BYD Goes After the Icons

JLR (Jaguar Land Rover) should be shaking in its boots for example, with the Denza BAO5 rolling straight through forests and fields to European consumers in the next few months. Don't mistake this SUV for another Chinese Tesla Model Y clone, it used a completely different animal as inspiration. This Land Rover Discovery inspired vehicle will try to match superb luxury with some serious off-road capabilities. On the one hand you should feel like royalty with 18 speakers, hydraulic suspension, four screens, a cooling/heating central console, massage seats and a large panoramic roof. On the other hand, all this opulence will go wherever you want it to with that suspension that can be raised to over 30 cm, roll-on and-roll off angles that can compete with the Ineos Grenadier (39° and 34° vs 36° and 36°), three electronic differential locks and almost instant torque steering across the axles. After playing in the dirt you can get home in a hurry with the over 500 horses and 700 nm of torque delivered by the hybrid powertrain. The BYD Blade battery of 32 kwh will store the energy produced by the 1.5 l turbo petrol engine until it can be used by the two electric motors. For a sprint to 100 km/h in under 5 seconds for example!

If going after Land Rover sounds like sacrilege, how about the audacity of attacking the most mythic of them all: the 911! Well, BYD's sub-brand Denza is doing exactly that with the launch of the Z. Of course the BYD group is no stranger to supercar performance, the Yangwang U9 has been around for a few years now and is incredibly powerful. It is also only available in China, whereas the Z will be launched in Europe soon. This car is trying very hard to step away from its Chinese DNA by focusing on the most important person in the car: the driver. A true cockpit faces the one at the wheel and the rear seats are only usable for small kids or your weekender bag. The message is clear, this car is about performance. We all know what that means in the electric age. Over 1.600!! horses for the base version and 2.000 for the racing edition. I mean, really?? A sprint to 100 km/h takes less than two seconds and a top speed is almost 350 km/h for all editions. For those who are hoping that the chassis and handling knowledge of the traditional manufacturers will help them keep the edge there is also bad news. The new players are catching up fast and are innovating at lighting speed. The dampers on the standard Z will have Magnaride dampers which can change the level of damping in milliseconds under a magnetic field. The battery is kept quite small with only 76 kwh of energy content, which will surely run out pretty fast when you put the full cavalry to work. Not to worry though, the Denza Z will be equipped with flash charging tech from BYD, allowing it to recharge at 1.500 kw if you can find the right charger. I'm betting we might see one of these convertibles sitting happy at truck chargers while they sprint to their holiday destination.

The message is clear, from a technology perspective the Chinese players are leaving everyone in the dust and don't seem to be content fighting only for the volume bits of the market. They want the aura and margins that come from having halo cars in the lineup. Having the vehicles is only the first step of course. Manufacturers like Porsche and JLR are much more than just producers of cars. Their value sits in the subtle but deeply ingrained connections their brands trigger. That doesn't mean they are invincible though, the new players have the products ready, if they now have the patience and marketing prowess to slowly but deliberately introduce them to European drivers they are not without a chance.