BMW and Great Wall ally to produce Mini BEV cars in China
- The BMW group, already in JV with Brilliance for the production of BMW models in China, this time ally with Great Wall to produce Mini models in China.
- BMW informed that the Mini made in China with Great Wall would be 100% electric models (BEV), with the objective to comply with the quotas set up by the Chinese government. Great Wall already produces BEVs with 40,000 units sold in 2019 under the ORA brand. Two models are sold: the ORA R1 (A segment/sedans), which has sold 29,000 units while the iQ(C segment/SUV) has sold it at just over 10,000 units.
- The JV plant, which will be located in Jiangsu Province, will start in 2022 and will have a production capacity of 160,000 vehicles per year. This volume represents 30% of BMW's current sales in China but the production volume will be probably less. Actually, It is not certain, that BMW will be able to sell 160,000 BEV Mini per year from 2022. It will take several years before this volume is reached or rather approached.
- The B segment models (all engines combined) are not very popular in China (far behind the C and D segment models). And this is also the case for the BEV market where segment B represents only 11% of the market in 2019. In addition, the Mini EV will compete with BYD Yuan, the best selling BEV of B segment, with nearly 62,000 units in 2019. A model marketed at around 25,000 Euros (without subsidies) in its most powerful version (120 KW of Battery capacity - 535 Km of autonomy announced).
- The BEV products offer in B segment is certainly still far from being saturated, with less than 15 different models proposed (which is already much more than on other global markets), and only BYD Yuan exceeds 10,000 units. The Mini EV will therefore have to offer strong added value to face the local competition in order to be able to take a share of the market.
Contact us: info@inovev.com