Automotive News World Top 20 June 2016 (Special Edition) - SIBEJO-

BYD Qin: "I'm baaack..."

Models - Tesla Model S Wins June

The global EV market continues to grow at rapid pace, with over 68.000 units delivered in May, representing a 61% growth YoY, with the YTD total up 49%, we are headed for a total sales number this year of over 800.000 units, not the Million a year that everybody was hoping for, but an encouraging number nonetheless.

In the models ranking, the Best Seller of the Month was the Tesla Model S, thanks to the usual last-month-of-the-quarter-peak (5.401 units), winning for the second time this year the Best Seller Of The Month award, with the first time unsurprisingly being in March (You see the pattern, right?), then with 7.777 units. 

Looking below in the ranking, the BYD Qin was up two places to #8, thanks to 2.751 units, a year best, although still far from last last year record (4.030 in July), BYD's 300hp sedan has potential to climb even further in the ranking, possibly even repeating last year position (Fourth Place). 

As this is a Full Year special edition, we dig a little deeper, into the Top 20, where we can see five chinese models (#11 Roewe e550, #12 JAC i EV, #13 Kandi EV, #16 JMC E100, #19 Chery eQ), making it nine models coming from China in the Top 20.

The Tesla Model X it's starting to appear on the radar, in #15, having been #10 in June, expect the Minivan-that-thinks-is-a-Sports-SUV to climb to the Top 10 later in the year. 

Comparing with last year, while some models climbed positions, like the BYD Tang, now #3, or its e6 older brother (#10 now vs #22 in '15), others dropped significantly, none more so than the Volkswagen Golf GTE, #18 now, when last year it ended in #10. Just to have an idea of the dimension of the sales drop, in June '15 it had registered 1.863 units, while last month it had only 717...

Looking at the BEV / PHEV breakdown, despite a slow start, BEV's are once again leading the race with 60% share, exactly the same number as when it ended 2015.

Pl	WORLD	June	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	Nissan Leaf	4.150	27.151	9	2
2	Tesla Model S	5.401	22.181	7	1
3	BYD Tang	3.519	19.134	7	8
4 5 6	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV Renault Zoe Chevrolet Volt	1.986 2.439 2.263	15.308 11.982 11.124	5 4 4	3 7 9
7	BAIC E-Series EV	1.265	9.977	3	11
8	BYD Qin	2.751	9.404	3	4
9	BMW i3	1.432	9.303	3	5
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20	BYD e6 SAIC Roewe e550 JAC i EV 4/5 Kandi EV Ford Fusion Energi Tesla Model X JMC E100 Audi A3 e-Tron Volkswagen Golf GTE Chery eQ Volvo XC90 T8	1.647 2.329 1.349 4.670 1.722 2.166 1.500 840 717 953 844	9.226 8.711 7.862 7.797 7.300 7.038 6.027 5.525 5.666 5.337 5.315	3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2	22 15 16 N/A 17 69 36 14 10 21 39
	TOTAL	68.652	306.639

Geely: The Next Big EV Maker coming from China?

Manufacturers -  Tesla Rises to Second

BYD has set an ambitious goal of doubling sales regarding 2015, and after a slow start, the Chinese brand is pushing hard to reach its own goals, in June it delivered 10,129 units, just short of its best performance ever (Last December, with 10.148 units).

Will BYD beat its own record in July? It all points to that, the question will be by how much, the demand is there, it all will depend on their ability to deliver accordingly.

Looking elsewhere, Tesla went back to Second Place and with the Model X finally without major production constraints, expect the Fremont-based automaker to be a hard cookie to remove from the Silver Medal Place.

As this is a Full Year edition, we dig a littler deeper into the Top 20, where we see Zotye in an unusually low #13, compensated by JAC (#11 now vs #17 in '15) and Roewe (#12 vs #15) brilliant performances, with JMC also impressing.

As for newcomers, the most important is closing the ranking in #20, Geely, owner of Volvo, is finally entering the EV Game for real and has a lot of potential to grow, something that can also be said regarding the Chinese EV industry, if you don't believe it, just look at the numbers...

...In 2014, Chinese automakers had 17% of the World EV Market, in 2015 their share grew to 32% and half year passed into 2016, their share is at 39%.

Not only that, i expect Chinese car makers to have over 50% of the total EV market by December, 31st. Yes, in 2016.

So regardless of what happens outside China (Anti-Tesla & EV lobbying, Trump, Brexit, etc), the EV (R)evolution will happen, the only question is: Will traditional automakers be part of it or will they go the way of Dinosaurs, replaced by new, more evolved kids, like Tesla and the Chinese car makers?

Pl	WORLD	June	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	BYD	10.129	43.244	14	1
2	Tesla	7.567	29.222	10	2
3	Nissan	4.468	28.884	9	4
4	BMW	3.409	21.147	7	6
5 6 7	Mitsubishi Volkswagen Renault	2.401 2.810 3.098	17.705 17.030 15.481	6 6 5	3 5 8
8	BAIC	4.116	14.584	5	12
9	Chevrolet	2.627	12.947	4	11
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20	Ford JAC SAIC Roewe Zotye Kandi Volvo Mercedes JMC Chery Audi Geely	2.429 1.349 2.545 1.841 4.670 1.117 1.501 1.500 1.004 931 1.334	11.143 9.720 9.231 7.863 7.797 7.477 7.191 6.027 5.990 5.820 3.795	4 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 1	10 17 15 9 7 18 16 25 13 14 N/A

Automotive News World Top 10 May 2016 - SIBEJO-

BYD Qin: "I'm baaack..."

Models - Nissan Leaf vs BYD Tang

The global EV market continues to grow at rapid pace, with over 54.000 units delivered in May, representing a 42% growth YoY, with YTD up 45%, we are headed for a total sales number this year of around 800.000 units, not the Million a year that everybody is hoping for, but an encouraging number nevertheless.

In the models ranking, the Best Seller of the Month was the Nissan Leaf, thanks to a good result in the domestic market (805 units), just managed to edge out the BYD Tang by 44 units (3.293 vs 3.249), while YTD the Japanese hatch is comfortably ahead, although it was down 1% in share. Will we see the same picture in 2016 as last year, with the Leaf losing the leadership in the last months? 

Looking below in the ranking, the Chevrolet Volt was up to #6, making May the Third consecutive month of 2.000-something sales for the GM product, a consistent result but somewhat disappointing for those that expected 3.000-plus units from this Second Generation. Is the Chevy Bolt already making damages here? 

The BYD Qin (#3 in May) reappears in the Top 10, making three BYD's in the Top 10, the first time that any brand achieves that, while below these top positions there are models making an impact: The Kandi Panda EV was #4 in May, with 2.598 units, the SAIC Roewe e550 was #7 with 2.198 units and a certain Tesla Model X (#12 last month, with 1.603 deliveries) is already making waves, outselling (4.853 units) their direct rivals, the XC90 (4.451), X5 (4.277) and Cayenne (2.392) plug-in versions. Next Stop: Top 10 Ranking.

Pl	WORLD	May	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	Nissan Leaf	3.293	22.982	10	2
2	Tesla Model S	2.245	16.824	7	1
3	BYD Tang	3.249	15.615	7	8
4 5 6	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV Renault Zoe Chevrolet Volt	2.276 1.668 2.172	13.690 9.543 8.856	6 4 4	3 7 9
7	BAIC E-Series EV	1.714	8.712	4	11
8	BMW i3	1.520	7.846	3	5
9	BYD e6	1.683	7.579	3	22
10	BYD Qin	2.912	7.334	3	4
	TOTAL	54.504	237.526

Manufacturers -  BYD Pushing Hard

BYD has set an ambitious goal of doubling sales regarding 2015, and after a slow start, the Chinese brand is pushing hard to reach its own goals, in May it delivered 9,148 units, its second best performance ever (It set the current all-time record last December, with 10.148 units), and third best score ever by an automaker, behind the aforementioned December and Tesla's last March performance (9.636 units).

Will BYD beat its own record in June? It all points to that, but will it be enough to win over  the likely Ludicrous performance from Tesla?   

Looking elsewhere, Ford is back to #10, but JAC is close (8.371 units), so the last place in the ranking is still pretty much open.

Pl	WORLD	May	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	BYD	9.148	33.209	14	1
2	Nissan	3.485	24.346	10	4
3	Tesla	3.848	21.677	9	2
4	BMW	3.254	17.148	7	6
5 6 7	Mitsubishi Volkswagen Renault	2.579 2.822 2.103	15.614 14.182 12.383	7 6 5	3 5 8
8	BAIC	2.536	10.464	4	12
9	Chevrolet	2.576	10.318	4	11
10	Ford	2.085	8.717	4	10

Automotive News Markets Roundup May 2016 - SIBEJO-

May 2016 Top 11 EV Markets

Country	% BEV	% PHEV
China	65	35
USA	52	48
Norway	56	44
UK	31	69
France	82	18
Japan	69	31
Germany	48	52
Sweden	31	69
Belgium Holland	29 40	71 60
Canada	50	50
World	58	42

As one can see, a lot has happened since this last overview, BEV's are losing share (-4%) on a global level, but it could have been worse, as it had the help of China, the largest EV market, where BEV's recovered ground (+4% share), but there were another two markets where all electric vehicles recovered significantly, with  BEV's recovering 6% share in Japan and 23%(!) in the Netherlands, although, in this last case, fiscal incentives had a lot to do with it.

But the overall trend is PHEV's conquering share, and the more blatant cases are Belgium, the new halo market for PHEV's, where plug-in hybrids won 18% share, and Sweden, Norway & Canada, where PHEV's did even better, conquering 23% share in just 11 months...

Even France, a BEV stronghold, plug-in hybrids won share, going from 16% to 18% share.

Automotive News World Top 10 - April 2016 - SIBEJO-

Models - BYD Tang #1 in April

The global EV market continues to grow at rapid pace, with almost 50.000 units delivered in April, representing a 48% growth YoY, with YTD up 46%, we are headed for a total sales number this year of around 800.000 units, not the Million a year that everybody is hoping for, but an encouraging number neverthess.

In the models ranking, the Best Seller of the Month was the BYD Tang, with 3.145 units, while the YTD leader Nissan Leaf was a close second.

With this performance, the BYD Tang climbed one position to Third Place, displacing the Mitsu Outlander PHEV to Fourth, recovering the Best Selling SUV and PHEV title. 

Below these heavy weights, the Chevrolet Volt dropped one position to #8, despite having its best April in history, GM's model is taking more time than expected to reestablish itself as a major player in the ranking, a case of just not growing fast enough or is the all-electric Bolt already making waves?

Pl	WORLD	April	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	Nissan Leaf	3.136	19.428	11	2
2	Tesla Model S	1.893	14.508	8	1
3	BYD Tang	3.145	12.366	7	8
4 5 6	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV Renault Zoe BAIC E-Series EV	2.218 1.974 1.415	11.915 7.875 6.998	7 4 4	3 7 11
7	JAC i EV	2.331	6.741	4	16
8	Chevrolet Volt	2.248	6.687	4	9
9	BMW i3	1.904	6.202	3	5
10	BYD e6	2.089	5.896	3	22
	TOTAL	49.644	182.964

Manufacturers -  BYD New Number One

After a couple of months in the leadership, Nissan had to leave the throne for BYD, that with 7.592 units, made its best monthly performance in 2016 and looks set to be on top for a long time. 

Mitsubishi had a rather forgettable month, with only 2.516, and is now in plain sight of the players running for the Fifth position, with BMW, Volkswagen and even Renault, chasing each others tails. 

Final mention for JAC joining the Top 10, in...Tenth, replacing Ford.

Pl	WORLD	April	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	BYD	7.592	24.193	13	1
2	Nissan	3.323	20.446	11	4
3	Tesla	2.743	17.758	10	2
4	Mitsubishi	2.516	13.505	7	3
5 6 7	BMW Volkswagen Renault	4.504 3.502 2.626	13.093 11.449 10.280	7 6 6	6 5 8
8	BAIC	2.019	7.932	4	12
9	Chevrolet	2.672	7.738	4	11
10	JAC	2.331	6.741	4	17

Automotive News World Top 10 March 2016 - SIBEJO-

Tesla's Ace: After a memorable March sales month, nothing like showing the Next Big Thing

Models - Tesla Model S Goes (Almost) Ludicrous

The global EV market continues to grow at rapid pace, with the 58.000 units delivered in March representing a 37% growth YoY, with last month being the second best selling month ever, only behind the 86k of last December.

In the models ranking, the leader Nissan Leaf had its best month in a year, delivering 6.564 units, but that wasn't enough to win the Best Seller Of The Moth award, because the Tesla Model S made its usual March party trick and delivered 7.777 units, only slightly worse than the all-time record of 8.082 units set last December...

With this impressive performance, the Model S climbed one position to Second Place, displacing the BYD Tang, which slipped not one, but two positions, because the Mitsu Outlander PHEV did a year best by registering 4.532 units, just enough to displace the chinese SUV to Fourth and recover the Best Selling PHEV title. 

Below these heavy weights, a lot has also happened, with the Renault Zoe climbing one position to #5, the Chevrolet Volt slowly coming back to its old form, rising one position to #7, while in #10 we have something of an unexpected arrival, with the six year old (An eternity in the EV World) BYD e6 reaching the bottom place in the Top 10, the last time that happened it was way back in 2012, when Tesla was getting ready to put the Model S on the streets, in fact BYD's veteran MPV/wagon is having its best production year ever, which says a lot on the current state of the Chinese EV market.

Pl	WORLD	March	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	Nissan Leaf	6.564	16.282	12	2
2	Tesla Model S	7.777	12.420	9	1
3	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV	4.532	9.279	7	3
4 5 6	BYD Tang Renault Zoe BAIC E-Series EV	3.111 2.783 2.361	9.221 5.901 5.583	7 4 4	8 7 11
7	Chevrolet Volt	2.116	4.439	3	9
8	JAC i EV	1.802	4.410	3	16
9	BMW i3	1.596	3.998	3	5
10	BYD e6	2.016	3.807	3	22
	TOTAL	57.998	132.343

Manufacturers -  Tesla and BYD Charge

If the leader Nissan had its best result in a year, with 6.902 units, Tesla did even better, with a personal best of 9.636 units delivered, staying only behind the 10k all-time record achieved by BYD last December, speaking of the chinese automaker, they have stepped up deliveries to over 7.000 units, putting pressure on the leader Nissan, only 330 units ahead. 

Tesla profited from last month the excellent performance to surpass Mitsubishi and reach the last place of the podium, while the race for the Fifth position continues rather interesting, with Volkswagen trying to reach the #5 BMW, but having to look out with the #7 Renault, dangerously close  to it. 

Pl	WORLD	March	YTD	%	'15Pl
1	Nissan	6.902	17.113	13	4
2	BYD	7.215	16.783	13	1
3	Tesla	9.636	14.820	11	2
4	Mitsubishi	4.883	10.607	8	3
5 6 7	BMW Volkswagen Renault	3.405 3.396 3.376	8.524 7.947 7.654	6 6 6	6 5 8
8	BAIC	2.426	5.848	4	12
9	Chevrolet	2.373	5.062	4	11
10	Ford	1.984	4.536	3	10

Segment Leaders

A / City Car - JMC E100 (2.409 units), chinese brands kingdom, remaining positions in the podium also by chinese models: Zotye Cloud EV and Chery eQ.

B / Subcompact - Renault Zoe (5.901 units), with BAIC E-Series EV and BMW i3 as close competitors;

C / Compact - Nissan Leaf (16.282 units), the Volt is too far away to pose a threat;

D / Midsize - Ford Fusion Energi (2.772), leader to be dethroned by the VW Passat GTE (1.5k) ?

E+F / Fullsize - Tesla Model S (12.420 units), hands down leader. Second Best: Mercedes S500e, 219 units...

Sports car / Convertible - BMW i8 (724 units), without real competition;

SUV - Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV (9.279 units), a close race with the BYD Tang;

MPV / Minivan - BYD e6 (3.807 units), shaming the Ford C-Max Energy (1.5k);

LCV / Van - Renault Kangoo ZE (954 units), really close race with the Nissan e-NV200 / Evalia;

Pick up - Mitsubishi Minicab Miev Truck (36 units), why does no one picks up on this?

Automotive News Markets Roundup - March 2016 - SIBEJO-

One of the questions frequently asked regarding EV's is "Where is the tipping point?", when do sales reach a point of no return and numbers start to grow like a snowball?

I believe that it is not one, but several increasingly important tipping points, the first one is the 0.1-0.2% market share barrier, which is more psychological than anything else, leaving enthusiasts happy for starting to watch another EV every other week. Or month.

Then, the 1% EV Share. You can see EV's fairly regularly, becoming a relatively common thing in some communities, and even someone (Probably new tech-related) you know has one or is thinking in getting one.

Now, 3%. The innovators have embraced the new technology and EV's are ready to take on the more forward-thinking-mainstream, those that like new stuff, but only if it makes sense in their lives and isn't heavy on the wallet.

Finally, somewhere 6 to 10% share, the forward-thinking majority accepts the new technology and it becomes something of a new trend, where people buy them because it's the way of the future and, like in so many cases in the past, the average consumer is drawn to the new technology, even if they don't understand it really well, simply because don't want to look outdated in among their peers. 

Currently, the only market reaching this last, and most important tipping point, is Norway.

Market Share Tiers

To know how the remaining markets are at this point, i have divided them in three Tiers, 1, 2 and 3, where the first is for markets around 3%, the second is for the 1% and the last for the smallest 0.1-0.2%

Tier 1

Hong Kong (5%), Iceland (3%), Sweden (2.6%), Netherlands (2.2%) and Switzerland (2%). 

The Netherlands and Hong Kong are the most likely to follow Norway and reach the last tipping point, but Switzerland is the most important market to study, because it got here without  significant incentive aids.

Tier 2

France (1.8%), Belgium (1.7%), Austria (1.6%), UK (1.2%), Finland (1.2%), China (0.9%), Portugal (0.8%), Germany (0.7%), Japan (0.7), USA (0.7) and Canada (0.7%).

France, Belgium and Austria are all growing fast, but the really interesting stories in this Tier are China, by the sheer volumes, and also Germany, which in the past didn't had significant incentives for EV's, but will have them in May now, it will interesting to follow the evolution of this market in the following months, as incentives kick in. I believe 1% will be a given, but will 3% by year end be too much to ask? EV Sales will follow this closely.

Tier 3

Ireland (0.4%), Estonia (0.4%), Denmark (0.3%), Spain (0.3%), Italy (0.2%), Slovenia (0.2%), New Zealand (0.2%) and Czech Republic (0,1%).

This last tier has two special cases, Estonia and Denmark had in the past much higher market shares (2.4% for the first, 2.3% for the second), but because fiscal incentives were withdrawn, they have seen their share dwindle, which brings attention to the fact that the EV market is still very incentive-sensitive, something that it is expected to be less so, when the next generation of EV's (Chevrolet Bolt, Nissan Leaf II, Tesla Model 3...) arrive.




Off-topic: Two notes on markets not usually present in the spotlight:

Only this year, the Ukraine has registered 700 EV's, increasing the total EV fleet there to around 1.500 units;

Little Andorra at the moment has a stock of 25 EV's, but the goal is to reach 500 in 2019, with generous incentives being given for that purpose: 9.000� grants, free use of bus lanes, personalized number plates, free annual road tax, free tolls and a free wallbox per new car bought. Did Andorra just copied Norway's EV incentives book? No matter, EV Sales wishes them all the best!