At the Shanghai motor show, some of the biggest manufacturers you’ve never heard of displayed their newest models alongside familiar Western brands keen to crack the world’s most lucrative automotive market.
Long gone are the days when Shanghai was an exhibition of the most blatant copycat cars, and the impressive quality of new Chinese creations is beginning to pose a very real threat to more established manufacturers. The 2019 edition was especially significant, with an increasing number of Chinese models being prepared for European launches and global manufacturers such as Volkswagen adding to their range of models adapted specifically for sale in China.
Shanghai 2019: Full show report
China’s car sales fell for the tenth consecutive month in March, pitching the country’s growing ranks of car makers face-first into an unprecedented headwind whipped up, in part, by on-going trade frictions with the US and a continued slowing of the global economy, stymying their dramatic growth of the past two decades and threatening new model plans along the way.
But if there were concerns for the long-term health of the Chinese car industry in what has been described as its biggest crisis yet, it certainly wasn’t showing as the 2019 Shanghai motor show opened its doors.
With business confidence in the world’s largest car market showing heartening signs of a rebound, owing to a timely reduction in sales tax ordered by the Chinese central government effective from the beginning of April, the mood within the vast halls of the international convention centre, where the country’s biggest motor show takes place every two years, was cautiously upbeat.
While China’s car sales have fallen for the good part of the past year, they continue to far outstrip those of any other country. The overall figure for March, at 2.52 million, showed the smallest decrease year-on-year in over seven months, at 5.2 per cent.
With many car makers reducing prices to boost sales in light of the tax break, expectations are total car sales for 2019 will be roughly in line with those of 2018 at around 22.5 million.
Predictably given the importance now placed on Shanghai motor show as an automotive showcase with international reach, every key Chinese car maker, including the five state-owned heavyweights SAIC, FAW, BAIC, Dongfeng and Changan, all presented new or improved production models this year. They were kept honest by an ever more competitive list of private own rivals headed by the likes of Geely, GAC, Great Wall Motors and BYD as well as key introductions by joint venture operations such as those operated by Volkswagen, BMW, Toyota and Honda.
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And where????
Oh dear. A significant non show seems to be FORD. With the closing of their factory in Russia, and their downward spiral in Europe, it seems to me the Blue oval maybe destined for a short life in USA before being gobbled up by a Chinese company. Its sad but not unexpected, nothing decent has come from the brand for years. Their prices are much too high and the quality mediocre at best and a dearth of equipment levels makes Hyundai and Kia very happy thank you, plus those two offer minimum 5 upto 7 year warrenty against 2 years for a ford.
The Chinese are a threat to all, but Audi/VW are on top of it with good products and partnership wheras BMW is relying on a poor partner and their name only, that wont cut the mustard for long
Apalling ignorance.
Apalling ignorance.
British Leyland managers had the same attitude about the Japanese...
He will eat crow one day.
If he knows what that means....
Open your mind...
Sweeping statements, there are some nice looking cars here, and some are EV powered, and, I was thinking this....what if China became the epicentre of car design?, because these designs aren’t that far off.
AND
Quite right Peter my old friend. What caught my attention was the hydrogen powered vehicle. I still believe that once the (ruinous) cycle of battery is done, this power source will be the only one by 2040. And what a fabulous design too.