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Foreign automakers willfully arrived at their current China market predicament | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
Okay, it’s been a while since the last blog post. No excuses. The springboard for today’s blog is a story I wrote for Automotive News on November 14, 2005. It highlights how, while foreign brands may have seemed to be winners in the China market until recently, where they ended up today, with plummeting sales…
Where are the T1 suppliers in China now? | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
In April of 2004, I wrote a story for Automotive News about the Yanfeng Visteon joint venture in Shanghai. Its subsidiary company Yanfeng Visteon Automotive Trim Systems accounted for almost one-third of the JV’s sales. It was the number one automotive trim supplier in China at the time. A month later I wrote about how…
An early prediction about those pesky Chinese exports | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
In 2003 I worked for Automotive News in China. Late that year, my then-colleague Jim Treece flew over from Japan. We interviewed numerous foreign and Chinese OEMs, including J.M. Noh, president of Beijing Hyundai, a joint venture between Hyundai and BAIC. We talked to him at the site of the JV’s new plant, under construction…
SAIC-GM-Wuling: The beginning of missed opportunities? | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
As many of you know, I lived in China for around 14 years including a couple of stints as a student, in 1984 in Nanjing and in 1991-93 in Kunming (I was teaching English and studying Chinese concurrently part of that stint). I moved back to Greater China -- since Hong Kong was still British…
Education key in WM Motor’s plan to create a second-hand EV trading platform | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
When I read about WM Motor’s idea to launch a trading platform for second hand electric vehicles, my initial thought was that it was doomed to fail. How will WM determine residual value for those vehicles, I thought? After talking with some experts I’m still not convinced it won’t end up being a total money…
Human Horizons aims to be more than just an EV startup in China | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
Ecosystem is the new buzz word in China’s electric vehicle startup world. Take my recent conversation with James Shyr, chief design officer and a founding partner of Human Horizons, a Shanghai-based company. “The automotive industry, in our opinion, has largely remained inside its own walled garden, closed off from the rest of the ecosystem,” says…
China EV maker Seres adjusts U.S. plan to fit reality | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
Several Chinese EV makers have recently scaled back their U.S. market plans. One, Seres Automotive, at least has a Plan B, its new co-CEO Jim Taylor tells ChinaEV. It aims to be both a contract manufacturer at its U.S. plant and a supplier of electric vehicle drive train technology. Launching an electric vehicle in the…
Toyota and BYD–China NEV regs make for interesting bedfellows | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
BYD has long been loathe to share its battery technology with other automakers. Of course, some would say that is not a huge loss as BYD doesn’t have the best battery technology around. There have been rumblings of change at BYD of late, however. When I interviewed BYD Auto Sales Co. vice general manager Li…
Magna aims to sell EVs in China through JV with BAIC | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
Magna International is jumping on the China EV band wagon. Well, that’s not entirely correct. It was already a major player in the EV component space. Now, Magna will form two joint ventures with Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Corp aka BAIC. One joint venture will focus on engineering, the other will manufacture pure electric vehicles.…
WM Motor aims to be China’s BEV for the masses | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
I was in China the last half of February doing interviews for a comprehensive report on China’s NEV sector I am writing for Wards Intelligence. It should be out in May. Everyone buy it! One of the folks I interviewed was my old friend Freeman Shen, whom I met in the year 2000 or so…
China’s EV sector needs concrete revisions in the dual credit policy, not vague comments | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
Some pretty important statements regarding the future of China’s New Energy Vehicle market emerged from the just-concluded ChinaEV 100 Forum in Beijing. (Full disclosure: I was not there.) But as usual, the central government made only vague statements regarding NEV policy. What it needs to do is revise its dual-credit policy, because the one it…
Protean Electric gaining traction in U.S., China with in-wheel motors — finally | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
The proof is in the pudding, as the saying goes. I’m not exactly sure what that means, but I think it applies to Protean Electric’s current situation. I’ve been writing about Protean since 2012. The “start-up” is still chugging along, still working to get automakers to give its in-wheel electric motors a try. “We…
GYON adds name to long list of Chinese EV startups | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
LOS ANGELES -- Can you believe it? Another EV startup -- that will produce "affordable luxury" electric vehicles -- has popped up. It is called GYON -- name is an acronym for "Grow Your Own Niche." I attended an event here on August 8 to announce GYON's partnership with the Gaffoglio Family Metalcrafters, a firm in…
How to become a lifestyle brand on the cheap, or the China EV startup dilemma | Alysha Webb's ChinaEV Blog
I just returned from a two-week trip to China doing research for my next report for Wards Intelligence, this one on autonomous vehicles. I will save my insights on that sector for the report itself, which will be out in coming months. Meanwhile, I have some thoughts on the electric vehicle sector, which I wrote…