The car manufacturers BMW According to industry expert Stephan Bratzel, Mercedes-Benz and Mercedes-Benz are holding up well against their Chinese competition. Both almost doubled sales of electric cars from January to September compared to the previous year: BMW sold 247,000 electric cars, Mercedes-Benz 175,000. “This means they are leaving behind Chinese competitors who are also targeting the premium segment,” said the head of the Center of Automotive Management (CAM) in Bergisch Gladbach on Tuesday.
Given the price war in China Newcomers like Nio or Xpeng would gradually have difficulties with sales. The manufacturer Nio, known for its battery replacement concept, only increased its sales by a third to 110,000 vehicles, while Xpeng’s sales fell by 18 percent to 81,000 vehicles.
Tesla is still the world leader with 46 percent growth to 1.324 million battery cars (BEVs) delivered – but is under increasing pressure because the Chinese car manufacturer BYD increased its BEV sales by 80 percent to 1.048 million. According to Bratzel, BYD is benefiting from the high demand in its home market: BEV sales there rose by a quarter to 4.2 million by September. Electric cars already have a market share of 23 percent in China.
The Volkswagen-Group increased its BEV sales by 45 percent to 530,000. However, VW has not been able to shorten the gap to Tesla and BYD and is “far behind the market leaders in electromobility” in third place. The VW Group has been able to process previous BEV orders, according to the CAM study.
In order for the market to ramp up, car manufacturers would increasingly have to offer cheaper BEVs. This increases the pressure because the profit margins “at many established volume manufacturers are low or negative,” said Bratzel.
BEV sales by the Chinese SAIC group are likely to have fallen by 4 percent to around 500,000, while GAC and Geely are likely to have increased significantly to around 350,000 electric cars each. According to CAM calculations, the South Korean Hyundai group sold 370,000 BEVs in the first nine months, and the French-Italian Stellantis group sold around 280,000.