Chinese electric vehicles are becoming more and more familiar to UK road users; BYD sold more cars in June than Mazda, Mini, Citroen and Dacia in the UK. Not bad for a company that's only two years old. However, with the imminent of arrival of more Chinese EV brands, some are concerned about price wars being sparked by BYD as well as an oversaturation of the UK market. More concerning still, security experts have told this website that an explosion in the number of Chinese EVs driven in the UK could be a national security disaster.
BYD, now the world's largest EV manafacturer, has come in for fierce criticism for driving down prices and undercutting the market. It has prompted several other Chinese EV-makers to follow suit, with prices tumbling an eye-watering 30%. Great Wall Motor's chairman Wei Jianjun said he was pessimistic about the "healthy development" of the EV market, warning it could go the same way as the Chinese real estate industry and go into a downturn.
Geely, Denza and Chery, meanwhile, may be relatively unknown on British streets at present, but all three large Chinese brands are planning to come to the UK this year. Andy Shields, Indicata's global business unit director, warned that Chinese brands are looking at the UK market and markets in Europe to boost profits amid the Chinese price war. He said: "Chinese OEMs [original equipment manufacturers] are facing massive oversupply and intense competition in their domestic market. They need to find markets outside of China to sell their vehicles, and Europe represents their most viable and profitable export destination."
He added: "Whilst there are tariffs in place for BEVs [battery electric vehicles] in the EU, it's still possible for Chinese manufacturers to sell BEVs in Europe more profitably than in their home market.
"The UK market is particularly exposed as there are currently no additional tariffs on Chinese BEVs," he warned.
Some experts have warned that the vast number of brands coming to the UK could trigger a price war, while others have suggsted that the oversaturation of the market will spark a "bloodbath" of Chinese EV brands. According to consultancy AlixPartners, only 15 out of the 129 brands that currently sell EVs and plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) in China will be financially viable by 2030 due to intensifying competition.
Against this backdrop, high-ranking security experts have warned that the UK could be crippled if Chinese EVs make it onto British roads, even in small numbers. Sir Richard Dearlove, who led MI6 from 1999 to 2004, told the Daily Express that the Government should consider banning Chinese EVs.
He said: “China could cripple the traffic in London by cutting the controls of let’s say 400 electric cars in one go, so they couldn’t be moved. This is not a scare story, it’s an actual possibility. One day it will happen, or something like that will happen, if we get into a tense international crisis with China - and it’s a real problem.”
Jim Saker, a green car expert from Loughborough University, says Chinese EVs are embedded with cellular modules that can be remotely controlled allowing anyone with access to direct them.
He said: “Within all of these vehicles there are these cellular networks… and they can provide access and information to whoever wishes to control it.
“It’s only this new generation of cars that this is really affecting. When you’ve got cameras on the front, rear and internally, you’ve got the ability to communicate [with the car].”
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