Chinese Automaker Unveils First Electric Car

JuliusSu writes "A Chinese auto manufacturer, BYD, is introducing today the country's first electric car, a plug-in hybrid vehicle. It plans to sell at least 10,000 cars in 2009 for a price of less than $22,000. This put the company ahead of schedule against other entrants to this market, such as Toyota, due to release a similar car in late 2009; and GM, whose Chevy Volt will be launched in late 2010. The company is best known for making cellphone batteries, and hopes its expertise in ferrous battery technology will allow it to leapfrog established car manufacturers."

Comments

Re:Your "American" car is full of Chinese stuff

[Facegarden]

That high quality American car is packed to the gunnels with Chinese made parts, including engines.

About the only thing that is truely american is the arrogance.

Arrogance? You obviously don't know much about chinese cars. It doesn't matter where the parts are made, but american cars aren't ENGINEERED in china. So far all the chinese cars that have been engineered in china have been terrible. I remember one example that looked like any other common car in the US or elsewhere, but it did so poorly in crash testing it couldn't even manage ONE STAR. It was a deathtrap.

Don't call people arrogant without checking your own ignorance. I'm not saying the car can't be good, but given what has come out of china so far, people have a right to be skeptical.
-Taylor

People laughed about Japanese cars, too.

[Lonewolf666]

When the first Japanese cars showed up in Europe in the 1970s, they were cheap but had a terrible reputation. That has changed. Today they are on the same quality level (and almost as expensive) as European cars. Toyota even ruled the reliability/breakdown statistics for years, only recently some European models have retaken the lead.

I expect that the same will happen with the Chinese cars. They may have not much experience in car making now, but 10 years from now things can look different.