BYD Wants to Be #1 in the World—Can Anyone Stop Them? | China EVs & More #250

Episode 250 marks a major milestone for China EVs & More—and fittingly, the discussion centers on one of the boldest announcements yet from China’s automotive industry.

BYD Chairman Wang Chuanfu publicly declared that BYD intends to become the world’s largest automaker by 2030, setting its sights on Toyota and signaling that the company’s global ambitions are only accelerating. But is that goal realistic? Tu Le and Lei Xing break down what it would actually take to sell more than 10 million vehicles annually—and why battery production, overseas manufacturing, charging infrastructure and geopolitics could become BYD’s biggest challenges.  

The conversation also explores:

• China’s slowing domestic auto market despite record NEV adoption
• Why exports continue to hit new highs
• NIO’s growing momentum with the ES8 and ES9
• The intensifying rivalry between NIO and Li Auto
• GM’s new energy strategy and what it means for EV adoption
• Mercedes, Honda and other legacy automakers navigating China’s rapidly changing market

From global expansion and intelligent driving to battery strategy and industry consolidation, Episode 250 examines the next phase of China’s automotive transformation—and why the rest of the world can’t afford to ignore it.

🔑 SEO Keywords

China EVs, China EVs & More, BYD, Wang Chuanfu, Toyota, NIO ES8, NIO ES9, Li Auto, Chery exports, China EV exports, Chinese automakers, EV industry, global auto industry, electric vehicles, GM Energy, intelligent driving, China auto market, NEV sales, Tu Le, Lei Xing, Sino Auto Insights

Chapter Timestamps (45-minute episode)

00:00 Episode 250 & Welcome
01:20 China’s Domestic Market Slows
04:10 Why EV Exports Keep Growing
08:00 BYD’s Goal: Become #1 by 2030
14:15 Can BYD Really Pass Toyota?
20:30 NIO’s ES8 & ES9 Momentum
25:30 NIO vs. Li Auto Intensifies
31:20 GM Energy & The Next EV Strategy
36:15 Legacy Automakers’ China Challenge
41:00 Final Thoughts & Episode 250 Reflection

Transcript

Tu Le (00:00)
 Hi, everyone, and welcome to China EVs and More, where my co-host, Lei Xing and I, we'll go over the week's most interesting and important news coming out of the global EV, AV, and mobility sectors. What Lei and I discuss today is based on our opinions and should not be taken as investment advice. For those that are new to the show, welcome to our loyal listeners and viewers. Welcome back. Help us spread the word about this podcast. And of course, tune in again next week.
 
 My name is Tu Le. I'm the managing director at Sino Auto Insights, a global management consultancy that helps organizations bring innovative and tech-focused products and services to the transportation and mobility sectors. I write a free weekly newsletter that we pull many of our discussion topics from. You can sign up for it at Sino Autoinsights.substack.com, which of course I encourage you all to do. Lei?
 
 Congratulations on episode number 250. We are celebrating 250 today. I think we've actually done more than 250 episodes, but for all intents and purposes, we're 250. That's a huge, huge milestone. Huge milestone. Can you please introduce yourself?
 
 Lei Xing (00:57)
 I don't know
 
 Yes, good morning. this is your co-host, Lei Xing, former chief editor of China Auto Review. Yes, and this this is the big 250 episode.
 
 Tu Le (01:10)
 Non extravaganza
 
 episode. Non extravaganza. Because we didn't really prepare anything special.
 
 Lei Xing (01:17)
 so this is a big year. America is celebrating its 250th birthday in three weeks. We're at 250. the World Cup is going on. I mean it's the biggest and the grandest event in the world. I'm sure you're watching, I'm watching. congratulations to
 
 Tu Le (01:24)
 And we are at two fifty.
 
 Lei Xing (01:35)
 the Korean team, our Asian brothers winning yesterday.
 
 BYD
 
 has some big, big plans. We can talk about that. auto sales in China, it's still big in terms of penetrations of NEVs are rising significantly, but the domestic market is shrinking. So that's the only thing that's not big. But there's been a lot of big things going on. SpaceX.
 
 It's IPO in twenty five minutes. so that's the theme this episode.
 
 Tu Le (02:02)
 Elon will become first trillionaire the world?
 
 Can
 
 quick story about South Korea. My son has a good buddy named Dohan, 8th grade. They both just graduated from middle school. And my wife saw him crying a little bit at the graduation event. They call it a clap out, they don't call it graduation. Come to find that his dad, who is transferred from Seoul,
 
 Lei Xing (02:19)
 Mm.
 
 Tu Le (02:26)
 For his company, he wanted to get an extension. Dohan wanted to stay, couldn't stay, so they're moving back. So as a going away, they had a sleepover at a buddy's last night, and they all watched the South Korea game in kind of support of him. So I thought that was cool. I but one of the things that I'll talk about today, Lei, after we've gotten through.
 
 Lei Xing (02:32)
 Mm.
 
 yeah, that's a good game. Good game, yeah. I watched a little bit. And yeah.
 
 Tu Le (02:51)
 BYD's enormous, enormous, bold, bold, outwardly facing goals. The discussion about that is that I went to the GM Empower event and there's been some news about that. So we'll talk about that a little bit as well. But why don't we start with the challenges in the China market that you a little bit earlier?
 
 Lei Xing (03:13)
 the big number that's been reported is 20% year-on-year sales drop. so another way to look at it is domestically, or if you want to look at the overall sales, it's basically selling the same number of vehicles in the first five months.
 
 As they did in the first four months of last year. That's kind of how you put it. So, and the other one was the drop in absolute sales, more than 80% were accounted by ICEVs. So the traditional internal combustion engines. At the same time, we're seeing the penetration go into the 60s.
 
 So there's no turning back in terms of what people are buying, NEVs and also exporting now the share of NEVs of the vehicles exported are still below 50%, but they're growing much faster than the ICEV export. So those are some of the pealing of the onions of the numbers.
 
 Tu Le (04:12)
 Let me let me let me add to that
 
 because this is the eighth consecutive month that sales have slowed. So the domestic market and part of it is due to some of the subsidies going away. The Chinese government pulled some of the subsidies earlier this year. but also to your point, Lei, it indicates that number one, the denominator is much larger. so we're seeing NEVs really, really
 
 take control of the entire Chinese market. And it's an indicator that the incentives do matter from the Chinese government and that the overall economy with the real estate market still struggling a bit is weighing on consumer buying.
 
 Lei Xing (04:50)
 But at the same time, NIO is a good example. they launched the ONVO L60 yesterday. That's probably their last model, major model launch of this year. And the rest of the way, all they have to do is just sell, sell, sell, sell, deliver, deliver, deliver. And in the month of June, we're possibly looking at the ES9 and the ES8 both getting to 10,000 units.
 
 In a single month. that's unprecedented. for NIO and also for the industry, considering the price points they're at. Given the backdrop that the domestic market is stalling falling. so there's these anomalies at the same time,
 
 Tu Le (05:25)
 The other thing that I think would be interesting to watch for, so for all you NIO stans out there, Geely stans, ZEEKR stans, the competition between the AITO M8, the NIO ES8, and the Zeker 8X is going to intensify over the next several months. In May, ZEEKR 8X won that crown.
 
 Lei Xing (05:33)
 Many being one.
 
 Tu Le (05:49)
 they sold 6,000 units, but it's going to be an intense competition because to your point, Lei, ES8 is likely gonna get to 10,000 units pretty soon. So what does that mean for the 8X and what does that mean for the M8? The M8 is the oldest of the three, I think, although it did get a refresh recently. but
 
 The 8X has been out for a little bit now, a few months, and the ES8 was refreshed recently as well. The M8, the ES8, to me set the standard, but it seems like the 8X has some resilience. So keep an eye on that three headed competition because that'll kind of give a good indication of whether or not NIO is gonna have a strong 2026 or finish to 2026.
 
 Lei Xing (06:35)
 It looks like given the current momentum they should be finishing strong. and then the other number I just just remembered, for two consecutive months, over 900,000 vehicles exported.
 
 it's pretty significant.
 
 Tu Le (06:48)
 that it's still less than 50, but I thought in the month of May 50% clean energy vehicles versus 46% I CE vehicles were exported. And in May, the year over year growth of exports was over 100%
 
 Lei Xing (07:01)
 It's yeah.
 
 Yeah, so basically that's mind boggling because just six years ago, I think 2020 or 2021, China exported one million vehicles.
 
 And now we're exporting nearly a million a month.
 
 Tu Le (07:13)
 Mm-hmm.
 
 we'll be over ten million by the end of 2026 six.
 
 Lei Xing (07:18)
 that's pretty significant. And I think the narrative is
 
 that all of these car makers they're exporting because of capacity, because of this domestic pressure at home. And it's always hard to look at it positively or negatively. we can debate on that. but I've always thought, many years earlier that.
 
 Even in the late 2010s, I've never thought the China market was ever gonna go above 30 million. Even there's talk about the ownership for the thousand people was way below the the US or the mature market standards. now we're seeing the export market of 25 million, 30 million, at least a third are exported. Should that be surprising?
 
 Tu Le (07:51)
 Europe. Yeah.
 
 Lei Xing (07:59)
 Given the geopolitical backdrop, global geopolit politics, there's demand of these Chinese EVs, that some markets are opening up, that they're building plants outside of China.
 
 Tu Le (08:11)
 Case in point. Brazil or Geely started building the Xingyuan in Brazil earlier this week or last week the Xinguan is the most popular mass market EV in China. last year it sold about a half million units and
 
 Lei Xing (08:11)
 Maybe it's yeah.
 
 Mm-hmm.
 
 Tu Le (08:31)
 second only to the Model Y in China. So it's a very popular product and I think it's gonna continue to win hearts and minds in Latin America and building domestically is a huge, huge, huge win for Geely. And we hear this narrative that the Chinese are gonna ship their expensive cars abroad. And that's not really the case.
 
 You what's important also is that the BYD Dophin, which was specifically designed for the European market, is gonna land later this year in the EU and it's gonna come in at around 30,000 euro or 29,000 euro, 33,000 US dollars. So they're really, really continuing to be aggressive and they really want that low end of the market now.
 
 Will they also look at exporting cars like the ES8, the M8, the the 8X? Of course they will, but at the end of the day, there is obviously some truth to the overcapacity issue, the pressure on sales in the domestic market and the weakening of sales potentially for a lot of automakers, including, BYD has been struggling, Part of that is because of competition, but the other part has been because the market has
 
 Cooled off quite a bit. And so this dovetails into what did Wang Chuan Fu say this week, Lei?
 
 Lei Xing (09:50)
 We wanna be number basically.
 
 Tu Le (09:51)
 Let's set the table.
 
 Well where was he at? What was he doing? what event was he at?
 
 Lei Xing (09:56)
 BYD had their annual general meeting and Wang Chuanfu spoke to their shareholders, investors, and one of the biggest things he blurted out was we're gonna be number one in 2030. globally. And it's not something that he's said before that carried significant weight. It was back in 2007 when he said BYD will be number one
 
 Tu Le (10:09)
 Yeah.
 
 Lei Xing (10:20)
 in China by 2015 and number one globally by 2025. Something along the lines of that. And BYD achieved it much ahead of time. In NEVs. Obviously, they're still behind the big players, Volkswagen, Toyota. But they were at number six last year in global sales.
 
 So they want to be number one by 2030. That's the biggest kind of bomb that he dropped. something not surprising to us. it always had the potential or wanted to get to number one. that was their goal for for quite some time. but in order to get
 
 Tu Le (10:53)
 seems very very aggressive.
 
 Lei Xing (10:53)
 there's a few questions, that we need to look at. First of all, do they need to even get to 10 million to be number one?
 
 That's the first question. And second
 
 Tu Le (11:03)
 Lei, Toyota last year was closer to 11, so just
 
 Lei Xing (11:06)
 so 10 million would be a good benchmark that they need to get, which means they have to double sales from this year I'm thinking they might get to close to five million. Last year was 4.6, doubling in four years is crazy.
 
 And then the other question is where they are this year. The other thing that Wang Chuanfu said they expect to sell more than 1.6 million outside of China. So that's roughly a third of sales, total sales expected. by 2030, Stella Li has said this on the record that they want to be 50:50 domestic sales versus
 
 Overseas. So the other question is is it easier to get to 5 million at home or is it easier to get to 5 million outside of China?
 
 or it's both not easy.
 
 Tu Le (11:49)
 I've become less bullish. do I still think they have an opportunity to be the number one automaker in the world? Yes. Yes, yes, I do. Do I think that's gonna happen by 2030? No, I don't. and if we put into do you think it's gonna be by 2030?
 
 Lei Xing (11:58)
 Mm. We shall make a bet.
 
 I'm willing to bet they can get to number one by 2030.
 
 Tu Le (12:06)
 an important caveat because Jojo EX6BI just wrote this in the chat.
 
 Lei Xing (12:12)
 No.
 
 Tu Le (12:13)
 it's a mighty hill to climb. Yeah, exactly. think there are a a number of asterisk. so I don't know if
 
 Lei Xing (12:15)
 That's Phew.
 
 Tu Le (12:19)
 BYD is going to be able to export five million vehicles from China. Now they do have factories opening up and already open. They have CKD and full manufacturing coming online in the next several years, but it's not gonna be three, four million units. Okay. And we always have to remember that their love of complexity increases exponentially as they
 
 Ship more vehicles outside of China? Number one. Number two, build more vehicles outside of China because it's not just final assembly and manufacturing. They also have to figure out what they're gonna do with battery production. Do they do assembly of passenger vehicles in Hungary, in India, in Thailand, and ship cells from China? Or are they gonna be forced to build cells locally as well?
 
 And these are all open questions and we see that.
 
 BYD I think also appreciates now how well managed Toyota is to get to 11 million units.
 
 Lei Xing (13:19)
 No, something that just thought of that was very important, very interesting that Wang Chuanfu mentioned how do you spell BYD? You spell it battery. For someone who spells as a battery maker, they're facing constraints in their ramping of the second-gen blade battery production. That's the other thing Wang Chuanfu talked about and he said,
 
 ramping is increasing at about 20,000 to 30,000 units per month in the coming months. So they're constrained by batteries. And what Li Bin said just earlier today or yesterday in the interview that the ONVO L60 the cost went up by RMB10,000 because of the raw materials because of the memory chips
 
 So all of these are going up while BYD is facing this constraint in the battery. If that's gets solved, okay, so they should be better off this year. And the other thing was I saw your tweet about they're investing 2 billion euros for 3,000 flash charging stations, As reported by FT, by 2027.
 
 So these are small things that they're doing to support that 10 million target.
 
 So there's tactics, there's strategy. They're trying to execute on those. And those will be the question marks that if they're answered correctly, then they have a good path to 10 million.
 
 Tu Le (14:33)
 Right. And ultimately the question needs to be as well, if we're talking and looking at strategy, does BYD need to eventually outsource some of their battery production to C ATL or Gotion to get to that 11 'cause remember it's 11 million units, not 10 million. and 'cause I don't see Toyota losing ground from a vehicle sales standpoint significantly over the next four years.
 
 and the pathway to 11 million units, I I think you and I are in agreement that it doesn't happen without the US market. And they're not in the US market yet. If best case scenario they enter by 2027, they probably need to sell 2 million units in the US market alone.
 
 At 4.6 remember, think of it this way we have to sell 5 million in China, 5 million outside of China. They're exporting like 1.6 right now. Okay. And let's say production outside of China is fairly insignificant. So let's say around two million right now, okay. Exports and non-Chinese sales.
 
 That means they need to get to 5 million at least. And this is based on what Stella Li is telling us, right? They can get to 11 million by selling many, many more in China over the next three years. That I think is more controllable than assuming that they can get to 5 million units out five and a half million units outside of China. I you
 
 'cause currently I don't think they have capacity in the battery side or the vehicle production side to get to 11 million units. build factories.
 
 Lei Xing (16:03)
 those are the wrinkles and the 2 million you mentioned happening in US by 2030, I don't see that happening. No. That's that's the
 
 Tu Le (16:13)
 if they enter by 2027 Lei, realistically, how many do you think they could sell? By 2030,
 
 Lei Xing (16:18)
 of hundreds of thousands of units are okay, but 2 million is can't think of that, I know it needs to be a benchmark, but
 
 Tu Le (16:26)
 let's not use 2030 as the date. Let's just say open ended. If they're to become the number one vehicle maker in the world, I think let's say it's a 12 million unit number, and that can be over ten years, right? It doesn't have to be 2030. I think the US market probably needs to be 25% of their market at least.
 
 Lei Xing (16:45)
 Hmm. That's pretty high. Yeah. It's pretty high. a quarter. Wow. Okay. I haven't thought about that kind of the breakdown. but yeah.
 
 Tu Le (16:54)
 'cause for Toyota, the US market is so so so so important. don't have that breakdown percentage of sales of the US market for Toyota, but you know, I I'll that homework myself. because it could rely on the emerging markets, right? But
 
 The politics of emerging markets is pretty complicated as opposed to trying to enter North America with the USMCA intact so they could ship from Canada to the US and Mexico tariff free and vice versa. So
 
 Lei Xing (17:19)
 yeah.
 
 I think Trump just said he doesn't want the USMCA anymore. Something like that. Or
 
 Tu Le (17:28)
 Well
 
 I talked to a couple of Canadian folks this week and they're like, Yeah, we don't see the USMCA going away.
 
 Lei Xing (17:35)
 Okay. All right. Trump is Trump.
 
 Tu Le (17:37)
 Trump would prefer bilateral agreements, for sure, 'cause that helps control the free trade and really would lock in the Chinese into building in the United States if they wanted access to the US market. With the current language of the USMCA, Chinese could build in Canada and ship to the United States. Technically.
 
 Would Trump administration stop that? Yes, they would. But from a letter of the law, in the current language of the USMCA, the the Chinese could ship to the United States, I believe, technically, and to Mexico from Canada. So
 
 but let me ask you this before we move on. why do you think Wang Chuan Fu needed to say all these things?
 
 Lei Xing (18:15)
 Why does Elon Musk say things?
 
 No, I mean obviously it's to give confidence to the investors and shareholders, that they passed some stretch of rough patch of stretch. I think they're still kind of trying to overcome that. sales are coming back, slowly. We're gonna see 400,000 level most likely in June and later in the year. Not surprised if they can get back to half a million a month.
 
 Tu Le (18:21)
 Right. Yeah. Agree.
 
 Lei Xing (18:37)
 Which they got to at the end of '24, I think.
 
 And then it's just a matter of
 
 Tu Le (18:40)
 Wa w one thing that I think
 
 is really important to remember as well, Lei, is that
 
 We talk like BYD will eventually it's like a done deal. 2030 might not be the date, but it seems like a done deal. And it's not. want to emphasize that. You and I are just talking best case scenario for BYD. Now, the legacy automakers, they're gonna come around and they're gonna have one or two hits here and there that will
 
 Take away from BYD sales eventually. That's number one. Number two, Chinese competition is gonna also be exported. I just talked about the Xingyuan, the EX2, being locally produced in Brazil. Brazil's an emerging market, an important market for BYD. And if the EX2 is built locally, they're not gonna have that market. They're not gonna have free reign in that market.
 
 Lei Xing (19:29)
 Which reminds me of the other thing that I saw and you tweeted this that Magna would be open to producing in Canada with Chinese OEM customers. Only if it's long term. This was Swamy, their CEO, talked about it at an event earlier this week.
 
 so there's another wrinkle that that's happening and at least I don't know how that works because Magna does not produce whole vehicles in Canada, They only have the Graz facility in Austria.
 
 Tu Le (19:58)
 Well, that's the other thing to think about, Lei, Like if BYD needs to accelerate production in order to try to achieve these goals, do they outsource some of their production? not only for batteries but for final assembly,
 
 Lei Xing (20:07)
 Yeah.
 
 there's no precedent, I can't imagine BYD being built by Magna.
 
 I just feel like it's something that BYD don't normally do or never does. somebody like a Xpeng, right? Or somebody like a GAC yeah, sure. but
 
 Yeah, I mean there's so many possibilities.
 
 Tu Le (20:27)
 we we have to talk about all the possibilities. What if they acquired a struggling brand that had a million units in sales or you know 1.2 1.4 million so that would be an immediate injection of sales volume for them. And so we have to think about that. There's acquisition possibilities, there's of course organic growth.
 
 If we look at the organic growth path
 
 That is very, very capital intensive. so I guess my question to you, Lei, is how much control do we believe Wang Chuanfu is willing to let go of in order to achieve the sales volume that he's looking for, to be the number one automaker in the world? Because
 
 In order to achieve that, he's either gonna need to write many checks over several years. But we already see that if BYD sneezes is really weighs heavily on their share price. So if you have 11 million, yeah, so yeah, I don't I don't
 
 Lei Xing (21:24)
 Yeah, the answer is not much.
 
 Tu Le (21:28)
 At this point in time, I think he also wants to maintain significant control of their trajectory. but
 
 Lei Xing (21:34)
 And they're
 
 they're basically trying to repeat what Tesla did the batteries, the flash charging stations, Chickens or eggs.
 
 Greetings.
 
 Tu Le (21:41)
 And the other thing too that's a little bit out of their control, and this is probably why the flash charging investment into Europe is what if adoption rates because countries don't wanna continue subsidizing EV purchase, what if adoption rates slow significantly? Now, does that mean they're plug-in hybrids?
 
 sales spike over the next few years, potentially, but I believe that there needs to be a balance between the hybrid sales and the BEV sales in order for them to get to number three or to number five, four, three, two, one. Now
 
 Lei Xing (22:19)
 the other significant thing is all of these other top global automakers, their ICEV sales or hybrids at least, account for a significant portion, whereas BYD, everything they're selling, 10 million units are NEVs. That's another pretty big hurdle to achieve. Is they get to number one globally by selling all NEVs.
 
 Tu Le (22:38)
 I mean Chery, Great Wall, the Geely, the other three large, I mean, selling in the millions of units per year, they they do have a combination of ICE and NEV. So we saw Tesla struggles. Now BYD does also sell hybrids, but part of Tesla's strategy was incorrect, but
 
 You
 
 let me summarize what I think you think and I think at a high level. Do we think it's impossible for BYD to become the number one automaker? I don't think five years ago, four years ago, three years ago, you and I would have been like, yeah, they can't do that. We believe they can, or I believe they can, and you tell me I'll let you speak for yourself. Three or four years ago, the political environment, the export environment, completely different.
 
 The domestic competition environment completely different. So I was very bullish that they were gonna become number one with a bullet. I'm not as bullish, but I still believe they can achieve number one status. I don't believe they can achieve number one status by 2030.
 
 Lei Xing (23:35)
 Yeah, I'd say I probably 99% agree.
 
 Tu Le (23:40)
 What's that one percent you disagree with?
 
 Lei Xing (23:42)
 interesting. 'cause he did say 2030, I think, that's the clear target.
 
 Tu Le (23:46)
 but you
 
 and I'd heard that they were targeting 2030 and it just wasn't openly stated. But now that it has been openly so anything that BYD does, anything and everything from a strategy standpoint from this point forward, I'm looking through that lens.
 
 of becoming the number one automaker in the world to analyze why they did what they did.
 
 Lei Xing (24:10)
 Yeah, it's not many more years. I mean it's 2027 coming up, three more years basically. Tough. It's gonna be tough.
 
 Tu Le (24:15)
 'Cause let's say they have
 
 six million units of capacity for production around the world. Let's say six, six and a half.
 
 And each factory that they need to open, let's also say, let's say averages 250 to 300,000 units. So that means they to open 10 more factories. And then if they want to supply 100% BYD batteries to those vehicles, they then need to open more battery factories.
 
 Lei Xing (24:32)
 Mm-hmm.
 
 Yeah. And then yeah it
 
 Tu Le (24:42)
 and
 
 We know that the Chinese government doesn't really want more capacity being built in China. And if they build that capacity outside of China, they lose a lot of flexibility. And these decisions as to where, how much, become so much more important to them over the next few years.
 
 So you and I are gonna scrutinize a lot of these decisions moving forward.
 
 Lei Xing (25:06)
 Yeah, regionally they probably need to have production in all the major regions they sell, including the US eventually.
 
 Tu Le (25:13)
 So while you were talking, Lei, I did a quick Google search. And Gemini told me that Toyota's US sales as a percentage of global is between 15 to 20%. So that is consistent with the two million units that I if at 11 million, two million's just less than 20%. So so my my cha bu duo guess was pretty good, pretty accurate.
 
 Lei Xing (25:20)
 Yeah.
 
 Hm. Yeah. So okay. Two million, yeah. okay. Yeah.
 
 Good benchmark benchmark.
 
 Tu Le (25:40)
 let me ask you this, your best guess. If they enter in 27, and let's say they have a factory built by end of 27, early 28, how long do you think it takes for them to in the United States to get to a million and a half?
 
 Lei Xing (25:54)
 Well, first of all, 27, 28, sounds early. I'm thinking it'll be more toward the end. best case scenario then early 2030s probably. That's my kind of yeah.
 
 Tu Le (25:58)
 Yeah. I I'm saying best case scenario. I'm saying
 
 And that's like if there aren't any significant issues and challenges, that's like best case, I think.
 
 Lei Xing (26:12)
 It is.
 
 Tu Le (26:13)
 So you wanna move to the GM Empower?
 
 Lei Xing (26:16)
 Let's talk about energy. GM and Ford are all in on energy. so which is the event Tu went earlier this week in San Francisco, where the chief product officer talking about the the energy part of the plans.
 
 Tu Le (26:25)
 Yes, so
 
 JB Strobel was on stage as well. ex-Tesla CTO, co-founder, and current CEO founder of Redwood Materials, whose company repurposes and recycles lithium-ion batteries. And so I think that was kind of
 
 Lei Xing (26:44)
 And GM is a big partner
 
 because of the used battery packs that they're using for Redwood, right?
 
 Tu Le (26:49)
 Yes.
 
 So a friend pointed out to me that one of the reasons that GM had this event was because a little bit of the FOMO that you Ford received all this attention for. and so they had to also say, Me too, you know, we're doing this too. So let me set the stage. GM Empower was an event that updated everyone on
 
 what's happening with GM Energy, their newest division, or one of their newest divisions that focuses on energy storage, V2X, you know, grid management and charging. And yeah. And so Sterling Anderson, chief product officer, as you mentioned, kind of introduced everyone. Kurt Kelty had a big part in it. And I recorded it. I will try to post it later next week with some captions because I don't know how
 
 Lei Xing (27:21)
 V2G yep. Mm-hmm.
 
 Tu Le (27:37)
 how good the sound was. the president of GM Energy. He also spoke the biggest takeaways that I got from the event and they were hosting at Fort Mason and so they picked us up at the hotel in only GM EVs. I was
 
 Driven in an Escalade IQ, big, big, big, big truck. and so great event. I mean, they're the the yeah, need to look at the dimensions because you know if the ES9 is that big, yeah, that's that's big. But so my biggest takeaways effectively were sodium ion for ESS. they have partnered with a
 
 Lei Xing (27:57)
 Think NIO ES9 Think of NIO ES9.
 
 Even bigger.
 
 Tu Le (28:12)
 Startup called Peak Energy. GM Ventures made a $30 million investment in Peak Energy. So they're partnering on development. But it sounds like GM will be manufacturing the sodium ion cells themselves. Kurt Kelty said they have a three-prong strategy. NMC for their top-end vehicles, LFP or LMR for their mass market mid-level vehicles, and then
 
 Lei Xing (28:33)
 Mass.
 
 Tu Le (28:34)
 LFP for their more affordable vehicles. So that's their long-term strategy for clean energy vehicles or how they're going to power them. And one of the interesting things that Kurt had mentioned was that they're launching an app called Energy Pass that will create a seamless experience for charging across
 
 multiple charging platforms. So think EVGo think IONA So he had shown like five or six charging providers. And this should have been done from day one. consolidate that so you don't have six, seven apps. You're lucky you have Tesla, so you just basically go to Tesla superchargers. But when I had my IONIQ 5
 
 I needed to some regions of states have certain charging stations, and then you go across the state and they have other charging stations, and there's not one that allows you to just plug in and charge without downloading an app, without creating a new payment system. And it was really, really ma fan (cumbersome) so this promises to
 
 Create a more seamless experience. But my question was if you want to advocate for EVs and clean energy vehicles, you should open this app up to non-GM vehicles. Because currently, Energy Pass is only going to be available to GM vehicles. You other thing that was interesting is that every vehicle they ship effectively, every EV they ship is bidirectional.
 
 And so they brought in the Peak Energy CEO who talked about how they're partnering on the vehicle to grid stuff. But yeah, it was interesting. a lot of small details were still not kind of articulated. So there's a lot of meat that needs to be put on the bones to really execute on what they had
 
 Lei Xing (30:10)
 What what
 
 Tu Le (30:20)
 announced during that event.
 
 Lei Xing (30:22)
 So one of the things I saw was this interface that GM is introducing in the app, Where how the utilities or the companies could be connected. So what Tesla does well is I have this kind of we have Eversource here and it's connected through my vehicle and I can see my charging sessions every month, every session. It's very seamless experience.
 
 Tu Le (30:41)
 Hmm.
 
 Lei Xing (30:43)
 Which I'm not sure the legacies are offering at this point. is not as easy, but Tesla makes it really easy. so yeah, that's something. And then just the peace of mind of charging. Why is BYD rolling all these in Europe? Because they believe the current European charging landscape is not enough to have that kind of the takeaway from the consumers. Tesla has done it.
 
 That's why I'm very happy that I have a Tesla. there's no anxiety at all. Anywhere I go, however long the trip is, no other competitor can offer this kind of peace of mind. So BYD wants to do it. NIO wants to do it, Xpeng wants to do it, Li Auto wants to do it.
 
 Tu Le (31:20)
 the other thing I'll add, Lei, about BYD investing in charging infrastructure in the EU is that not only is it a binary thing, there's not enough, full stop. And then number two, there's no guarantee that the current charging providers upgrade their systems to take advantage, full advantage of BYD's charging capabilities or charging speed.
 
 So part of the reason, the other part of that reason is that BYD is building the the most cutting edge, the fastest, ultra fast chargers into the EU so that it takes advantage of the BYD vehicles 800 volt you platforms or the fastest platform that they have is. And I think that's also an important reason they're investing heavily.
 
 In the EU charging infrastructure. So and they're not waiting. They're just not waiting for the government to do things for them, which the legacy automakers, they're always like, Well, we can do this if you do this or if you help us. And it's just like, okay, then that's gonna be your limiting factor. One of your huge limiting factors is waiting on governments to make investments.
 
 Lei Xing (32:02)
 Yeah.
 
 Tu Le (32:21)
 you lose a lot of control that way in BYD to our discussion earlier, they want to control everything. overall it it was a good event. one of the highlights, sidebar highlights was I got to ride in a ZOOX. I did that three times. we had gone out on Monday night after all the events were over
 
 Lei Xing (32:33)
 Finally.
 
 Tu Le (32:39)
 And so we had been drinking, we get into a ZOOX and ride around back to Soma from North Beach. it's a good experience,
 
 Lei Xing (32:47)
 So you hailed it, arranged.
 
 You hailed it, or it was
 
 Tu Le (32:51)
 just in Union Square they have a ZOOX house because I'm still on the wait list for the app to be activated. I'm gonna go to Vegas and try to do one in Vegas.
 
 Lei Xing (32:52)
 Invite like
 
 Okay.
 
 Yeah, CES where I experienced
 
 Tu Le (33:05)
 go to this ZOOX house, they bypass the the wait list and they will call you one and it picks you up right at the ZOOX house on Union Square on post, I want to say. And I waited 30 minutes. So I went to the Nike store and I bought a San Francisco Nike shirt and came back. It was there. And then my friend who
 
 Sophia Tung, who writes the Ride AI substack, she had a credit from ZOOX. And so she called a ZOOX at around 9 or 10 PM in North Shore and it took us back to Soma. So they are doing it as like one-offs for I media and analysts and things like that. But it's geofenced because a lot of the routes from the ZOOX house.
 
 Lei Xing (33:32)
 Mm-hmm.
 
 Tu Le (33:48)
 Will take you one way. It won't be round trip. they did have capability to do a round trip, but it was a much smaller ODD for round trip. and so, I recorded it, but yeah, very limited.
 
 Lei Xing (33:57)
 Yeah, I mean it's it's still limited. I mean in Vegas it was like
 
 probably like a two mile thing from the strip up to the north of the strip. And I did have to wait a long.
 
 Tu Le (34:05)
 then of course, Waymo's
 
 are flying by, flying by all over the place in San Francisco. So
 
 Lei Xing (34:12)
 of Waymo is launching their first ad today, I think you've seen some videos posted online, interestingly, and then they're offering the premium $29.99 a month. I I don't know about that, but
 
 Tu Le (34:17)
 yeah, they're gonna they're gonna
 
 Yeah.
 
 so so I I I
 
 Lei Xing (34:23)
 Only for the for the for the user
 
 who use it a lot, right? Maybe it's worth it, but not not for everyday, you know, like me. I have too many subscriptions already. Yeah.
 
 Tu Le (34:31)
 I tweeted, I was like, This is how you do subscription serv this is how
 
 you do subscription service, legacy auto, so
 
 Lei Xing (34:36)
 it's it's definitely a subscription based life right now, right? Streaming, I don't have cable anymore. I have the FSD subscription, everything is subscription nowadays.
 
 Tu Le (34:46)
 I'm I'm gonna say something, man. I almost thought 'cause I couldn't tell what the colors were until just, you know, a like half an hour ago, but I almost thought you had a USA soccer jersey on. Cause it kinda looks
 
 Lei Xing (35:01)
 from Volkswagen in Munich. It's is their ID. Polo camouflage. So I thought in the spirit of World Cup I have to wear something colorful, as you are.
 
 Tu Le (35:08)
 geez.
 
 I'm repping the China EV some more. so Team USA plays tonight at 9pm. I'm looking forward to that. I love these global events.
 
 Lei Xing (35:16)
 Yeah. speaking speaking World Cup, right? Yep. Yep. Same here.
 
 I'm saying speaking of World Cup, How is this related to China EVs? We have to find some connections. So one of the connections is BYD is the partner of Red Note. And Fang Cheng Bao and Denza are broadcasting partners for CGTN. That's how BYD is involved. and then
 
 Tu Le (35:25)
 'Cause you
 
 Well
 
 and you know, Alibaba's involved, Lenovo's involved, for these events.
 
 Lei Xing (35:49)
 Hisense, Mengniu, it's a lot of Chinese brands. The balls, the chips. You know in the soccer balls, the chips, I think they're Chinese made.
 
 Tu Le (35:53)
 Mung yo, Mung Yo.
 
 Lei Xing (35:59)
 the joke is there's only one referee, match referee from China and there's Labubu from China. Those are the Chinese national teams. That's the joke online. Yeah.
 
 Tu Le (36:08)
 'cause the Chinese national team did not make the the World Cup. So that's all I have, me repeat. Congratulations, Lei, on episode number 250. I will pat myself and you on the back.
 
 Lei Xing (36:11)
 Yeah.
 
 Same to you, same to you.
 
 Tu Le (36:22)
 You there's still a few listeners, live streamers, but I think we do really, really important work. and we haven't really done a great job of promoting this, but man, I think we're
 
 Lei Xing (36:31)
 I I'm trying to figure some things that
 
 help because because yeah, I mean the the the utilities and the tools that we have. it it it it it helps. so you know
 
 Tu Le (36:41)
 'cause I I'd like to get us in front of more people because I think what we've been doing for so long, 250 episodes for more than almost five years, is gonna be much more relevant to more people. And I think we're objectively some of the best truth tellers. good and bad. but hey men.
 
 I wanted to give 30 seconds of reflection episode 250. So congratulations, man.
 
 Lei Xing (37:01)
 imagine just just four years ago, the last time World Cup happened. I got COVID in November 2022 for the first time. And then how the market was then versus just four years later. how things change, the narratives change, the momentum, they could change any minute.
 
 Tu Le (37:17)
 gonna I'm gonna
 
 Lei Xing (37:17)
 we always have to look at this through a longer lens.
 
 to to really make a conclusion and judgment on what happened or how things would turn out. No.
 
 Tu Le (37:28)
 I'm gonna give you an assignment, man, because you're much better at it than I am. Like maybe what you do is like episode one to episode 250 like do that compare and contrast you just did. The number one vehicle, the number one vehicle today, the sales volume, the sales volume today. Maybe you just record a quick video and we post it as like our marketing for episode 250 today.
 
 Lei Xing (37:49)
 it's just classic one would be China exported one million vehicles for the longest time annually up until 2021 And now China exports close to a million vehicles per month in the last two months.
 
 In a matter of five years.
 
 Tu Le (38:03)
 And it's still growing. So, but before we Tom H greetings from Shanghai. SSJJ005. If NIO can't sell at least 10,000 a month of the new L60 from July, it's a failure considering the new lower price and all the features. Man, he's harsh. You're harsh, man.
 
 Lei Xing (38:24)
 I mean L60 the BaaS pricing starting at RMB135,800 BaaS is the same pricing as the Firefly.
 
 Not the BaaS firefly, but the regular price firefly. So think about that.
 
 yeah.
 
 Tu Le (38:37)
 A prezza
 
 Rights ICE car sales around 50% over year. my down 50 year over year. Malcolm Bennett 3555. Good morning everyone. Just getting on. BYD announced flash charging in Canada. Do you believe this shall force encourage all charging operators to follow all EVs to upgrade? let me start. I don't know if
 
 Many charging operators have the budget or the the the funds to upgrade, unfortunately. And there needs to be some sort of analysis that's being done unless BYD wants to fund the upgrades to charging infrastructure. Again, you know, pointing back to Li's comment, there that could be their moat for all these markets.
 
 But is it necessary to have a three minute, four minute, six minute charger? I don't know. but so could be overkill to to upgrade every single charger in Canada just because BYD has done it. But Lei, what do you think?
 
 Lei Xing (39:33)
 No, I think this is where maybe the late comers and you know, BYD, if I think of the ones are at the forefront, right? So Tesla has done it. So BYD is trying to do it. NIO has established the power swap model. other than that, I mean there's a bunch of Chinese ones are building now their own. But if you're talking about the traditional charging operator, they're just not as fast as BYDs are doing.
 
 established or rollout is not just as fast. and then the earlier question about ONVO L60, the way to answer that is all of the three NIO brands needs to have at least one model, 10,000 units a month model. So NIO has done it. ONVO has not at least well they have, but maybe for one or two months. Firefly, not yet. they're selling 5,000, 6,000 a month.
 
 Tu Le (39:57)
 Right.
 
 Lei Xing (40:18)
 But each brand needs to have a 10,000 unit a month model, I think, to be the next stage of kind of consistency. NIO already has two. They're about to have two. ONVO, I'm hoping L60 can be that one. so that's how I kind of look at it going forward.
 
 Tu Le (40:34)
 Tom H, greetings from Shanghai. BYD can operate as the low-cost producer and value price their export production that will fuel their growth ambitions. Sure. but I also think that more countries will sound alarm bells that that the Chinese are kind of dumping. even even if there's demand for their vehicles.
 
 They need to really, really be careful about looking like they're shipping excess capacity as opposed to shipping to accommodate demand. So
 
 Lei Xing (41:03)
 But I mean BYD is just trying as hard at at home as they're trying to export, as they're trying to overseas, because at home they just announced that fallback covering you for accidents in urban NOA. that's a major I think Xpeng has followed it somewhat. they're trying hard.
 
 Tu Le (41:18)
 Mm-hmm.
 
 Have
 
 they?
 
 Lei Xing (41:24)
 Xpeng I think is a different the fine print is different, but it's not like they're giving up the home market.
 
 Tu Le (41:27)
 Yeah.
 
 'Cause 'cause
 
 I mean it is when you think about how bold that guarantee is with fine print. I mean that's it didn't catch in Western media that much, but I mean th they are really, really pushing out that line and are forcing a lot of companies to try to follow them. And a lot of companies just aren't going to be willing
 
 You what else does BYD do to separate itself because they're trying everything. and you know, there's good and bad to that, but we can talk about that in the next episode. Tom also writes the higher margins on export sales to EU CA will underwrite the expense of deploying charging infrastructure. You make a great point. But again, you know, I think the ability to export
 
 is gonna be limited moving forward. Number one, as countries become more aware of it and likely increase certain protectionism. And then also as BYD domestic production in those regions comes online. because then they'll need to export less, you would think. So
 
 Lei Xing (42:30)
 I think the rhythm of launches also is happening much faster. So BYD, their Big Tang is launching and they're about to launch the Big Han, The Big Tang has over 100,000 orders. Da Tang Da Han And then Volkswagen came out with the ID. ERA 8X Li Xiang is about to launch the L8.
 
 Tu Le (42:40)
 Tahanya.
 
 Lei Xing (42:48)
 Yeah.
 
 Tu Le (42:48)
 Eight series is is the meat market the sweet spot for mass market and premium.
 
 Lei Xing (42:54)
 Volkswagen, especially the joint venture, Shanghai Volkswagen, they haven't done well, but I think ID. ERA 9X was number one in the EREV in May, the rankings. Like over five thousand units, so there's some momentum, but we'll see how it goes.
 
 Tu Le (43:06)
 Mm-hmm.
 
 Lei Xing (43:10)
 But the foreign automakers continue to lose share. The Honda's. right? The shareholders want the CEO out, right? Or the other the
 
 Tu Le (43:14)
 Did you
 
 you mentioned Honda, Lei, a shout out to Nori. He had posted a a Reuters article that he wrote about the Honda board trying to oust Mebe.
 
 Lei Xing (43:26)
 Bored, yeah. Wanting
 
 to yeah.
 
 Tu Le (43:29)
 And and it seems like the Western OEM's boards are tolerant of mediocrity. So last comment from Tom. BYD's export pricing will be higher than domestic. They can price just below their EU CA competitors to avoid dumping stigma. So well, I I look at dumping more as volume thing than a price thing.
 
 Because honestly, Tesla is now shipping is it top end or mid end, maybe top end, Model 3s to Canada for 36,000 dollars So that is a cheap, cheap Model 3 for I think dual motor. so they can point to Tesla being the one that starts that price war in Canada at least.
 
 not looking at BYD as an individual exporter. I'm looking at China EV Inc. as being the exporter and the concern from the large macro numbers, not the individual numbers from each individual brand. So anyways, we've been on this for an hour and four minutes, Lei. So we are gonna figure out a way to celebrate our 250th episode.
 
 But for those that have been a part of this, yes, right? We're gonna have a UFC fight in front yards, anyways. for those of you that have been for a few episodes, for a lot of episodes, for most of the episodes, thank you. Thank you for spending your time with us. We do appreciate it. and love all your feedback as well. your comments. So keep them coming.
 
 Lei Xing (44:33)
 Just like America is doing for its 250 right?
 
 Tu Le (44:55)
 And Lei, I will talk with you on DMs. Have a good weekend. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening.
 
 Lei Xing (45:01)
 Same to you, brother.