New energy vehicles export drive accelerates

Chinese firms eye more overseas markets

A cargo of 3,600 new energy vehicles recently transported to Southeast Asia from Nansha Port in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, marked the largest single shipment to date by a Chinese NEV startup.

The electric Neta V models, made by Hozon, left China in late March, destined for Thailand and neighboring countries aboard a ship operated by NYK Line.

Before this shipment, Hozon, which is based in Shanghai, had sold more than 3,000 electric vehicles in Thailand since it started trading in the nation in August.

The startup's Neta V ranked second on a list of popular electric vehicles, or EVs, in the Thai market in the first quarter of this year, with 2,502 vehicles delivered, local media outlet AutoLife reported.

The best-selling model was Chinese manufacturer BYD's Atto 3. In total, 5,542 of these vehicles were delivered to Thai owners during the same period.

Six of the top 10 EV models on the list are from Chinese brands. In addition to the Hozon and BYD vehicles, the list includes the Ora Good Cat from Great Wall Motors and the MG4 Electric, MG EP, and MG ZS EV from SAIC.

Combined, the Chinese vehicles accounted for nearly 78 percent of the Thai EV market in the first quarter, with the rest of the market shared by models from Tesla and Volvo.

In addition to Thailand, Chinese NEVs are attracting attention and orders in other overseas markets, including European countries, Israel, Australia and Japan.

The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, or CAAM, reported that a total of 248,000 EVs and plug-in hybrids were shipped overseas from China in the first quarter, a year-on-year rise of 110 percent.

The popularity of vehicles made in China, especially NEVs, started to rise in 2021, with exports reaching 2 million, taking industry insiders by surprise.

For nearly all of the preceding decade, the figure stood at about 1 million vehicles, even though China became the world's largest vehicle market in 2009.

Last year, such exports reached a new high of 3.11 million, a 54.4 percent year-on-year rise, with China overtaking Germany as the world's No 2 vehicle exporter.

Overseas demand for NEVs is rising fast, and 679,000 were shipped from China last year, a rise of 120 percent from 2021.

However, this soaring demand has been accompanied by rising shipping costs.

Data from marine analysis agency Clarkson Research show that in mid-2020, it cost $10,000 per day to hire a ship with a capacity of 6,500 vehicles, but in December, the price rocketed to $110,000 a day.

Some carmakers complain that despite these fees they have to wait a long time to ship vehicles.

SAIC, China's largest vehicle maker, does not have this problem. It has its own logistics company, Anji, which helped ship more than 600,000 of the company's models to global destinations last year, or about 60 percent of its total exports for the year.