There’s no denying that Chinese language automobiles could be polarising.
The common particular person doesn’t actually care the place their automobile is coming from, although, and with non-Chinese language manufacturers like Tesla, Mini, BMW, Volvo and others already making and delivering automobiles to our market from China, the thought of a Chinese language automobile is definitely slightly blurry.
Nonetheless, there are many precise Chinese language manufacturers like MG, GWM and Chery which can be already working in Australia and there are various extra (Zeekr, Aion and so on) which can be set to launch within the close to future.
The onslaught of Chinese language manufacturers in our market has solely simply began, and spending final week on the Beijing motor present made us realise simply how way more there’s to return and, extra importantly, why it would come.
It was the very first motorshow we’ve got attended the place referring to ourselves as Automobile Consultants most likely didn’t apply. So many manufacturers, so many automobiles… like a child in a sweet retailer not realizing what most of it was.
From four-door sedans with scissor doorways, an virtually limitless variety of SUVs in differing sizes wanting like G-Wagens and Defenders to limitless hypercar-looking EVs that blended the easiest of their donor’s designs, the Chinese language carmakers had been out in power to showcase what that they had constructed and what that they had coming.
To say that right here in Australia, we’ve got an excellent grasp of what’s obtainable in China when it comes to automotive choices can be laughable.
There may be genuinely a automobile for everybody, and with the speedy takeover of electrical automobiles, the capability to take the identical battery and motor setup and put it in as many physique varieties and types has created a fast-paced tradition that ought to scare the hell out of the remainder of the automotive manufacturing world.
Whereas the Europeans and particularly the Japanese have struggled to adapt to the altering world of electrification on the similar charge because the Chinese language, this motion is a lot extra than simply EVs.
Virtually each Chinese language automobile we jumped in had extra screens than any Japanese automobile on sale right now, usually utilizing tremendous responsive Android software program that felt like the most recent smartphone slightly than the antiquated techniques you’d discover in most Japanese automobiles. The match and end of the interiors was additionally an enormous step up from what we’re used to right here right now.
The final time we attended the Beijing motor present was earlier than COVID, and the speed of change has been marked because the Chinese language have employed international engineers, manufacturing managers and designers – MG, for instance, lately appointed the man who penned the Bugatti Veyron as a designer.
Now I do know you’re considering, “However the high quality is crap!” It’s actually not. This may increasingly have had some reality a decade and even 5 years in the past, nevertheless it’s categorically not the case now.
We sat in over 50 completely different automobiles and pushed and prodded as many issues as we might and tried to scratch beneath the floor.
We additionally did the identical to the non-Chinese language manufacturers on the present and naturally, you may’t decide high quality, reliability and sturdiness primarily based on sitting in a automobile, however in an apples-to-apples comparability, the Chinese language automobiles critically stacked up. Typically, they had been really nicer to be in.
It’s a genuinely scary thought what has occurred in that market and the way rapidly it has all come about.
Given the lengthy guarantee intervals manufacturers like GWM, MG and Chery have in Australia (seven-year, unlimited-kilometre warranties for all), there is no such thing as a query the carmakers again their merchandise as properly.
However why Australia? Why has our market change into the Chinese language battleground for thus many rising carmakers? The explanations are fairly easy when put into context. Australia is the closest and best Western marketplace for Chinese language manufacturers to check their merchandise.
Going to Europe requires billions of funding, and North America is even worse. As for Australia, a model can arrange an inexpensive chain of dealerships in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide and canopy nearly all of the inhabitants comparatively rapidly.
This enables Chinese language manufacturers to check market acceptance earlier than they make investments considerably extra and enter a lot bigger Western markets.
This actually was the case with MG, with the model having come right here, confirmed itself to be very profitable, then ventured into markets in Europe and past.
Rewind 10 years to 2014 and solely 4154 Chinese language-made automobiles had been bought in Australia. Final yr, 193,433 reached Australian patrons, and they’re solely getting began.
