China's BYD to bring electric cars to U.S. in 2010

Chinese auto company BYD plans to bring an all-electric sedan in small numbers to the U.S. next year.

The company chairman Wang Chuanfu told the Wall Street Journal that the company, which is part-owned by investor Warren Buffet, is now gearing up for a U.S. push. It plans to raise money by offering shares in the company in China to help finance the expansion.

BYD's e6, its high-end all-electric car it plans to bring to the U.S. in small numbers next year.

(Credit: BYD)

BYD plans to offer a few hundred of one of its most advanced cars in the U.S., the five-seat e6, which takes seven to nine hours to fully charge and has a 250-mile range.

Initially, it will make the $40,000 car available to "government agencies, utilities and maybe some celebrities" in a specific region, Wang told the Journal during a factory tour of the BYD's lithium ion battery factory.

Part of the goal with the car introduction is to raise brand awareness of BYD with American consumers, he added.

BYD already sells plug-in hybrid sedans with a small gasoline engine that charges the batteries to fleet owners.

Although BYD is still not well known with most consumers, the company has gotten a lot of media attention, in part because of Buffet's $230 million investment. Also, BYD appears to be one of the front-runners in making electric cars for the mass market.

Other automakers betting on all-electric cars include Coda Automotive, Mitsubishi, and Nissan, which introduced the Leaf earlier this month.

[sartor1]

Good! More competition! More competition = more innovation.
And hopefully lower prices.

[galeso]

250 miles per charge for $40,000. That is proof that sartor1 is most likely correct.

JavaMan09 & subslug check your facts, US manufacturing output peaked in the 2nd quarter of 2008. Yes we buy a lot of junk from China. Yes, we make more with fewer workers. Yes, we will hit a new high in manufacturing output probably before Bush III - I mean Obama leaves office, even if he does nothing.

EV-lover, you are stretching it a bit when you say "lithium-ion batteries, which are MUCH more expensive, untested, and untried." They have been tested in laptops for years and they will produce such a pretty explosion when scaled up to car-sized.

[gggg sssss]

of course, your job will disappear and you too will be earning a bowl of rice a day.

[Dalkorian]

gggg sssss, at least we'll get a bowl of rice a day. There are some people on this planet that don't get that much to eat in a week.

[gggg sssss]

@Dalkorian That will not get better because china dumps cheap cr*p cars into the US.Th epeopel taht have no food (chose to) live in inhospitable climates, (choose to) live under moronic, incompetant governments, and (choose ) not to live under the western ideals of society, government and commerce. China is not helping any of them AFAIK get closer to teh Western ideal. Sorry if teh truth hurts.

[EV-lover]

Personally, I'm excited to see smaller businesses getting involved with electric cars. The big auto companies have dropped the ball pretty hard on electric cars, and they are too closely associated with oil companies. Take for example, GM. GM is finally coming out with the chevy volt soon, but it's going to be too expensive for most people. Over a decade ago, GM built the GM EV-1, a 100% electric car that went over 100 miles on a charge. GM leased a few hundred of them (to the likes of danny devito, bill nye, among others), but then decided to not renew the lease, and drove them all to the desert and crushed them. GM then sold the patent to the NiMH batteries they were running on to Chevron, who has refused to let anyone else use those batteries in 100% electric cars. Now, auto manufacturers are stuck using lithium-ion batteries, which are MUCH more expensive, untested, and untried. To learn more about why electric vehicles are so important, and how they have been suppressed in the last decade, I recommend the book "Two Cents Per Mile" by Nevres Cefo, which you can check out at http://www.twocentspermile.com or read reviews and excerpts of on Amazon at http://www.bit.ly/2centspermile

[MRmw]

Cefo? Is it you?

[subslug]

So basically, people in China are taking bets on whether or not people in the US will buy their Chinese built electric cars by buying stock in the company backed by Buffet?
Is this the same China that can't even get on board with the whole global warming thing? And now, they've built a car that gets 250 miles on a charge?

I'm not sure the US needs to give anymore money to China, especially not to buy cars that we should be building ourselves. How about we fund our own developers to build our own electric vehicles right here in our own country.
I really hope for our own sake that not one of these Chinese cars ever sells in the US.

[Renegade Knight]

We don't need to give more money to China. However China has a car that works now and is for sale, while the Volt is still in pre production and will be sold someday.

[eddy m]

Are you kidding? Kettle/black/Kyoto/US are words that come to mind most immediately. Let's hope not one more US product get sold worldwide from now on. We've subsidised your way of life for far too long.

[subslug]

Does any US product get sold worldwide now? Free trade works great huh? great for every country but the US where all these other super duper cool countries put astronomical tariffs on US products.

Answer this, how many US made cars are cruising down the streets of Beijing right now?

[knowles2]

Whole you been misinformed, China is very much on board with the Global warming, the fact is it also relise it the west who created the problem in the first an so they think it the West that should solve the problem they just happens to relise that the West will need to go through a massive transition to cleaner energy efficient technologes which the west consumers will have finance using Chinese money, and it just so happens that China will make a nice profit when Westerners pay back that debt. It also relise it can use Western consumers over the next 10-20 years make the technology much more affordable so that China will be able to make the transition much cheaper and more quickly than the Western. It a pretty brilliant plan actually. By the way it can also use that to make it own auto makers companies have caught up and overtaken the heavily indebted Western Automakers, becoming the dominate market player.

[MasterChefD]

The Chinese aren't totally behind when it comes to the global warming issues. I think their vehicle emissions standards are higher than those in the US.

[MasterChefD]

(should have made this part of my previous post)

American cars companies are doing quite well in China.

[JavaMan09]

Great comment subslug. At least someone in this country of ours, US, understands that free trade is bunch of crap created to elevate other nations, and let hard-working Americans eat it.

On this Chinese car. I find it sad that a Chinese company has to be the one to introduce to US an electric car. Well, at least we still innovate in computer related tech, well wait a minute whats that sound I hear? Oh yes, the faster Japanese internet.

[Sourdust]

@ Renegade Knight,
It isn't for sale now, it will be in 2010. Actually, the article says "available to 'government agencies, utilities and maybe some celebrities' in a specific region", which means that the rest of us can get it in 2011.

[open-mind]

Let's see ... GM announced the volt 2.5 years ago and they are now building pre-production Volts at the rate of 10/week. Mass production starts next year. The BYD electric was announced after the Volt and will not have prototypes in the USA until next year, with no firm mass production date communicated. Sounds to me like GM is ahead of BYD.

[gggg sssss]

China = the world leader in coal fired electricity - their polution = our problem.

Do not buy cr*p made in China

[Mergatroid Mania]

I have a better idea. How about they send ME one of these cars and I'll test it for them in frigid Canadian winters?

AND, I'll do it for free! AND if they just leave me the car when the testing is done they won't have to pay to ship it back. What a great deal eh? I'll be waiting for their call (or email).

CNET, you have my permission to give them my email address.

[xmitman]

It seems clear to me that eventually making an electric car is going to be a lot like making a notebook computer. The prices will be high at first but soon they will be like netbooks, small, light and cheap. Many companies will jump into the car business as the components become readily available particularly from countries like China. I will not be surprised if Apple one day makes it's own iCar. It could even be possible to order your own parts, like building your own desktop computer. The traditional car companies are going to have to change much more then they realize. I expect almost none in business today will be around in 20 years. This will be a radical business model change. Bigger then even the assembly line innovation of the Ford model T.

[GlobalOutsourcer]

A few months ago this car was supposed to retail around $21,000. Now it will initially cost $40,000. What happened?

[JDias38]

250-mile range !? How, temp around 75, down hill, a tail wind and a driver less than 100lb ?
Electric cars will work relatvely well only on tropical or subtropical climates, and forget about airconditioning. At the moment and in the current state of the electricity sources, (read batteries), the electric car is an inconvenient form of transportation limited by the capacity of the storage media.
When that battery runs out of charge, usually in the middle of nowhere, your only recourse is to call the road assistence to tow the car to the nearest source of electricity, take a cab, running on gas of course, to take you home. Then another to bring you back, 9 hours later to retrieve your electric toy.
And I would like to see you running one right here in the frigid North, where battery efficiency drops and drain on it increases...

[mike_ekim]

There was a time when the horse and buggy was more reliable than the automobile.

[Wei_Zhu]

As a Chinese living in the US, I would love to get one of these cars. However, I will wait reserve my excitement until BYD actually ships the cars. There have been several attempts by Chinese car manufactures to enter the US market in the past, but none actually happened in the end.

[bambooshoots]

Free market is not about US handing money to China; it's about competitive companies making money while uncompetitive companies DIE.

[gggg sssss]

its about preserving US jobs. Hard to compete when you only pay a few bowls of rice a day to people content (forced??) to live in a slum with pigs in the back yard. That is where the swine flue started. And you call that competition?.

[edwardqiu123]

so true. the U.S. should've died a long time ago. There's a reason why nobody wants to buy American anymore. Now the Chinese has just given them a slap in the face. by the way gggg ssss, don't embarrass yourself with your stupidity. what you said is like saying everyone in America is stupid, which is actually kind of true.

[anakin2006]

a lot! GM has big success in china from their BUICK line. dealer literally ran out of cars...

"by subslug August 24, 2009 10:43 AM PDT

Answer this, how many US made cars are cruising down the streets of Beijing right now?"

[old3eyes]

Wonder if this new car will meet the crash tests standards. Saw somewhere recently that they failed dismally..

[Pinocchio_Gepetto]

Lets do ourselves a Big Favor and stay away from China all together. Their evil currency manipulation game is well understood and a big reason China products (junk or otherwise) are cheaper. We have NOTHING to gain by buying from China - let them sell their junk elsewhere. Buy American, buy North American. If anything we need to sort out North America, including Central and South America - STAY AWAY from China. Nothing, absolutely Nothing good comes from or will come from further eroding the American lifestyle especially by propping up China's economy. And please - our economy and DEBT will do alright even if China decides to get upset and sell/dump our debt - remember they hold our currency so effectively they will be shooting themselves in the proverbial "foot" ;) at the same time........let do business with honest business people, with fair trading practices, and trade policies - China is NOT a friend of America (the West) ............God Bless America !!!

[gggg sssss]

Agree whoel heartedly on China - not so sure about the God part. And Korea and Hyundai too.

[gggg sssss]

I cant wait to see these things exploding like the Chionese ipods and dvd players. Except the batteries wlll have enough lithium in them to burn right through the pavement. And the fie will put out enough toxins to kill a small village.

[bigton09]

not sure since when iPod become Chinese brand. and re: your prior opinion, if other people are working for "a few bowls of rice a day" and you are doing the same job (or maybe even lazier), why would you deserve more than that?

[gggg sssss]

@bigton09 iPods are made where? by who? The same people who braught us - "if you can sell melamine for the same price as milk in your baby formula" why would you deserve milk.If you can sell melamine for the same price as wheat gluten in your dog food why do you deserve wheat

[edwardqiu123]

Iopds are a product of whom??!! And which company chose the batteries that goes in the ****** Ipods again?! China only ASSEMBLES Ipods, tehy are not MADE in China, stupid.

[karlengblom]

Why bother bringing these to the US? Sell them in Europe instead. They are going to fly off the dealerships in places where gas is $6/gallon, like in much of Europe. Also, the (physical) climate in Europe is more favorable, rarely below freezing or requiring air-conditioning.

[elektromotion]

The idiotic posts made by many of you morons betray a lack of knowledge with regard to BYD's core technology. The LiFePo4 (lithium iron phosphate) batteries used in the e6 is ultra stable. You can shoot it with a gun and it will not explode. This type of battery has consistent stable performance from -40 deg F to +160F. If you live in hell then maybe you should stay away from this car. The media in this country is doing the public a huge disfavour by failing to tell the truth about what is actually happening in China. The technological progress in China today is very rapid and deep. When GM made the EV1 in 1996, BYD was just a tiny little company with only 20 people in operation for 1 year. Just contemplate on this fact for a moment. The fact is Chinese industries today are entering the innovation phase. BYD is just an example of this trend. This is why Warren Buffett owns 10% off this company. He wanted to buy 20%, but BYD was only willing to sell him 10%.

[edwardqiu123]

look at where the "western ideals of society" have gotten America, America, following the "ideals of western society" has managed to destroy itself, and the world in less than a decade. Good job. YOU are the moron here. You are just jealous that the Chinese came up with something America can't even think about as of right now.

[edwardqiu123]

Small company??! BYD is the world number one rechargeable battery maker.