Now that China has relaxed its joint-ownership mandates, BMW has announced that it will procure a majority stake in its venture with Brilliance Automotive. The German firm will be the first foreign automaker to have majority control of its business in the region.

Being first will not come cheaply, however. It will cost BMW $4.2 billion to assume control with a majority stake of 75 percent of the business — albeit as part of a larger deal. All the manufacturer has to do is come up with the funds and wait until 2022, when rules limiting foreign ownership for all Chinese auto ventures are officially lifted.  Read More >

Tariffs and other pressures are weighing on the once blistering hot Chinese new car market, and a suspension issue has now added new storm clouds to General Motors’ formerly sunny skies. The automaker’s Chinese arm, GM Shanghai, has announced the recall of 3.3 million Chevrolet, Buick, and Cadillac models.

Bad news for a foreign company in a suddenly dodgy market. Read More >

While the trade situation is still very much in flux, Toyota sees itself as standing to gain from the turmoil, just not in the United States. The automaker, along with other Japanese brands, finds itself in an advantageous position in China — a massive market facing its own troubles.

China’s anger at the U.S., and vice versa, could mean big bucks in the short term for Toyota. Read More >

Last week, we looked at how the world’s largest automotive markets are coping. If you’re interested in an abridged version, they could all be doing better. We also noted that China was getting around to summarizing its summer sales data. Well, that ship has since come in, and it was full of corpses. The country has endured three straight months of falling car sales after years of consistent growth.

As the world’s largest automotive market, China impacts just about every other industrialized nation on the planet. Unfortunately, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) reported that influence helped the market share of U.S. brands fall to 10.7 percent in the first eight months of 2018 versus 12.2 percent just one year earlier. The association’s assistant secretary general, Xu Haidong, said this decline could be attributed to American firms inability to refresh their lineups in a timely manner and definitely had nothing to do with the trade war, anti-American sentiments, or the boycotting of U.S. brands by Chinese consumers.  Read More >

U.S. Ford Focus production ended in May, but the automaker planned to import the next-generation Focus Active, a slightly lifted, mildly cladded five-door, in order to have something to sell to entry-level buyers. With the subcompact Fiesta ceasing production early next spring and the Fusion following it a couple of years later, that left very little low-end product for new or returning customers.

Well, scratch a crossoverized Focus off your shopping list. The automaker now says the Focus Active will not arrive on these shores in the latter part of 2019, or any date after that.

After learning this, how many of you are now pricing a three-cylinder, FWD EcoSport? Anyone? Hello? Read More >

This Chinese New Yorker is a long way from home. Photos snapped by TTAC reader MUSASHI66 show a GAC GS8 SUV sunning itself in an Aurora, Colorado parking lot. Wearing New York dealer plates, the SUV also carries a Motorola Radius two-way radio and front passenger seat-mounted laptop, which isn’t standard content in any SUV.

Of course, this isn’t just any SUV. It’s a utility vehicle made by an automaker that really, really wants to spread its wings in the United States. Read More >

Evergrande Health Industry Group Ltd, which owns a 45 percent stake in U.S.-based Faraday Future, said Tuesday that the electric vehicle startup has officially moved its headquarters to China. The group claims Faraday now plans on building five R&D and production facilities across the country over the next decade.

The intended goal is to have the startup reach an annual production capacity of 5 million vehicles within 10 years and launch multiple “premium to entry-level segments for the global auto market, to build an internet-based intelligent mobility ecosystem,” Evergrande said.

It sounds a little premature for a company that managed to evade certain death by the skin of its teeth — and only just snagged a manufacturing facility — a few months ago.
Read More >

General Motors wants an exemption from a 25 percent U.S. tariff for the Buick Envision, the Chinese-made sport utility positioned between the Encore and Enclave. On Thursday, the automaker said it filed the request on July 30th with the U.S. Trade Representative to exclude the model from the prospective Section 301 tariff on products shipped from China.

The Envision hasn’t been a strong seller in the United States. While it managed to move 41,040 units in 2017, this year is not on track to meet that number. Obviously, the model has had some troubles. Early reviews were unfavorable, often accusing the Envision of being a faux luxury vehicle with an overly ambitious price tag. However, the manufacturer has since dropped the price and updated the vehicle for the 2019 model year.

Unfortunately, enough damage was dealt in those first two years to make the new model look less appetizing to customers. It now holds the stigma of an overpriced, Chinese-made compact crossover that falls short just about everywhere. It needs time to rebuild its image after the refresh, and it won’t be able to manage that if it is taxed into oblivion.  Read More >

Former Jeep and Ram boss Mike Manley was a top choice among the candidates competing to succeed Sergio Marchionne, but no one could have expected his ascension to the CEO’s chair would occur in such a sudden, tragic manner.

During his first earning call, Manley was forced to address not just his predecessor’s death — which occurred mere hours before investors, analysts, and journalists picked up the phone — but also the automaker’s slipping grasp on the Chinese market. FCA’s revenue and net income took a haircut in the second quarter of 2018. The company’s share price plunged in the wake of news of Marchionne’s death. And, last but not least, there’s tariffs flying left and right, cutting into the automaker’s earnings — indeed, the company has already readjusted its earnings forecast downward.

Some first week on the job. Read More >

Nah, that’s completely false. You know exactly which car buyers would turn up their noses at the prospect of bringing home a brand new Geely or GAC. (Aren’t these brand names inspiring?)

After becoming familiar names in Europe, new tariffs have made the imminent influx of Chinese-branded vehicles into the U.S. less than certain. Suddenly, the 2018 Detroit auto show, with its big display of shiny new GACs (including a luxurious minivan with La-Z-Boy-like rear seats), seems so long ago.

But pretend for a second that the new tariffs don’t exist, and that Chinese automakers are poised to open up American showrooms tomorrow. Who’s likely to consider one? Who isn’t? A recent study will almost certainly not surprise you. Read More >

We’ve mentioned Chinese startups working on electric vehicles in the past. You’ve got the American-based (but Chinese-owned) Faraday Future that couldn’t pay its bills, its big brother LeSEE (which is facing similar troubles), the performance-focused NIO, the luxury-minded Byton, the German-named Weltmeister, and a handful of others making ink every so often.

While EV startups from other countries (Tesla, Rimac, etc.) garner their own headlines, it’s more common to see a Chinese startup angling for media exposure as of late.

Of course, established automakers are busy setting up their own electric divisions to fulfill the nearly absent Western consumer demand for EVs. They’re gambling on a future where electrification replaces internal combustion, but nobody is betting more on “green” than China. As of today, it’s estimated that the country has 487 electric car companies, and the nation feels this still isn’t enough. Holy shit.  Read More >

Unlike Volvo’s S90 sedan, which is built half a world away from its V90 wagon stablemate, the Chinese-owned Swedish automaker has some flexibility in where it sources its XC60 crossover. Two plants — one in China, one in Torslanda, Sweden — crank out the second-generation utility vehicle, but the U.S. market gets its full share from the Orient.

After the Trump administration imposed a tariff of 25 percent on Chinese-built vehicles, Volvo’s XC60 suddenly found itself dragging a financial anchor. Hardly a great situation for a model that outsold all other Volvos in the U.S. last month. To side-step the tariff, Volvo’s already making changes.

Say goodbye to the Chinese XC60. Read More >

China and Germany signed a collection of commercial accords valued at $23.5 billion this week. Meanwhile, the nations’ leaders publicly affirmed their commitment to a multilateral global trade order, while the United States adopts a more protectionist policy.

“We both want to sustain the system of World Trade Organization rules,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said during a press conference. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, also present, agreed and stated protectionism must be prevented for the good of the global economy.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has already pleaded for governments to maintain an open trading policy. “We reject selfish, shortsighted, closed, narrow policies, [we] uphold World Trade Organisation rules, support a multi-lateral trade system, and building an open world economy,” Xi said in an incredibly hypocritical speech from last month.  Read More >

Tesla’s sole assembly plant in Fremont, California won’t be lonely for long. A preliminary deal reached between the automaker and the government of Shanghai could see a new assembly plant start production in about three years’ time. The Chinese plant would most likely build Model 3s and upcoming Model Y crossovers, Bloomberg reports.

Assuming Tesla can scrounge up the $4 to $5 billion needed to complete construction of the facility (a Goldman Sachs estimate), the plant could produce up to 500,000 vehicles per year. And it just so happens that Shanghai has a free trade zone. Read More >

That “someone else” might be a Chinese buyer. At least, that’s what former Cadillac president Johan de Nysschen implied in March, shortly before packing his bags and hitting the road.

The premium sedan market stands to grow along with the rest of that country’s appetite for high-zoot models, he said, even though the overall take rate might shrink.

American buyers, however, have made it clear what they want. And what they want isn’t what Cadillac’s planning for its Lansing Grand River assembly plant, if sales stats tell us anything. Read More >