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China’s global dominance in electric cars helped it overtake Japan as the world’s biggest vehicle exporter last year, official data confirmed on Wednesday.
Japanese giants like Toyota and Nissan are more cautious on electric vehicles (EVs) than their Chinese counterparts like BYD, banking on hybrid models instead.
Data released Wednesday by the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association showed shipments of cars, trucks and buses rose 16 percent last year to 4.42 million.
But China exported about 500,000 more — a total of 4.91 million vehicles, as reported this month by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.
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China’s Customs Bureau puts the number at more than 5.22 million, a massive 57 percent increase year-on-year, with one in three being fully electric vehicles.
The country was already shipping more vehicles than Japan on a monthly basis, but Wednesday’s data confirmed it was also number one for the entire year.
Unlike Chinese companies, Japanese automakers including Toyota – reaffirmed on Tuesday as the world’s largest company by unit sales – also make huge volumes of vehicles in other countries.
In 2022, vehicle production in Japan excluding motorcycles totaled 7.84 million units, but overseas production was about 17 million.
Japanese manufacturers have long bet on hybrids that combine battery power and internal combustion engines, an area in which they have started with the Toyota Prius.
But they have vowed to up their game, with Toyota aiming to sell 1.5 million EVs annually by 2026 and 3.5 million by 2030.
The company is also hoping to mass-produce solid-state batteries that charge faster than conventional batteries and give EVs more range.
With the help of strong government support, Chinese EV companies have gained an edge over more established rivals such as General Motors, Volkswagen and Toyota.
BYD also took away Tesla’s crown for most sales of all electric vehicles in the fourth quarter of 2023, data this month showed.
On Tuesday BYD – it stands for “Build Your Dreams” – which also sells batteries to companies such as Tesla, BMW and Mercedes, said it expected net profit last year to reach 29-31 billion yuan ($4.1-4.4 billion). are supposed to. ,
But China’s success in EVs has also landed its companies in trouble, and regulators in Western markets are concerned about unfair competition for local automakers.
The European Commission is investigating Chinese state subsidies in an investigation that could lead to the EU imposing import tariffs.
To calm concerns, BYD plans to build more factories overseas, including a $600 million plant in Brazil and another in Hungary.
“It’s kind of reminiscent of what happened with Japan in the 1980s, when they started exporting a lot of automotive,” said Christopher Richter, an auto analyst at CLSA.
“So the Japanese solved it (for manufacturing) by starting a lot of factories overseas… they manufacture four times as much as they export,” he said in October.
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