+++ In BAIHRAIN , demand for Chinese vehicles is increasing with car imports from China reaching nearly 18 million Bahrain dinars ($48 million) in 2021. Ridha Mohammed Abas, a showroom manager of China’s auto manufacturer Changan, said that the Changan vehicles were introduced in Bahrain in 2018, and their sales have been climbing over the years. The high demand is mainly for two reasons, the innovative designs and the increasing confidence of local consumers in Chinese vehicles. People want to have Chinese cars because they are reliable, with distinctive features and competitive prices, Ridha explained. “We opened a larger showroom, and the maintenance and post-sale services have drastically improved in the past years”, he explained. The affordability was the main reason that made Fatima Mohammed, a Bahraini, buy a Chery Tiggo as her first and only car in 2019. “I fell in love with the car as I wanted an SUV, and it was within my budget. The car is still with the same performance as the first day I bought it”, she told. Noora Khamis Al Sadoon, the director of economic statistics at Bahrain’s Information and eGovernment Authority (iGA), affirmed to Xinhua that the kingdom had imported 3.814 motor vehicles from China in 2021. According to the country’s foreign trade statistics, Chinese motor vehicle imports in 2021 totaled 17.955.457 Bahrain dinars, Al Sadoon noted. Meanwhile, Abas revealed that the Changan showroom in Bahrain sold 480 vehicles in 2020, and the number jumped to 640 last year. The success of Chinese vehicles in the local market is evidence of Bahrain consumers’ understanding of the high quality of cars and their manufacturing process, Ahmed Ghazwan, head of public relations and marketing at Tas’heelat Automotive Company, had told the press last year. He predicted that Chinese vehicles would dominate the global auto industry with competitive prices and high-quality standards, as China has developed the ability to produce the best vehicles in the world. +++
+++ CHINA ’s vehicle market ended its 3-year decline last year, with deliveries edging up 3.8 percent from 2020 to reach 26.28 million. The China Association of Automotive Manufacturers estimates that the market will grow 5 percent to 27.5 million in sales in 2022. Despite the hard-earned rebound and the positive prospects of the market as a whole, carmakers individually had an up-and-down year battling Covid-19 and chip shortages through 2021, a sign of the fast-evolving changes in the world’s largest vehicle market. Thanks to the rising popularity of electrification, new energy vehicle carmakers performed well, and local private brands attracted buyers away from international volume brands. SAIC Volkswagen’s sales plummeted 17.5 percent in 2021 from 2020, which Volkswagen Group China CEO Stephan Wöllenstein said was the result of chip shortages and low demand for the ID models. The joint venture’s sales drop, coupled with a slump at another joint venture, FAW-Volkswagen, resulted in Volkswagen’s second yearly sales decrease in China. SAIC GM’s sales in 2021 fell around 9 percent year-on-year to 1.47 million units. Despite this, GM China president Julian Blissett said he is optimistic about 2022. Many Japanese carmakers suffered as well. Nissan’s deliveries totaled 1.38 million units, down 5.2 percent year-on-year, while Honda sold 1.56 million, marking a 4 percent fall. Mazda’s sales slumped 14.3 percent year-on-year to 184,000 units. Toyota was the only exception. Partly insulated from chip shortages, it delivered 1.94 million vehicles in China, up 8.2 percent from 2020. The CAAM said both Japanese and German carmakers’ market share fell somewhat in China last year, without offering specific figures. The premium vehicle segment experienced something different in 2021. Volkswagen’s Audi deliveries fell 3.6 percent. BMW, however, saw its deliveries soar 9 percent to 846.000 units, consolidating its position as the bestselling premium carmaker in the country. Luxury marques hit all-time high last year. Lamborghini sold 935 vehicles in China, up 55 percent from 2020. Bentley delivered 4.033 units, soaring 40 percent year-on-year. Porsche’s deliveries totaled 95.671 units in China, up 8 percent from 2020, but the growth rate was less than its global average of 11 percent. Private Chinese carmakers did a decent job as well. China’s largest SUV maker Great Wall Motors sold 1.28 million vehicles last year, up 15.2 percent year-on-year from 2020. The year 2021 marked the 6th year in a row that Great Wall Motors sold over 1 million vehicles. Last year, a record number of 143.000 units were sold in international markets, accounting for over 11 percent of the carmaker’s total sales. Great Wall Motors aims to sell 4 million vehicles a year in 2025, with 80 percent of them NEVs. BYD sold 740.000 vehicles last year, up 73.34 percent from 2020. Of its deliveries, more than 80 percent were electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, which helped the carmaker seized the No 1 position in China’s NEV segment. Wuling came second by delivering 452.000 small electric vehicles last year, up 160 percent from 2020. They brought cumulative sales of the Sino-US joint venture’s small electric cars to 750.000 units by the end of 2021. Of its small electric models, Wuling said the most popular one was the Hongguang Mini EV. It has been the most popular electric model in China for 16 months in a row, with its cumulative sales hitting 550.000 units by the end of last year. Tesla had the best growth among all international carmakers in China. Over 484.000 Model 3 sedans and Model Y SUVs rolled off the facility’s assembly line in 2021, accounting for 51.7 percent of Tesla’s global deliveries of 936.000 units during the year, according to the China Passenger Car Association. The carmaker is seeing its popularity hit a record high in China as well. In December, over 70.000 Tesla vehicles were sold in the country, 34 percent higher than the November figure. They brought Tesla’s China deliveries to over 320.000 units in 2021, which were one-third of the carmaker’s global sales, according to the CPCA. A total of 3.52 million electric cars and plug-in hybrids were sold in 2021, up 160 percent from 2020, said the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. NEV exports in 2021 reached 310.000 units, a year-on-year surge of more than three times, which exceeded the cumulative exports in previous years, the ministry said. Wang Weiming, an official from the ministry, said it will further promote the development of NEVs and smart vehicles, and improve the stability and competitiveness of the industry and supply chains of the automobile industry. According to China’s development plan, NEVs will account for about 20 percent of vehicles sold in 2025. +++
+++ Then Chinese FAW GROUP , a leading automobile maker in the country, plans to sell around 4.1 million vehicles in 2022, growing at an annual rate of 17.1 percent, the company said. The company’s operating revenue is expected to reach 770 billion yuan ($121 billion) this year, with annual growth of 8.9 percent. In 2022, the automaker plans to channel between 3 and 3.5 percent of its operating revenue to research and development expenditure. Last year, FAW Group sold a total of 3.5 million vehicles. Sales of its leading sedan brand Hongqi came in at 300.000 in the period, an increase of 50.1 percent year-on-year. Its truck subsidiary FAW Jiefang sold a total of 440.000 vehicles. Chinese auto sales are likely to rise 5 percent year-on-year in 2022, with total sales reaching 27.5 million units, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) said. While the impact of epidemic prevention and control measures on the market will gradually weaken, China’s auto market will maintain growth in 2022 driven by huge demand potential, the gradual easing of chip shortages, and the strong demand for new energy vehicles, Fu Bingfeng, CAAM executive vice-president, told a press conference. Founded in 1953 in the northeastern city of Changchun, the capital of Jilin province, FAW Group is considered the birthplace of China’s auto industry. +++
+++ FORD has opened a new design center in China’s business hub Shanghai, a move considered an important layout for the US automaker to increase investment in the Chinese market. With world-class facilities such as a full-size clay model workshop, it is the only full-function automotive design center in downtown Shanghai. The company said it will use the latest technology to create future products that cater to the demands of the Chinese consumers and at the same time lead global trends. Focusing on the design and development of products for the Chinese market, the center has the whole-process automotive design abilities such as design trend research, interior and exterior modeling design, digital interactive experience design, and full-size clay model production. At the design center, designers can review the clay models with 8K resolution high-definition LED large screen and the latest virtual reality equipment, while revising and delivering relevant data through a 3-dimensional scanning device. “Through Ford’s global virtual reality real-time review system, design teams in China can effectively communicate and review designs online with their counterparts in other continents at any time”, said Chen Liang, an exterior design manager of Ford China. Last year, Ford sold nearly 625.000 vehicles in China, up 3.7 percent year-on-year, with its Lincoln brand recording the best annual sales since entering the country. The opening of this world-class design center is the latest impetus for Ford China to continue its brand transformation, according to Anning Chen, group vice-president of Ford Motor Co and president and CEO of Ford China. “Through design, Ford’s iconic classic elements can be seamlessly integrated with Chinese innovation trends, and this is the most intuitive way for the company to connect with Chinese customers”, Chen said. China’s auto sales have topped the world for 13 consecutive years. In 2021, the country sold about 26.3 million vehicles, up 3.8 percent year-on-year, according to data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. As one of the country’s automobile manufacturing bases, Shanghai has become an emerging global art and fashion center, with many international car companies, including Ford, Tesla, Nissan and General Motors, setting up design centers in the city. Ford’s design workforce in China has increased about 10-fold in the past 2 years, and more than three-quarters of its creative design team is currently made up of young local designers aged under 35. +++
+++ GREAT WALL MOTORS registered an operating revenue of 136.3 billion yuan ($21.52 billion) in 2021, up 31.95 percent year-on-year, said China’s largest pickup and SUV maker. Its net profit last year soared 26.45 percent year-on-year to 6.78 billion yuan, and the average price of its vehicles rose 14.5 percent from 2020 to 106.400 yuan. Great Wall Motors sold 1.28 million vehicles in 2021, up 15 percent year-on-year, despite chip shortages and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. The year 2021 was the sixth year in a row that its annual sales had exceeded one million, said the carmaker. The carmaker said it would speed up its efforts in terms of digitalization and electrification in 2022. Among other things, connectivity will be a feature available in vehicle models across all its marques, it said. Great Wall Motors said its Wey and Tank marques will launch vehicles overseas this year, as the carmaker continue its globalization campaign. Last year, it sold 143.000 vehicles in overseas markets, up 103.7 percent from 2020. +++
+++ Lithium-metal battery maker SES said on Wednesday that it has partnered with HONDA to develop products as part of the Japanese carmaker’s next-generation battery strategy. The partnership marks a key milestone on SES’ strategic roadmap to achieve commercial production of hybrid lithium-metal batteries for electric vehicles, said the battery maker headquartered in Boston, the United States. Besides Honda, General Motors and Hyundai have signed joint development agreements with SES. In a previous statement, SES said the samples with GM and Hyundai will be ready in 2022 and their commercialization is scheduled to start around 2025. Like several carmakers including GM and Hyundai, Honda said it would invest in the battery maker after its combination with Ivanhoe Capital Acquisition Corp. SES unveiled the world’s largest lithium-metal battery late last year, marking a breakthrough for the automotive industry that is shifting towards electrification. The battery cell, with 107 ampere hours, is also the world’s first 100 plus Ah lithium-metal battery ever demonstrated. The average capacity of a lithium-ion battery cell in today’s electric cars ranges from 50 to 120 amp hours. SES founder and CEO Qichao Hu said he is confident that SES will be the first to commercialize this next generation lithium-metal battery. He said SES is building a production facility in Shanghai, which is scheduled for completion in 2023. It will be capable of producing 1 GWh of lithium-metal batteries annually, by far the largest of its kind in the world. Carmakers in China, Europe and the United States have rolled out plans to go electric, ranging from volume brands including Volkswagen and GM to premium marques such as Jaguar and Volvo. Last year, over 3.5 million electric cars and plug-in hybrids were sold in China, up 157.5 percent year-on-year, the fastest growth rate since 2016, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. Their deliveries are expected to reach 5 million units in 2022, up 42 percent, said the association. +++
+++ HONGQI , the premium arm of China FAW Group, expects its sales to hit 450.000 to 500.000 units in 2022. Qiu Xiandong, president of the State-owned carmaker, announced the goal at an online press conference. Even if Hongqi sales hit the lower range of the target, that would mark a 50 percent rise from its deliveries of 300.000 units in 2021. The upper range of 500.000 stands for a 66.7 percent rise year-on-year. Hongqi has seen its sales grow rapidly over the past few years. Last year, it ranked fifth in terms of sales in China’s premium vehicle market after BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Audi and Tesla. Besides Hongqi, FAW expects its two major joint ventures, FAW-Volkswagen and FAW Toyota, to see big sales rises as well this year. Qiu said FAW’s sales goal stands at 4.1 million units in 2022, up 17.1 percent from 2021 thanks to the prospects of China’s growing vehicle market. Total vehicle sales in China are estimated to grow 5 percent year-on-year to 27.5 million this year, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. +++
+++ LAMBORGHINI will electrify its line-up in stages over the coming years, introducing the hybridised Aventador successor in 2023, a Urus PHEV in 2024, a Huracán hybrid in 2025 and a pure EV in a new segment around 2028. Confirming the company’s hybridisation plan, company CEO Stephan Winkelmann estimated that the electrification of the firm’s 2 super-sports car and big-selling super-SUV could slash CO2 emissions to around half of their current levels. Asked if the company’s customers are ready to switch into electrified models, Winkelmann said: “For sure, they are ready for hybridisation because we always said we don’t need to be the first ones, but when we kick in, we need to be the best, and this is something we strongly believe is going to happen”. The newly confirmed timeframe means 2022 will be the last year Lamborghini has a pure-combustion line-up – ushering in electrification to its series-production models exactly 60 years on from the reveal of its debut model, the 350GT, at the 1963 Turin motor show. “By 2025 we will offer only hybrid cars in our line-up”, said Winkelmann. “This is to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 50 %”. In the 6 years before it launches a pure-electric car, Lamborghini will follow sibling brands Porsche and Bentley in endowing its current line-up with an electrical power boost and EV-only running capabilities, but Winkelmann was keen to emphasise that it will not necessarily join those 2 firms in offering a V6 power plant. “We are not planning a V6 engine”, he told, adding that big engines in the vein of the Huracán’s V10 and the Aventador’s V12 are “part of our heritage. For example, the V12 on the follow-up to the Aventador will be a completely new V12 engine, and as long as they fulfil the rules, it’s something which in my opinion is important to deliver”. Asked if it is difficult to make a V12 compliant with the latest emissions regulations, Winkelmann said simply “yes”, but that it is worth the investment and effort because “it is part of the DNA of the halo car”. The Aventador’s replacement, due on sale next year following a reveal in late 2022, will use a plug-in hybrid drivetrain, rather than pairing the petrol motor with an energy-storing supercapacitor device as used by the Sían and closely related Countach LPI 800-4. This should allow for a more tangible power increase and EV running at higher speeds for longer periods. The Urus and Huracán hybrids, due later, will use a similar set-up, but it is not yet confirmed whether they will keep their V8 and V10 engines. +++
+++ Sales of PICK-UP trucks in China recorded a solid growth last year, data from the China Passenger Car Association showed. A total of some 550,000 units of pickup trucks were sold in the January-December period, up 14 percent from a year earlier, according to the association. In December alone, pickup truck sales increased 21 percent year-on-year to about 59.000 units. In terms of region-wise figures, more than 40 percent of the consumer demand for pickup trucks came from the country’s northwestern and southwestern regions. The association attributed last year’s steady growth to policy support for pickup truck consumption, the release of passenger-use pickup models by some major automakers, and the development of a “pickup truck culture” in China. The particularly low base in early 2020 also contributed to the increase in a year-on-year comparison, the association said. According to its projections, pickup truck sales, despite being under pressure, will continue to perform well. +++
+++ Swedish electric carmaker POLESTAR sold 29.000 vehicles globally in 2021, up 185 percent year-on-year. The joint venture between Volvo and Geely now has two models available in the market, all of which are made in China. Polestar said its sales in China last year soared 471 percent from 2020. Polestar said its vehicles were available in 19 markets by the end of 2021. The figure is expected to grow to at least 30 by the end of 2023. The number of its dealerships doubled in 2021 to 100 globally and the company aims to have 150 in operation by the end of 2022. “We are delivering on our targets”, said Thomas Ingenlath, Polestar CEO, in a statement. “It is a hugely exciting time for the brand, with new markets and models to support the ambitious growth plans we have set for ourselves”, he said. Mike Whittington, Polestar’s head of sales, said he has observed people’s growing interest in the company and its products. “Our order intake is strong and we are looking forward to further growth in our sales volume again in 2022”, he said. Polestar is accelerating efforts to enrich its lineup. Polestar 3, a performance SUV, is set to launch in 2022 and will be the first Polestar to be built in China and the United States. Polestar said the model will feature advanced technologies from Luminar, Nvidia and Zenseact that will provide cutting-edge unsupervised autonomous driving functions. Polestar 4, a smaller performance SUV, will follow in 2023. The company will launch a four-door GT coupe, called Polestar 5, in 2024. +++
+++ China is proving crucial to Elon Musk’s ambition in terms of electric vehicles, and the latest proof is this: over half of TESLA ’s global sales last year were made at its 2-year-old plant in Shanghai. Over 484.000 Model 3 sedans and Model Y cross-overs rolled off the facility’s assembly line in 2021, accounting for 51.7 percent of Tesla’s global deliveries of 936,000 units during the year, according to the China Passenger Car Association. The Shanghai plant, which started production in late 2019, is Tesla’s first car manufacturing facility outside the United States and China’s first and only passenger car manufacturing facility wholly owned by an overseas carmaker. Tesla has made the plant its major export hub. Last year, it shipped over 160,000 vehicles into more than 10 countries, the majority of which were Model 3 sedans. The carmaker is seeing its popularity hit a record high in China as well. In December, over 70,000 Tesla vehicles were sold in the country, 34 percent higher than the November figure. They brought Tesla’s China deliveries to over 320.000 units in 2021, which were one-third of the carmaker’s global sales, according to the CPCA. China has the world’s largest new energy vehicle market, with 3.5 million units sold in 2021, but it is dominated by domestic brands such as BYD and Wuling. The latter rose to fame because of its affordable electric 2-seaters. Tesla ranked third after the 2 last year and was 1 of 2 foreign brands in the top 10 in terms of sales, with the other one being Volkswagen, which delivered 70.000 units. Cui Dongshu, secretary-general of the CPCA, said Tesla will gain more ground as new energy vehicles are rising as new serious choices for the general public in China. The association expects sales of electric and plug-in hybrid passenger vehicles in China to reach 5.5 million units in 2022, roughly 25 percent of all passenger vehicles sold in the year. International carmakers including Tesla would like to tap into the growth potential by ramping up indigenous research and development. Tesla unveiled a research facility late last year in Shanghai. It said the facility, its first outside the US, will gradually develop over time to be similar in size to the one in its home country. “The goal of Tesla’s team in China is to design, develop and produce new vehicle models and products with Chinese elements and sell them globally”, Tesla said in an online recruitment post last year. +++