BYD on track to top 2024 sales goal and outsell Ford, Honda
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox
BYD is on course to beat its annual sales target of four million vehicles, more than Honda and Ford in 2024 worldwide sales.
PHOTO: EPA-EFE
Follow topic:
SHANGHAI/BEIJING – China’s top electric vehicle (EV) producer BYD is set to show further market share gains when November data is released on Dec 9, putting it on course to exceed its annual goal and overtake Ford and Honda in global sales.
BYD has been on an extraordinary expansion in 2024, growing capacity and undertaking a massive hiring spree to turbocharge revenue, which overtook EV leader Tesla in the third quarter.
Aided by robust sales in China that continued in recent months, BYD is on course to beat its annual sales target of four million vehicles, more than Japan’s Honda and Detroit-based Ford in 2024 worldwide sales.
The Chinese EV giant delivered 3.76 million vehicles in the first 11 months this year, including 506,804 units sold in November.
Its strong sales, led by a competitive line-up of models with its latest plug-in hybrid technology, are likely to show the firm added more market share when the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) releases November data.
As at October, BYD’s share of the China auto market, which makes up more than 90 per cent of its total sales, stood at 16.2 per cent, up from 12.5 per cent in 2023, according to the CPCA data.
Volkswagen’s two joint ventures with SAIC and FAW Group took a combined 12.5 per cent market share in the January-October period, compared with 14.2 per cent last year.
If that sales momentum continues, BYD could sell more than six million units in the next 12 months. This would put it on a par with the world’s leading carmaker groups such as General Motors (GM) and Stellantis.
The Chinese firm aims to deliver five million to six million cars in 2025, Citi analysts said in a recent note after a meeting with management.
During August to October, the automaker added nearly 200,000 units in production capacity and hired 200,000 workers for auto and parts manufacturing, an executive said in November.
The total number of BYD employees was close to one million as at September, up from around 703,500 at end 2023.
Its efforts to boost scale have helped it outpace rivals in growth, better control costs and win a brutal price war in China that has squeezed many foreign automakers. BYD has asked dozens of its suppliers for price cuts, according to a recent state-owned media report.
GM said last week it would take more than US$5 billion (S$6.7 billion) in charges on its China operation due to restructuring and declining value of its joint venture that has suffered losses and weakening sales. REUTERS
