Agree and from what we can see with the vehicle in Australia, they are made to a price for sure. It’s a bit like the early Hyundai/Kias that competed against the Japanese brands, only time will tell how they actually last, suspect lack of parts in 8-10 years time might be a big issue with them
Most of the vehicles that are cheap in China are vehicles that wouldn't sell at all in the US. I know they sell larger models with larger price tags, but if your selling something that is like a Tesla 3 or a Mach E in size for $25K or less, there is something going on there....plus the whole how well do these vehicles hold up over the long term poses an interesting question-are they being developed to be put into a wrecking yard in 5-7 years?
I could pose an argument that today, legacy brands’ compact BEVs are either too expensive or rubbish
and apart from Tesla, sales of those vehicles are not what most legacy brands are focusing on but yes,
it is different to the 1970s and 80s because the small ICE vehicle market is mature and thriving.
The revolution of small affordable BEVs is being offered by China but the difference today is that opening
the door to those brands would probably decimate all the current high volume ice commodity vehicle sales.
I see that as a huge political challenge - here is a chance for rapid green BEV uptake today but
it comes at a heck of a price, are governments going to eventually “Walmart” the car industry?
I think US and Europe need to hit the pause button and think carefully.
Context (desperately hoping not to get into the weeds here)
Back in the ,60s and early ‘70s, many boomers considered Japan the enemy, thankfully, not anymore.
Sorry, I don’t like using the term enemy when discussing commerce but understand if others do but yeah,
I think it’s foolish to ignore the long drain on GDP and jobs that’s been happening over the past 50 years
all because multinational corporations saw huge advantages in offshoring their manufacturing and production.
I also understand that many consumers also want those lower prices too, so there’s that.
Lots to unpack there and don’t know if I conveyed all of that properly…
I bought at IPO, which was a dumb move looking back, but I figured with Ford backing them and Amazon backing them they were unstoppable. We see what happened with the Ford deal. I've bought a lot more recently and have a much better average cost, there's some things on production and engineering they need to figure out to lower production cost, but they have some really solid product so far. Still consider them a risk, but we'll see what happens as their new models come out.. I personally think they're the only start up that's going to survive out of the ev companies, but time will tell.
Edit to add: They'll never reach TSLA levels of valuation because they just build cars. Tesla is FAR more than just a car company, even if most don't want to admit that.
IMO there was a couple of factors working against Detroit when Japanese makes became popular
First off small cars where not that popular in the 1960-1970s, which nearly all the imports where at the time, so the Big 3 didn't feel that threatened.
Then after the Energy crises of the 1970s happened, smaller cars became more appealing and Japanese had an advantage there, plus the trash that was getting built from the 1970s to the mid 1980s from Detroit with quality issues didn't help themselves either.
The Chinese experiment was based on hey maybe if they get a taste of capitalism they become more liberal/democratic, but after the events of 1989, everyone should have thought long and hard about investing there, but everyone had $$$ in their eyes...and we are reaping that now.
Not to mention things are a bit more cut and dry with them operating here then say what happened almost 50 years ago with the Japanese.