Lined up none deep
The world’s first plug-in hybrid, the F3DM from BYD, has gone on sale in the Chinese domestic market. How’s it doing? A few breaths short of “Meh”:
Warren Buffett’s hefty investment into the cell phone battery maker quieted the skeptics and gave green-hued futurists a license to thrill. A 60-mile plug-in range, a multiple-mode hybrid system and a price tag under $25K had American hypermilers factoring in local tax credits and greengasming at the fantasy of it all. But in the world’s new largest market for automobiles, even $20K is a huge amount of money. And it turns out that one society’s eco-fantasy is another society’s overpriced, overly-complex answer to a question nobody has asked.
Xinhua reports (yes, nearly a week ago) that BYD’s F3DM has utterly failed to attract Chinese consumers; the firm has sold only 80 models since it went on sale in December. Apparently 20 of those were bought by the city of Shenzhen (think China’s Detroit) with the rest going to the local branch of China Construction Branch. In fact, BYD never even attempted to target private consumers with the model, despite the fact that an F3DM costs 30-40 percent less than a Toyota Prius (which only sold about 3,500 units in China between 2006 and 2008). Even the government isn’t rushing to put its citizens in the alleged volks-hybrid, offering a $7K hybrid subsidy to fleet buyers only.
Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway group, through a subsidiary, owns 10 percent of BYD.
The F3DM has a 1-liter inline-three producing 75 hp, plus two electric motors. The battery design is BYD’s own. Projected range is 60 miles.
All this is cause for concern at Specific (formerly “General”) Motors: if the car-crazy Chinese won’t buy a $20k hybrid in a booming market, how are they going to sell a $40k hybrid (Chevrolet’s Volt) in a market gone to pieces? Answer: more subsidies, of course. I have to wonder if this fact will appear in the advertising: “You’ve already paid for this car, now drive it.”
McGehee »
21 April 2009 · 8:49 am
There’s yer trouble. Lately the old coot’s been basing decisions on wishful thinking, relying largely on the fact that if he loses a few million he’ll hardly notice.
Less well-endowed investors who try to follow that kind of bandwagon are always the ones who get run over by it.