BYD’s BEV Commercial Vehicle Sales Drop Sharply in 2019 Due to Reduced Subsidies

BYD, a major Chinese automobile and electronics manufacturer, is stepping up activities in the commercial vehicle sector with an emphasis on BEV buses and BEV special-purpose vehicles. In 2019, the company’s factory shipment of BEV commercial vehicles declined 50.9% year-on-year to 10,000 units. The reduction of purchase subsidies on new energy vehicles in June 2019 resulted in a sharp drop in sales.

Looking at the current sales situation of commercial vehicles, BYD’s BEV buses operate as fixed-route buses in a number of cities in China such as Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Sanya. In overseas markets, BYD is steadily increasing sales. As for overseas activities, BYD Japan, a subsidiary of BYD in Japan, announced in March 2019 that it will launch a small BEV bus the J6 for the Japanese market. BYD began taking advance orders of the J6 in March 2019. One thousand units are planned to be sold by 2024. Moreover, the delivery of fixed-route buses to European countries such as Spain, Sweden, Germany and France was announced one after another in 2019. Elsewhere, BYD launched a BEV bus plant in June 2019 in Canada to strengthen sales in the North American market.