The automotive rise of China

THIS weekend, for what is only the second time, a Chinesebrand vehicle features on the cover of

Drivesouth.

The vehicle in question is the Haval H9 SUV. For those not in the know, Haval is an offshoot brand of Great Wall Motors, whose utes have been available here from some years. Indeed, it was a Great Wall ute that was the first Chinese brand to make Drivesouth’s cover, four or five years ago.

Add in the likes of Chery and Foton, and it is clear that Chinese brands are starting to gain a foothold in this country.

Sure, they have some way to go to achieve the sales volumes of established brands from elsewhere in the world, but a small bit of history was made last year when the Foton Tunland ute became the first allChinese vehicle to make the top 15 on our annual sales charts for cars or light commercials.

Ignorance about the Chinese automotive industry is possibly less common that it once was, but the average Kiwi motorist still knows little about motor vehicles in the world’s most populous nation.

Handsup, for example, those who are aware that Volvo — whose XC60 SUV has scooped numerous international car of the year awards of late — is these days owned by a Chinese multinational automotive manufacturing company, the Geely Holding Group? Or that China surpassed the United States as the world’s largest automobile producer by volume in 2009?

And who would pick that China’s topselling brand these days is actually a European brand — Volkswagen — albeit with most of the more than three million VWs sold in China last year being built in China.

Then there are the brands that are wellknown in China, but have yet to make their mark beyond their home market. Anyone for a Baojun, Changan, Zotye, BYD or Hawtai? What about a Wuling, Lynk & Co, or maybe an Arcfox (a Chinese EVonly brand)?

As for Haval, well this week’s cover car belongs to an allChinese brand that sold roughly a million vehicles in its home market last year. Most of those vehicles were either SUVs or utes.

A rising awareness is being accompanied by marked improvements in the crashworthiness of Chinese cars selling in this part of the world. Late last year the LDV T60 ute and Haval H2 SUV became the first Chinesebranded vehicles sold here to achieve the maximum possible fivestar ANCAP safety rating. As Richard Bosselman points out in his launch story, the Haval H9 is likely to upgrade from its current fourstar mark to a fivestar rating later this year.

The times are certainly changing, in a way that we haven’t seen since Japanese cars went from joke status in the 1960s to market dominance by the

1980s.