According to CNBC, BYD executives expect China's electric vehicle market to continue to expand as China's electric vehicle sales growth slows. BYD Executive Vice President Li Ke told CNBC on Monday: "As various innovative technologies continue to be introduced to the market, the penetration rate of electric vehicles in the Chinese market will soon increase to close to 80%."
Li Ke
Thanks to policy support and a wide range of vehicle models, the penetration rate of hybrid and pure electric vehicles in China has grown rapidly in just a few years. According to data from the China Passenger Car Association, new energy vehicles will account for more than half of new car sales in China in 2024, reaching a record 62.9% last month. In contrast, the International Energy Agency said last month that the penetration rate of electric vehicles in the United States still remains at only about 10%, and the global average is about 25%.
BYD remains optimistic about China's domestic market, thanks to advances in battery technology. Li Ke said that thanks to the promotion of BYD's fast charging technology, the current domestic market demand for BYD electric vehicles is about twice the company's existing delivery capacity. BYD's fast charging technology can charge the battery to 70% in just 5 minutes.
Looking to the future, Li Ke predicts that the next stage of competition will likely focus on assisted driving functions. On May 28 this year, BYD expanded its insurance coverage for "L2+" assisted driving users. Li Ke said that this move is expected to increase customers' usage of assisted driving functions by 5 percentage points to at least 95%. The company also released a self-developed assisted driving chip.
Although BYD has hired about 7,000 engineers to engage in semiconductor development, Li Ke said that at this stage, BYD will still mainly use Nvidia's assisted driving chipset. According to BYD's 2025 annual report, the company's total number of employees exceeds 869,600, of which semiconductor R&D engineers only account for a small part.
As growth in BYD's domestic market faces challenges, the company has turned to export markets to boost sales. Li Ke said that BYD aims to produce 75% of European car sales locally.