CHINA March 2017

MG Dynamo EV Concept

1-3 win for BAIC

The Chinese market had more than 32.000 new EV's zooming the streets last month, a 89% increase over the same month last year, with the annual growth rate now at 31%, the EV market share is firmly above the 1% barrier, at around 1.4%. As the year proceeds and sales expand, expect market share to rise above last year result (1.45%), maybe reaching North of 2% share.

All this while 95% of the market continues to belong to domestic brands. And of the 5% left for foreign brands, 4% belong to Tesla, with the remaining 1% divided by all other auto makers.

BAIC once again won the models and manufacturers titles in March, and with lofty goals for this year (170.000 units!) it seems Beijing Auto will be a tough cookie for BYD to beat… 

Here’s March Top 5 Best Selling models individual performance:

#1 - BAIC EC180: Winning the Best Seller status for the second month in a row, this little model is making a (small) earthquake on Chinese EV sales, and it should too, as this is probably the first (Only?) little city EV that private buyers must be proud to have, with Crossover-ish looks, decent specs and interiors/equipment, the 3.605 units sold last month are proving this model is here to stay and is leading the ranking with full merit…

#2 – Zhidou D2 EV: …The same can’t be said about this little bugger, a bare-basics city vehicle that doesn’t inspire anyone to want one. Nevertheless, they continue to be sold in large quantities (3.593 units in March), possibly due to a combination of bargain-basement prices and big fleet deals.

#3 – BAIC EU260: A major player last year, where it reached #5, BAIC’s middle-of-the-road electric sedan had its best performance of the year last month, with 2.608 units, and is now looking to recover lost sales. 

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#4 – SAIC Roewe eRX5: This PHEV SUV could be to SAIC a bit like what the Tang was for BYD a while back, by delivering 2.478 units in only its third month on the market, it set a new monthly record for any SAIC model, so it seems this rather handsome and trendy Compact SUV is set to become Shanghai Auto Best Selling plug-in and possibly one of the Best Sellers of the Year.

#5 – Geely Emgrand EV: Another electric compact sedan to succeed, Volvo’s owner Geely Emgrand EV returned to the market with a bang, jumping to #5 in March, with 1.804 units, a 218% increase YoY.

Year-to-Date Ranking

In the top positions there weren’t many changes, with the most important involving SAIC models, the Roewe eRX5 jumped seven positions to Fourth, becoming not only the best-selling plug-in hybrid, but also the highest ranked SUV, while its sedan relative, the Roewe e550, was down four places to #7, is this sudden fall due to production constraints (Floor priority to the eRX5), or is demand just not there anymore?

Crossovers and SUV’s are the hottest automotive trend in China and the plug-in market follows suit, as it wasn’t only the eRX5 to climb in the ranking, as the BYD Tang is slowly stepping up production, climbing one position to #6.

The slow production ramp up of BYD is making itself known, now with three models in the Top 10, after the Qin EV300 shooting 11 positions to Ninth, its less fancy relative, the e5, also climbed significantly in the ranking, jumping seven positions to #10.

Looking at the manufacturers ranking, BAIC stays firmly in the lead, with 23% market share, now followed by a recovering BYD (16%), but also by SAIC (12%), which is starting to look as this year dark horse brand among Chinese EV makers.

Pl	China	March	YTD	%
1	BAIC EC180	3.605	7.129	13
2	Zhidou D2 EV	3.593	5.799	10
3	BAIC EU260	2.608	3.521	6
4	SAIC Roewe eRX5	2.478	3.217	6
5 6 7 8	JMC E100 BYD Tang SAIC Roewe e550 Zotye E200	1.178 1.509 260 838	2.959 2.806 2.338 2.166	5 5 4 4
9	BYD Qin EV300	1.678	2.046	4
10	BYD e5	1.567	1.977	3
11	Geely Emgrand EV	1.804	1.903	3
12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20	Kandi EV BAIC EX200 JMC E200 Zotye Cloud EV Tesla Model X e) Changan Benni EV Horki 300E BYD e6 Chery eQ Others	1.800 1.050 548 850 993 763 1.067 719 3.109	1.899 1.697 1.694 1.525 1.524 1.408 1.296 1.259 1.120 7.216	3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2
	TOTAL Market	32.017	56.499	100