EV maker BYD on track to take top spot in world’s biggest car market in 2023

BYD is on track to have its biggest-ever quarter for sales in the first quarter as it aims to becoming the best-selling brand in the world’s biggest vehicle market before the end of this year.

According to company reports and cnevpost, BYD has sold 344,996 new energy vehicles (NEVs) in the first two months of the year.

With over 200,000 NEVs expected to be sold in March, the company would surpass the half-a-million NEVs quarter milestone in 2023. This already sets it in front of all other manufacturers including FAW-Volkswagen joint-venture.

That’s a huge step up from the same period in 2022 and is nearly doubled in sales of its NEVs in 12 months.

Reports from local media and cnevpost reveal what BYD’s chairman and president Wang Chuanfu said about the slowing demand in the local market.

At a conference this week, he described the state of the local vehicle market as being below what it has been in recent years but was confident that BYD’s local and international demand was still quite high.

BYD’s sales in the first two months are much higher than they were in 2022 according to Mr Chuanfu and with March sales data to be released in the coming days, he expected the first-quarter growth to be in excess of 80% compared to last year.

At the conference, he also commented on the recent price war in China’s auto industry. According to his assessment, the aggressive pricing across the industry is due to the excessive supply of vehicles while the demand remained below normal levels in the country.

This means that some companies will be “phased out” while others like BYD are set to gain market share. He compared the state of the industry to what the local home appliance and mobile phone industries have gone through. Now it’s NEV industry’s turn.

Wang Chuanfu expects the impact of the NEVs price wars to be lower by the end of April as the market is reinvigorated by the upcoming local auto shows in May.

He also touched on the export markets briefly by stating that BYD had no plans to enter the highly lucrative US market for the time being.

This in some ways sends a signal that BYD considers its local, Asian, European and Oceania markets as the key growth markets in the next 12 months.

One other sign of this is the company’s manufacturing plant expansion into Thailand where the first vehicles are expected to be produced as early as next year.

With BYD continuing to move into the affordable ground-up electric space in Australia, deliveries are expected to continue to rise in the coming months.

The first two months of the year have seen over a thousand EVs being sold. It’s this number that is expected to rise significantly once BYD launches its more affordable Dolphin EV in the coming months.

This week the company also launched its vehicle controls app for owners across Australia which will help improve the ownership experience for many current and future customers.

BYD’s high growth plans in its local and international markets indicate the scalability of its vertically integrated manufacturing. 

Like Tesla, it would benefit not only the company as it expands but also its current and future customers that make the switch to a ground-up electric vehicle.