If and when China’s car export machine ever gets going in earnest, the city of Chongqing in Western China could become one of its main export hubs. Chongqing is not a sea port. It is the far eastern terminus of a 7,000 mile railroad line that connects Chongqing with Duisburg in Germany. (Read More…)
The Chinese car market keeps plodding along. Total vehicle sales were 1,761,500 in May, up 9.81 percent. Passenger car sales were up 9.04 percent to 1,419,700 units. Commercial sales were up 12.88 percent to 364,600 units, the Chinese auto manufacturer association CAAM says.
(Read More…)
Russia is one of the BRIC countries, the folks that are supposed to power the world to new prosperity. Too bad Russia is running out of steam. Russian car sales dropped 12 percent in May, the Association of European Businesses (AEB) told Reuters. (Read More…)
What do People’s Daily, the voice of China’s Communist Party, and Jalopnik have in common? More than you would imagine. Just as a for instance, both are masters of the fine art of pecksniffian outrage. Both are experts when it comes to condemning loose morals, as long as the condemnation can be illustrated with enough graphic, click-generating pictures that show said loose morals in practice. Sanctimonious click-whoring knows no boundaries, and it transcends ideologies: Gawker and CCCP, unite!
A few days ago, Peoples Daily ran an 11 high resolution picture gallery, ostensibly condemning the fact that
“in addition to taking off clothes, some commercial promotions have chosen a more disgusting way to attract public attention. From sexy dress to body painting, public’s moral bottom line has been challenged again and again.”
(Jalopnik, aware of its TL;NR clientele, would have said it with fewer words, and with at least as many pictures.)
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With Volvo in Chinese hands, with a new Volvo plant in Chengdu “more or less completed,” and a second assembly plant in Daqing to come online in late 2014, there have been reports in Europe that Volvos may soon come from China instead from Sweden. Not true, Volvo’s production chief Lars Wrebo told Automobilwoche [sub]. However, “other markets” than Europe could get the Made-in-China Volvos. (Read More…)
Fiat might be looking for another Chinese joint venture partner to manufacture Jeeps, Fiat CEo Sergio Marchionne told Reuters. “In China we have a good partner, and we have the possibility to use a second one to develop Jeep,” Marchionne said. (Read More…)
This is the last Part of a 5 Part-series about how the Chinese car manufacturers are faring abroad.
You can check out Part 1 about Africa here, Part 2 about Latin America here, Part 3 about Eastern Europe here and Part 4 about Asia here.
The first 4 Parts in this series have shown Chinese manufacturers securing the less developed markets in each region as springboards to expand further. Less developed means smaller and less sophisticated but also less regulated as far as pollution and safety are concerned. These last two aspects have been the main barrier to the Chinese carmakers’ entrance in mature markets to date, and specific strategies have had to be developed to address this. This is why I am grouping all ‘mature markets’ in one article, independent of their geographic location…
Nice car you’ve got here
After newly elected President Barack Obama slapped a punitive tariff on made-in-China tires, China looked for a good tit-for-tat and quickly found one: The US imported $1.8b worth of Chinese tires in 2009, while China imported $1.1b worth of US-built cars in 2008. A retaliatory tariff was slapped on Escalades et al. Now, the same is about to happen to BMWs and Benzes coming from Europe.
“China is considering imposing import duties on high-end European cars following complaints over subsidies that enable EU carmakers to sell in China at a loss,” Reuters reports. That, of course, is only half of the story. The EU slapped a punitive tariff on made-in-China solar modules, despite opposition from a majority of EU countries, most notably Germany. Not surprisingly, China fights back. (Read More…)
This is Part 4 of a 5 Part-series about how the Chinese car manufacturers are faring abroad.
You can check out Part 1 about Africa here, Part 2 about Latin America here and Part 3 about Eastern Europe here.
In the first 3 parts of this series we have observed that Chinese carmakers have managed their expansion into Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe by securing less developed markets and using them as anchor points for a more widespread presence in these regions. In this context it’s interesting to note that in their own ‘backyard’, Asia, the same strategy has not been met with the same success, with only a handful of small markets in the region ‘cracked’ so far..
This is Part 3 of a 5 Part-series about how the Chinese car manufacturers are faring abroad.
You can check out Part 1 about Africa here and Part 2 about Latin America here.
As illustrated in Africa and Latin America, Chinese manufacturers have been working extra-hard below the radar to secure less developed markets that will form the bulk of global car sales growth over the next couple of decades. Their approach to Eastern Europe is very similar. There are currently three Chinese assembling hubs in the region – in Russia, Ukraine and Bulgaria – acting as a very convenient springboard for further expansion throughout the continent, including all the ex-USSR nations and potentially Western Europe…
GM’s sales in GM’s and the world’s largest auto market China were up 9.4 percent in May, the company says. In April, sales had been up 15.3 percent.
This is Part 2 of a 5 Part-series about how the Chinese car manufacturers are faring abroad.
You can check out Part 1 about Africa here.
If Chinese carmakers have started exporting to Africa in the early 00′s, they set foot in Latin America even earlier, with JAC starting to export trucks to Bolivia back in 1990. Similarly to the strategy they adopted in Africa, the Chinese have initially focused on the less developed car markets in the region. They are now in the process of stepping up their involvement by launching in the bigger, more mature markets like Argentina and Brazil.
In fact, the foundations the Chinese have built in secondary Latin American car markets are potentially their strongest in the world so far…
A few weeks ago, GM’s spokesman Greg Martin said:
“There will be no exports of these cars built in China. Cars that are built in China are sold in China.”
No true, said GM China head Bob Socia to Reuters today, reiterating former statements that GM’s Chinese export machine is in full swing: “GM plans to export as many as 130,000 China-made vehicles this year, up from 77,000 vehicles in 2012, driven by demand for its Chevrolet Sail in other emerging markets,” Reuters writes. (Read More…)
Volvo’s global sales are on a downward trajectory. The Geely-owned Swedish marker saw its 2012 global sales drop 6%. In the first four months of the year, sales were down 6.4 percent. Two new factories in China are supposed to bring the turn-around, a feature in Reuters says. (Read More…)
Today we inaugurate a 5 Part series about how Chinese carmakers are setting themselves up for success abroad. Each day of this week I will publish a new Part for the series. I hope you enjoy it!
For the first time in the history of car manufacturing, Chinese carmakers have sold 1 million cars outside of China in 2012. They are now relying more and more on export markets to boost their bottom-line, especially as conditions have worsened for local passenger cars at home over the last couple of years. However, as I described in my article “China: How local brands may finally find their mojo at home“, the Chinese are learning how to sell low-cost overseas and apply these strategies at home, making themselves more competitive in the process.
In fact, while the long-dreaded Chinese ‘invasion’ of the West European and American car markets is still a long way off, Chinese manufacturers have been working extra-hard under the radar to secure less developed markets that will form the bulk of the global car sales growth over the next couple of decades.
And this is why they will win…
First case in point, Africa.
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