BYD New Model Price Reduced by 11%... Intensifying Electric Vehicle Price Competition

Xiaopeng Also Launches Half-Price Electric Car
Home Appliance Company Xiaomi to Unveil Electric Car at the End of This Month
"Survival of the Fittest Begins in the Electric Vehicle Market"

Price competition in the Chinese electric vehicle market is intensifying further.

According to major foreign media reports on the 18th (local time), BYD, the world's number one electric vehicle manufacturer, launched the new Destroyer 07 Hybrid at a price 11.3% lower than the previous model. The Destroyer 07, which debuted at the Shanghai Motor Show last April, is a mid-size sedan known to have a driving range of 121 to 200 km on battery alone in the previous version. Earlier, BYD ignited the low-cost model competition by releasing an electric vehicle priced at 79,800 yuan (about 15 million KRW) right after the Lunar New Year holiday last month.

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

In response, premium electric vehicle brand Xiaopeng also raised the curtain on price competition by launching a low-cost brand. Xiaopeng’s Chairman and CEO, He Xiaopeng, revealed this plan at the White Paper event of the China Electric Vehicle Association on the 16th. Xiaopeng plans to release an entry-level product priced at 100,000 to 150,000 yuan (about 18 million to 28 million KRW), roughly half the price range of its current electric vehicles (about 37 million to 55 million KRW). Chairman He expressed his ambition, stating, "We will create the first AI-supported vehicle for the younger generation."

Similarly, premium brand NIO is set to unveil a general public brand in May, as reported last week by the US economic media CNBC. The new brand is named 'Lu Dao.' Founded at the end of 2014, NIO has been producing high-end sports utility vehicles (SUVs) and sedans that are more expensive than Tesla’s Model S or Model Y.

Chinese electronics company Xiaomi has also announced its entry into the electric vehicle competition. According to industry sources, Xiaomi will sell its first self-developed electric vehicle model, the Speed Ultra7 (SU7), nationwide in China starting on the 28th. Some speculate that Xiaomi, which has already entered the Korean market with low-cost smartphones, may also target the domestic automobile market. Xiaomi plans to accept electric vehicle orders through social networking services (SNS) at 59 stores in 29 cities nationwide.

As the Chinese electric vehicle market officially enters a survival-of-the-fittest phase this year, there are forecasts that some companies will be eliminated. According to the China Passenger Car Association, the growth rate of electric vehicle sales in China, which was 20.8% last year, slowed to 18.2% in January and February this year.