What Best Has China Got In Its EV Market That Troubles The Ford Motors

The conceivable answer to why future of the EV market belongs to China is nothing but Technological Intelligence.

While more and more automakers are lining up to get a piece of the pie in the electric vehicle segment, China has humbly stepped up the pavilion with more than 7 million units of the electric vehicles pandemonium.

28 years ago, BYD had doggedly affirmed that batteries would even replace fossil fuel in the auto industry and would stand tall as a dominant source of power for everything.

Without a pinch of doubt, Chinese EV sells on high performance in-house batteries, which has a striking edge over its competitors. Investors and industry experts echo China’s growth in the electric car segment as it continues to put forward novel competitive products into the market.

To resonate with its customer base, Chinese automakers, specially BYD has offered electric vehicles with trendy designs and a wider product range.

Keeping in mind the middle class households as well as the younger motorists adoring sporty cars, BYD has released more than a dozen EV models in two sets of classes – the Dynasty series for the former, and the Ocean series for the latter.

Innovation is the key to China’s growth in the EV sector with 70 per cent of EV production generated by China. It is not a case of sympathetic magic or an accident that has led BYD to enter the list of the most innovative companies of the world in 2023 in the 9th position.

The feather in BYD’s cap comes about as a battery chemistry that ensures faster charging with peak speed of 172 kW maintained before tapering off at 50 per cent battery charge.

BYD is focusing on blade batteries that is composed of less-bulky lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery that neither troubles with high heat generation or release nor shows susceptibility to fire and explosion, which brings battery safety to the forefront and in a nutshell redefines the safety standards of the electric vehicle.

What’s more, the Chinese hold on to collaborations with advanced tech companies to give them a headway into finer innovations, whilst the US Ford Motors find them to be very unnatural.

Ford Needs To Dive Into Full-Swing To Be In Par With Its Chinese EV Competitors

Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor Co., proclaimed his liking towards BYD with its impressive, vertically integrated and aggressive nature holding its commitment towards the electric.

Farley pointed out that neither the US leader Tesla, nor the crosstown rival General Motors poses a threat to Ford’s EV push, but the Chinese sector, calling them the powerhouse of the EV sector with its upfront battery technology.

Farley points out that as the European market let in the Chinese electric models with affordable prices and is selling in high volumes in Europe, it could be practically impossible to beat the scale of five times as Ford’s even on lower costs.

He declared BYD, Great Wall, Geely, Changan SAIC to be among the top winners of the Chinese EV segments.

Farley believes that it either needs to hanker around distinctive branding or lower the costs of its EV output to stay competitive in the auto electric market, while the latter seems difficult, Ford has a well established customer base and robust brand name that can still make a killing.

In a bid to beat the Chinese automakers, Ford has decided to partner with CATL for lower cost batteries and build an electric vehicle battery plant worth 3.5 billion dollars in Michigan, a move which has sadly faced criticism from Senator Marco Rubio amid China-US tensions.

Nonetheless, this development is still under question as the US Treasury is yet to rule out whether the SAIC-Ford deal violates the Foreign Entities of Concern prohibition, which circles around an EV tax credit of 7500 USD.

Farley declares that the next two years would showcase radically different next generation electric vehicles from Ford, with Transit Custom and Puma lined up for 2024 release and a three-row electric SUV of 563km range gearing for production in 2025.

Ford is backing on its Blue Oval City mega-campus located in Tennessee, that will divulge a production capacity of 500,000 annual electric pickups, starting 2025.

War For Domination In The Electric Car Market

There is a fierce competition among electric vehicle manufacturers around the world over costs, where having an edge is synonymous to lowering the price of the vehicle, while higher prices may screw up the consumers.

Ford is not the only auto company facing EV competition and a shrinking market share in the world’s largest electric auto market in China.

Finest global legacy automakers like Volkswagen, General Motors, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Toyota are facing a loss of Chinese market share, whereas more stronger footprints have been noticed by the local automakers of China in addition to Tesla.

Tesla’s electric car sales in China has also seen a drop in the past months, compared to its unbeatable numbers in the previous years.

CEO Mary Barra of General Motors, decided to visit China the coming week after witnessing an abrupt downfall of GM vehicles in the East Asian country.

Ford’s sales had been sliding in the Chinese auto market since 2016, thanks to the revolutionary development Chinese electric vehicles have brought out.

Adding to the woes, China has dethroned the USA to become the largest vehicle maker in the planet with over 30 million cars and commercial automotive.

To compete with market super-rivals like Tesla, Ford, Toyota, General Motors, and BMW, Chinese manufacturer BYD has come up with a plan to deliver smarter electric vehicles, which can be analogously termed as super mobile phones on wheels.

Be that as may, BYD shows a combined value of Ford Motors and General Motors taken together, and is worth an estimate of about 98 billion US dollars.

BYD vs. Tesla

Perhaps, it could be in response to Elon Musk’s laugh over their electric vehicle e6 a decade ago, that challenged Chinese EV stronghold BYD to beat Tesla on record of highest EV sales and grab the World No. 1 position as electric vehicle producer.

Presently enjoying the last laugh, BYD, synchronous to Build Your Dreams, got ridiculed by the CEO of EV maker Tesla as Musk commented on their product to be not good enough or particularly attractive, citing a weaker technology in 2011.

Contrary to this statement, Musk returned with a huge praise for BYD in January 2023, stating the Chinese automaker could surface second to Tesla in the EV domain, with their smartest and hardest moves.

In a more recent irony, Musk took to his microblogging site Twitter to exclaim that BYD is quite competitive these days, witnessing a drastic change of how the toughest builder of the EV replaced his mockery with respect towards the Warren Buffet-backed Chinese automaker post its tremendous success.

Tesla has also been enjoying the high speed battery back up offered by BYD in most of its recent productions.

However, both the EV contenders have prolonged their relations and are effectively working together for a sustainable and green environment.

Proofread & Published By Naveenika Chauhan