Again, China’s vaunted export machine received a black eye: China imported more cars in 2010 than it exported. Of the 18.27 million cars China produced in2010, a pittance of 2.98 percent left the country according to statistics released by China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) via China Autoweb. (Read More…)

Another indicator that the Chinese car market is not about to collapse, as projected (hoped?) by some: Daimler is guiding towards robust sales in January. “I hope that we will see double digit gains again in January,” Mercedes sales Chief Joachim Schmidt told Reuters. With the month nearly over, executives won’t “hope” what they don’t already know. And what does that have to do with China? (Read More…)

The oft predicted collapse of the Chinese market does not seem to happen. GM is the canary in the Chinese coalmine, and January, the month before the Lunar New Year festivities, is a key selling month. So goes GM, so goes China, so goes January, so goes the year. This time, January was especially critical: Many had predicted that the cancellation of tax incentives for sub 1.6 liter cars, that went in effect on January 1, would have serious pull-forward repercussions. Not as far as GM is concerned. (Read More…)

The civilian version of the car shown in the video will soon be available for purchase, reports TheTycho from Beijing. It won’t come with the microphones and the stand-up podium behind the driver. Instead, it will have full reclining seats in  the back. (Read More…)

Troubled BYD has even more problems: Dealers defect the Chinese car maker, because the alleged master of the electric vehicle has perfected one ancient tradecraft: The art of channel stuffing. A Beijing BYD store switched to another brand because BYD required them to carry a whopping six times the monthly selling rate on the lot. The poor dealer that moved 70 BYDs in a good month was sitting on a steadily restocked inventory of 400 units.

Even that generous inventory strategy did not help: (Read More…)

The recession must have come to a sudden end.  Volkswagen can’t make enough Phaetons to meet demand. Last year, Volkswagen sold 7,000 of the facelifted Über-VW. This year, all indicators say “mehr.” You probably suspect who’s buying most of those Phaetons: (Read More…)

The privileged life of the Chinese government employee is coming to an end. The southern metropolis of Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) will be using GPS to track usage of the city’s government vehicles, with the aim of preventing their unauthorized personal use. It’s not that the city is trying to curb unnecessary spending. (Read More…)

As the world’s first commercially-available (ish) plug-in hybrid, the BYD F3DM is one of the few modern cars that can legitimately claim a piece of automotive history. In full knowledge of this fact, a younger, more innocent version of myself once sent a number of emails to every possible BYD PR contact I could find, in hopes of securing an early review of the car that ushered in the plug-in automotive age. Needless to say, I never heard back from BYD… but I expected that. What I didn’t expect is that, years later, I still wouldn’t be able to find a real in-depth review of this mysterious yet potentially groundbreaking vehicle. Apparently BYD is either extremely cautious about letting writers experience its vehicles outside of convention hall laps and round-the-block drives… or the automotive media has a very poor sense of history. Or, as is most likely the case, both.

Either way, this strange state of affairs just got stranger: thanks to plugincars.com, we now have the first report of the F3DM’s performance on American roads… from an LA Public Housing Authority inspector. Yes, really.

(Read More…)

10 days ago, we reported that Porsche’s Matthias Müller had told the German magazine Focus that Porsche will decide this year whether they will build the new Cajun in China. Or in the U.S. It didn’t take them long to make up their minds. (Read More…)

BYD had a bit of a rough time lately. This might cheer them up: According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, a joint design team of BYD and Daimler has finished the styling of an all-electric battery car that will be launched by a BYD/Daimler ( or “Benz” as they call them in China) joint venture. (Read More…)

Ever since GM announced its BaoJun, ever since Nissan showed its Qi Chen and Honda launched its Li Nian, creating Chinese car brands has become all the rage. Volkswagen doesn’t want to be left out. Volkswagen, (German for “the people’s car”) plans a standalone brand for the people of the People’s Republic. (Read More…)

Another American car company rides to the rescue of China’s feared, but so far dismal car exports. Ford is in talks with its Chinese Joint venture partner Changan to export China-made Ford vehicles to emerging markets, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters. (Read More…)

“About 13.8 million vehicles were sold in 2010 in China compared with 11.6 million in the United States.”
The Detroit News

Yesterday, we had a short seminar on Chinese new car statistics. Apparently, it was needed. Too bad the Detroit News, Motor City’s hometown newspaper, skipped class. Message to the DetN:  It’s 18 million vehicles. 18,264,700 to be exact.

So where do the 13.8 come from? We know: In 2010, Chinese passenger car sales reached 13.76 million. However, that number excludes “commercial vehicles.” Common mistake. But shouldn’t happen to a Detroit paper.

Dear DetN: If you don’t count the Chinese “commercial vehicles”, then you can’t count the U.S. “trucks” either. You really don’t want to do that.

The case of three Renault executives who are accused of passing off trade secrets to a foreign firm has taken yet another turn for the confusing, as two of the dismissed managers are suing Renault for defamation. Reuters reports that Michel Balthazard, the highest-ranking executive to be accused in the case, has joined colleague Bertrand Rochette in threatening to file a defamation suit against his former employer. Balthazard is also appealing his dismissal to a French labor tribunal, in hopes of being reinstated at the company. Rochette, Balthazard and a third exec, Matthieu Tenenbaum, are accused of passing strategic information to a foreign network in exchange for bribe payments, charges all three executives deny. According to the WSJ, Rochette denies even having a Swiss bank account into which Renault alleges his bribes were deposited. Meanwhile, French finance minister Christine Lagarde tells the NYT that

I really don’t think that the Renault case has a Chinese angle. I have zero indication

But, as has been typical thus far in this strange case, other French officials including the head of Parliament’s economic intelligence working group insist that a Chinese connection is involved. We will continue to keep an eye on this case… but don’t expect much clarity on the details for some time.

China’s Chongqing Changan is entering the lion’s den. The Chinese joint venture partner of Ford, Suzuki, and PSA will open a research center in Detroit and draw from the rich talent pool. Changan will become the first Chinese automobile company to establish such a center in the US, Gasgoo says. (Read More…)