World Top 10 October 2015

Old and New

Models - Kandi Panda EV #1!

Thanks mostly to another outstanding performance of the chinese market, more than 51.000 plug-ins were sold last month, which not only represents a 8% increase over the last record (48k, two months ago), but also a significant 80%(!) increase regarding the same month last year, pulling the YTD sales to 385k units, meaning that we are headed for some 500.000 units at the end of the year. Yep, half a million EV's in one year, this year.

And to think sales in 2012 were at around 150.000...

Thanks to a booming Chinese market, for the first time since 2010, we see a chinese model claiming the Monthly Best Selling Model, but the real surprise is that it wasn't a BYD model, but a Kandi...The Panda EV, based on the Geely model with the same name, sold 4.581 units, the best performance ever for a chinese model, enabling it to outrun the usual suspects and win the October Best Seller Trophy, while at the same time allowed it to jump to #11 in the YTD chart, only 155 units short of joining the Top 10.

But there were more chinese models to impress in October: The recently landed BYD Tang was #4 (New pb for the SUV), with 3.212 units, the BAIC E-Series was #6, with 2.344 units (Year best), Zotye Z100 / Cloud EV ended in #7, with a record 2.340 units, and finally the once fearsome BYD Qin was #9, with just 2.209 units. All in all, five out of the Top 10 best sellers in October came from China. And foreign manufacturers are still weighing if they should or not start making plug-ins in there...

In other news...Taking the risk of reproducing myself frequently, the Nissan Leaf desperately needs to start selling the 30kWh, the 2.949 registrations made last month were its worst result in almost three years, losing 9% share regarding last year.  

Speaking of veteran models, the Chevy Volt II finally started to appear on dealerships and helped the Volt family(1) to register its best performance in 14 months, by selling 2.264 units.

The only notable position changes were the VW e-Golf dropping two positions to #9, to the benefit of the aforementioned Volt, up one position to #7, and the BAIC E-Series, rising also one position to #8.

Pl	WORLD	Oct.	YTD	%	'14Pl
1	Nissan Leaf	2.949	38.908	10	1
2	Tesla Model S	3.345	36.302	9	3
3	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV	3.734	32.503	8	2
4 5 6	BYD Qin BMW i3 Renault Zoe	2.209 2.150 1.841	28.365 20.190 13.623	7 5 4	7 6 9
7	Chevrolet Volt (1)	2.264	12.872	3	4
8	BAIC E-Series EV	2.344	12.688	3	16
9	Volkswagen e-Golf	1.334	12.626	3	21
10	Volkswagen Golf GTE	1.481	11.691	3	33
	TOTAL	51.698	385.843

Manufacturers -  BYD is the Best Selling Brand

This was the fifth sixth consecutive month that BYD won the Best Selling Manufacturer title, again with a new personal record (6.101 units), the chinese carmaker has finally surpassed Nissan, being now the Best Selling EV Manufacturer of the year, a novelty for any chinese carmaker. 

And to think BYD ended 2014 in Seventh...

In the race for #3, another position change, Mitsubishi is now ahead, benefiting from the restyled Outlander and a more complete lineup, but with only 311 units separating it from Tesla, a lot can still happen until the end of the year.

In the low end of the manufacturers ranking, things remain pretty leveled, Kandi surpassed Ford and is now #8, while Zotye reached #10, surpassing Chevrolet, now #11, but only 136 units behind the chinese carmaker.

Pl	WORLD	Oct.	YTD	%	'14Pl
1	BYD	6.101	43.073	11	7
2	Nissan	3.115	42.012	11	1
3	Mitsubishi	4.144	36.623	9	2
4	Tesla	3.349	36.312	9	3
5 6 7	Volkswagen BMW Renault	3.774 2.937 2.568	27.755 25.470 20.136	7 7 5	11 9 8
8	Kandi	5.081	17.201	4	10
9	Ford	1.776	17.117	4	5
10	Zotye	2.609	15.384	4	13

(1) - Includes Chevrolet Volt I and II, Holden Volt, Opel and Vauxhall Ampera;