Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

electrek.co

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 467 posts

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#231

Post by melonpan7 »

ecshafer wrote: post #100

Musk was saying at the start that Tesla was going to be $80k then scale up so they would have a $10k/20k car. It looks like BYD beat them to it. I guess putting manufacturing in China, giving them all of the tricks of the trade, letting them build consolidated supply chains, letting them iterate on every aspect of manufacturing, and automate it all was a mistake in the long run. pikachu_face.jpg

Tesla severely lacks competition in the North American market. They lost all their first mover advantage by sitting back and spending significant R&D into FSD. Chinese manufacturers have some incredible innovations such as Nio’s battery swapping.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#232

Post by mytailorisrich »

cromka wrote: post #110
fusslo wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have two chinese-born coworkers (who spent 20-30 years here in the us) in the same room. When we talk about china's expansion, I am always jealous of the public projects, infrastructure, housing, etc. They always point out the huge unemployment of young people, declining birth rate, and other social ills. They say they're worried when the building stops. Even more people will be out of jobs. And when the nation age…

China will likely become the go-to place for immigrants within couple decades. Just like any other developed economy had.

I doubt it because the Chinese are very protective of their homogeneity and see what has happened in Europe as a massive cautionary tale. So my guess is that they will be very picky and control both quality and numbers tightly.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#233

Post by AceJohnny2 »

cameronh90 wrote: post #173
arjie wrote: post #69

Traveling in Asia and South America, the primary impression I got was not that this is a war of manufacturing that we're losing but that the game is already up. Chile was full of Chinese makes and they were all surprisingly good. Riding in a Chinese MG in Taiwan or Hong Kong you suddenly realize that this isn't a future competitor. The people talking about the war of car manufacturers here seem like those Japanese ho…

It's not "surprisingly" unless you haven't bought much in the last 20 years. China-owned brands are now often better and more premium than their Western counterparts across the entire spectrum. Give me Anker over Belkin any day. There are a few areas where the West still leads - Chinese software tends to be buggier and less polished, luxury apparel isn't at the same standard - but that lead is diminishing rapidly. Cu…

> The worst products are now formerly high quality Western brands with PE overlords that forced them to outsource manufacturing to the lowest bidder.

Stanley Black&Decker?

https://www.worseonpurpose.com/

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#234

Post by usrnm »

Squarex wrote: post #183
hdhdhsjsbdh wrote: post #3

BYD has to me become an icon of US decline vs Chinese expansion. It’s just one example among many of China charting the way forward and innovating while the US recedes further into backward-looking, protectionist policy. See: US politicians on both sides trying to ban BYD imports rather than incentivizing stiffer competition from US automakers. Another example: massive growth in Chinese renewables while the US opens…

And even more an icon of european irrelevance. In Prague almost all EVs are Teslas. I see a BYD time to time. Škoda or Volkswagen almost never.

In the Netherlands I see plenty of Renault 5s or VW IDs, many Teslas, too. And almost no BYD

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#235

Post by Karrot_Kream »

triceratops wrote: post #224
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US with its high natgas generation is much cleaner than a majority coal driven generation scheme. I'm puzzled why we talk about "US decline" when we're pretty much creating paeans to marginal energy construction. Sure China's trajectory is good. But it's still not at the point where it's cleaner per capita than the US and it's still quite far from that. Let's talk about reality here. The US shouldn't rest on its…

> The US with its high natgas generation is much cleaner than a majority coal driven generation scheme. The difference is the US's hostility to renewable energy versus China's embrace of it. China's path takes them to zero coal eventually - the US's does not.

That's assuming the governments, policies, and economic conditions of China, US, and the world in May 2026 stay static.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#236

Post by strictnein »

tredre3 wrote: post #207
strictnein wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's certainly a take. China just has this decades long history of targeting foreign industries, flooding the market with that product, and then being the only one left standing. The idea that we should allow cheap vehicles to flood the domestic market because that will "cause the US auto manufacturers compete" ignores the wholly uneven playing field at work here, and the government backed goal of one side. Just th…

American car manufacturers have extremely small market shares outside N.A., and many (all?) of them required multiple government bailouts over the past few decades. If you think that keeping China is good for the consumer, you'll have to present a stronger case than "we must protect our companies".

> If you think that keeping [out] China is good for the consumer

It would be excellent for the consumer, in the rather short term, to not keep them out. Cheap cars! Cheap goods flooding our markets are great for consumers in the short term.

> American car manufacturers have extremely small market shares outside N.A

Here's a game:

One company is American. The other is not.

Company 1 Market Share: North America: 16.5% South America: 8.9% Asia: 7.6%

Company 2 Market Share: North America: 14.87% South America: 8.3% Asia: 8.28%

Now, without looking, which is the "US company without market share outside of NA", and which is the foreign company that understands how to compete?

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#237

Post by sofixa »

Squarex wrote: post #183
hdhdhsjsbdh wrote: post #3

BYD has to me become an icon of US decline vs Chinese expansion. It’s just one example among many of China charting the way forward and innovating while the US recedes further into backward-looking, protectionist policy. See: US politicians on both sides trying to ban BYD imports rather than incentivizing stiffer competition from US automakers. Another example: massive growth in Chinese renewables while the US opens…

And even more an icon of european irrelevance. In Prague almost all EVs are Teslas. I see a BYD time to time. Škoda or Volkswagen almost never.

As a counterpoint, around 1/3 of EVs I see in France are Renaults. SImilar story, but a bit less evident, in Spain.

Both have decent amounts of Hyundai Ioniqs, Teslas, and some BYDs and Dacias. But especially in France, Renault Meganes, 5s and now the 4 is everywhere.

Don't forget that "Europe" is actually 30ish (if you count EU) or even more countries (if you count the continent), with wildly different markets and players on them.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#238

Post by tartoran »

badpun wrote: post #177
throwaway_7274 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was glued to the window while flying over southern China recently. There is so much infrastructure you can see from the air, even in fairly rural provinces. So many bridges. So many wind turbines. It is visibly a country on the move, a country that believes in itself and its ability to do things. The Chinese Century is increasingly palpable, for better or worse.

I'd say it's a country that builds a ton of infrastructure, at the expense of living standards of common people. The money from infra has to come from anywhere, and an all-powerful central government can just redirect the stream from consumer spending into building out infrastructure. Whether Chinese are happy about it, you'd have to ask them.

The US is not building infrastructure at the expense of living standard of common people. Ask Americans if they're happy about it.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#239

Post by anonylizard »

margalabargala wrote: post #205
roughly wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And, more to the point, BYD exists because the CCP has been aggressively protectionist of its domestic companies and has been strongly involved in growing, supporting, and protecting its domestic industry to ensure it has one. BYD is not a cautionary tale about protectionism, it's a sales pitch for it.

Well, different kinds of protectionism. The CCP's protectionism is because China is going for a cultural victory. It wants Chinese products to be available and inexpensive and purchased around the world. It puts resources to that end. The US's protectionism is for the enrichment of the CEO, board members, stockholders, and Executive Branch's family members. It wants to protect the domestic market from sending money s…

It is just sad that commentary like this even exists.

I sincerely am curious of the education that produces sentences like this. On one hand it is articulate and educated, on the other hand its amazing that one can think China is doing this out of charity and not wiping out its competitors one after the other.

Re: BYD overtakes Tesla and Kia as the best-selling EV brand in key overseas markets

#240

Post by mrexcess »

roughly wrote: post #99
baq wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BYD has pretty amazing tech to be honest, but putting protectionism as an argument against the US and pro BYD in the same sentence is naive at best. The CCP allowed BYD to exist and the CCP can end BYD in a single weekend regardless of any human right concerns elsewhere.

And, more to the point, BYD exists because the CCP has been aggressively protectionist of its domestic companies and has been strongly involved in growing, supporting, and protecting its domestic industry to ensure it has one. BYD is not a cautionary tale about protectionism, it's a sales pitch for it.

Hasn’t the US been equally so, including the auto company bailouts, government fleet purchases restricted to US-made vehicles, US national moves to secure supply chain inputs for the auto makers, etc.?

The main difference that I see isn’t protectionism, it’s that BYD took a direction the market wanted, whereas US auto makers have not produced vehicles that were appealing to consumers who had choices.

Post reply on HN