placed above the Si Rui or below it either, but we can tell you that like the Su Rui it is packed with technology. A 12.1 inch screen is the obvious focal point in the center…
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Western companies moving into China usually did so through equity joint ventures, which were the predominant entry mode at least until China’s entry into the WTO in 2001 (Kasperk et al. 2011). This entry mode also facilitates the development of personal relationships or ‘guanxi‘ which is of great importance in conducting business in…
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The Chinese market has some howler brand names, we can point at Roewe, Besturn, Venucia, Ciimo, Everus and now we can welcome CINTURX to the party.
Ford and Mazda produce a wide range of vehicles with Chang’an, but with increased attention on the Chinese market by both companies has lead to greater technology cooperation between the three way tie…
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The JMC Qu Sheng SUV came about in partnership with Ford, the two companies have focused over the past few years on commercial vehicles which has now branched out into SUV’s. The Qu Sheng is not a strong seller, largely due to its high price when compared to better known Greatwall models, but the SUV has received strong reviews from Chinese media. The…
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During the 2008 Olympics Beijing Drivers were asked to toggle their driving based on their license plate numbers with plates ending in odd or even no’s being barred from the roads on alternate days. Beijinger’s being Beijingers simply bought second cars to get around the rule, but in 2012 they cant do that thanks to the license plate lottery that limits…
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The Chinese auto market is made up entirely of individual auto makers, there are the larger state owned companies that have several of their own brands, such as SAIC that owns Roewe and MG and Maxus, and First Automobile Works that owns Xiali, Besturn and Hong Qi, but these companies are shouldering the burden of design and development entirely by themselves,…
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We’re…
From Chicago Tribune:
Government-backed battery maker A123 Systems Inc. backed out of a deal Tuesday that would cede control of the company to a Chinese firm in the wake of mounting political pressure from…
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Dongfeng Auto announced today that it has bought a 70% share in the Swedish engineering firm, T Engineering AB. T Engineering was a spin off from Saab Automobile Powertrain and focuses on developing powertrains for the automotive world.
The original agreement was signed on December 8th 2011 and will see Dongfeng buy 70% of the company in stage one…
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Luxgen’s slow but sure rise to fame is happening in…
Daihatsu is one of those car manufacturers that made massive early gains in the Chinese market only to proverbially piss it all into the wind just as the market began to really open. The Japanese company played upon early warm relations between Japan and China when Japan was all about investing its new found wealth into its former colony, Daihatsu hit…
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Twelve BYD E6 cars are…
Sub brands were the hype at the 2010 and 2011 auto shows, it was brands brands brands brands brands, we’re going to make brands. By the time the 2012 Global Automotive Forum rolled around, automotive directors, CEO’s and consultants were starting to see the strain of maintaining marketing and engineering budgets for multi-brand companies, brands are…
Read More →Youngman and Spyker, once famed for their attempted take over of Saab, have returned to the negotiating table and announced the formation of a new joint venture. In 2011 Youngman received the rights to the Phoenix platform as part of its aborted take over of Saab, the new platform was apparently developed independently of GM and as such Youngman were…
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The Global Automotive Forum is quickly becoming one of the ‘must attend’ events in the Chinese automotive calendar behind the car shows, the two day event is now entering its third year of operation and is improving year after year.
This years forum once again brings international auto industry leaders together in Chengdu, significant speakers have…
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BMW are likely to be readying its ActiveHybrid technology into China later this if these road testing pictures are to be believed, the new 3-Series is on the verge of being aired in China in the next 10 days at the Beijing Auto Show with its new four cylinder turbo engine and its new long wheelbase variant. The next generation of 3-Series is being made…
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You may think that joint ventures…
China’s Ministry of Commerce and the National Reform and Development Commission (NDRC) issued a cryptic statement today stating that support for foreign capital in the auto industry will be with drawn in…
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With Saab’s demise into bankruptcy being confirmed in the week before Christmas the automotive vultures have started to emerge, as with MG-Rover’s death in 2005 multiple parties have emerged expressing an interest in buying the remaining assets of the stricken company. Youngman are expected to receive the lions share, but an outsider – Dongfeng Auto…
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At this years Guangzhou Auto Show Nissan showed off its new…
This article was originally written for Auto.Sohu.com and appeared in Chinese here and in English here. Martin Hayes is the Executive Chairman of AutomotivePR,…
Read More →The Zotye Z300 is Zotye’s latest mid size car, although the car looks like a completely new car it does have some interesting technology under it. Power comes from a 1.5L Mitsubishi engine owing to Zotye’s lack of self developed engine technology, but the platform itself comes from the Lancia Lybra platform, although thankfully the two cars do not share…
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BYD has received a lot of press attention this year and last, largely due to their rapid fall in sales which practically mirrored their massive increase in sales in 2009, but this has not put BYD off the car making game. BYD entered the car business in a similar way to Hyundai in the late 60′s, they had the car making passion but they did not have the…
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Although the automotive market is undergoing a certain amount of change in 2011 Ford have bucked the trend with a 9% increase in year on year sales through the January to October 2011 period. Ford cleared sales of 426,814 units from January to October this year, whilst Ford sales are at 40,857 units in October alone.
The Ford Mondeo continued to…
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The foundation laying ceremony of Toyota’s R&D center, or Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing Center (China), was held in Changshu, Jiangsu province recently.
China’s authorities are not satisfied with Toyota’s development of new energy vehicles in China. Now Toyota has invested $689 million to open its fifth R&D…
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We…
JLR themselves mentioned a while ago that they were looking to produce cars locally in the Chinese market to combat their Germanic luxury rivals, of course this fired up the rumor mill with many people pointing to local manufacturers…
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When it comes to automotive platforms in the Chinese market, Chinese manufacturers seem to run with the ‘waste not, want not’ mantra, this old school train of thought has lead to such legacy models as the Mk2 VW Jetta and the Santana and pretty much every Passat since then to remain in production whilst newer models are introduced alongside. Ford is…
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Zotye have long been the subject to take over rumors, as soon as the yearly automotive mergers and acquisitions rumor mill starts going Zotye are placed somewhere at the top of the list, but the plucky company has so far avoided overtures from major state owned companies they are rumored to be close to be setting up a partnership with Mitsubishi owing…
Read More →From the Inquirer.net via a Philippine media outlet:
Imitation is not only the sincerest form of flattery, it may also be one way of jumpstarting the development of a country’s fledgling automobile manufacturing industry. Examples: Cars built in Japan before World War II were often imitations of European or American models. In the…
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GM have successfully launched their latest brand and first model in Chengdu. The Baojun brand and the first 630 sedan had its first airing at the Shanghai Auto Show earlier this year, yesterday the 630 officially launched in Chengdu. The Baojun brand was created via a three way tie up between Shanghai Auto Industry Corp (SAIC), Wuling mini vans, and…
Read More →Although China has a massive automotive production capacity that makes everything from the compounds that make up tires to the little bolts that hold mud flaps to your car, it has so far failed to produce a unique Tier One automotive supplier that is able to rival the likes of Bosch, Delphi or TRW. Enter BWI or Beijing West Industries, the Beijing based…
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Chinese manufacturers are seeing major growth in the Brazilian car market after their recent entry into the South American country, Chery were the first Chinese car company to make a landing in Brazil but JAC have aggressively followed suit and have grand plans for the market.
Earlier this week JAC’s Vice President was in Sao Paulo where he announced…
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China is the largest car market in the world, but the Chinese automotive industry is far from strong. Few Chinese people want to buy a local brand car if they can afford a foreign branded one.
It is unlikely that Chinese local cars powered by inner combustion engines can catch up with European, American or Japanese cars, so the government thinks a…
Read More →Changchun is the home to First Automobile Works that has partnerships with Mazda, Toyota, Audi and VW, the problem is that although Changchun has become a major automotive production hub it just can’t attract the talent. Now the problem is not that FAW and its partners are paying low money (in fact, I hear they pay well above average) it’s just that…
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Audi will equip all of its locally-made models with mild hybrid technology next year according to an interview with Mr. Dominique Boesch, the GM of FAW-VW’s Audi sales unit., making it the first automaker in China to do so.
The mild hybrid technology can reduce energy consumption by 3-5%, told Mr. Boesch. But they have not made the final decision…
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Fiat’s Global…
This news came via an anonymous tipster early this morning and seems to show that a Beijing based start up may have been able to overcome the issues that have plagued EV manufacturers so far, albeit at a slightly price:
A Beijing startup called Wuhe is making electrode materials and batteries that could lower the cost of electric…
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It was seen here before, but now it’s officially official: BYD and Daimler signed a joint-venture agreement to develop electric car(s) for the Chinese market.
