2020 has been a year of big changes. The global economy experienced one of the biggest shifts ever and China has been at the forefront of all this.
Affecting the automotive market
China is many things and they lead in so many markets but the automotive market is still very much controlled by the common players. However, one can never discount China out of anything when it comes to manufacturing and production. In the automotive industry, while market leaders continue to dominate, automotive firms from China are slowly but steadily gaining ground. Before long, these names could well be at the top.
How is 2021 looking so far?
MG, the brand owned by China’s SAIC Motor has been performing extremely well. This has been evident in Australia when the new car sales reported there stated that China became the fourth largest country of origin, thanks to the sales of MG vehicles. To that end, there has been a 150% increase in Chinese cars in February 2021 compared to the same month a year ago. While one can argue that it could be due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the total sales for Chinese cars are about 40% higher than that of the German counterparts.
The market has been very volatile although the big names are still there. Japan is top in sales from brands like Toyota and Mistubishi followed by Thailand that rolls out the likes of Isuzu and Ford. Expectedly, the South Korean brands like Kia and Hyundai are third and then followed by China. This means that the usual boys like VW and Mercedes-Benz are below China. GWM, which makes the Haval are in this bracket and enjoying brisk sales too.
That said, this could spell trouble to the whole European community of carmakers and if they do not start rolling out more competitive models, they could well be struck out very soon.
