All about Chery, the third Chinese brand that will debut in Europe (starting from Italy)
The Omoda full electric SUV will be the first model with which the Chinese brand will land in Italy. At the moment almost nobody knows Chery, but in reality she has already been present for some time in our country …
BYD , Nio and now Chery. They are the Chinese houses, unknown to most, that Europeans will soon know well because, having come from afar and driven so far by the intoxication of the Old Continent for the ecological transition, they are about to break into our market, thanks to their very fierce electric models.
HOW EVER CHERY HAS CHOSEN ITALY
Chery, in particular, has chosen Italy and Spain as first landing countries: a particular decision, given that both Mediterranean nations still lack adequate infrastructure, which will in fact slow down the transition to electricity. But it should not surprise even that much given that Chery, already a partner of the Italian (Molise) DR, is in fact already present, albeit with an infinitesimal share, on our roads. But now the Chinese management will operate directly in the Bel Paese, without rebranding and with its own chain of distributors.
THE HISTORICAL QUERELLE WITH GM
"We have been leading exports of internal combustion vehicles for many years and the same is true for new energy vehicles," said Zhu ShaoDong , Deputy General Manager of Chery International as he played the charge for conquering new countries. The brand is currently present in more than 80 countries and has already produced, according to the data provided, over ten million vehicles. After all, since it was founded in 1997, the Wuhu company has immediately looked abroad, as well as the domestic market. And abroad, in the early 2000s, it became known above all for a very long judicial dispute with the American Chevrolet, a division of GM, which accused it of having copied the South Korean Daewoo Matiz of which it had recently become the owner.
And indeed the Chery QQ closely resembled the Matiz , with only one difference: the price. To buy it, the equivalent of 4,800 euros was enough, in short, what you pay for a good moped. She was also good-naturedly made fun of by the three well-known British journalists of the sector, Jeremy Clarkson and James May in their Top Gear special dedicated to China, included among the “clone” cars of the then Asian privateer market.
A corsair approach to Western brands that was advocated by the government itself which, let's not forget, holds stakes in every national company and which was obviously tolerated by the Chinese judiciary, without all that part of the civil code concerning the protection of brands and patents. international, so much so that it all ended in a soap bubble.
But the most curious aspect of the story, which differentiated it from the many similar episodes of those years in which the Chinese car market was filled with more or less successful clones of established Western brands (to get an idea, we always refer you to the episode of Top Gear ), is that, at the time, 20% of Chery Automobile belonged to a Chinese joint-venture between GM itself and Saic, given that the laws in force until December 2021 required Western brands to be allied with national ones to distribute and produce locally. As if to say: if the Western partner had complained, he would have risked losing his access to the Chinese market …
CHINA GETTING CLOSER
But now China no longer needs such means to increase its presence on the market: it has moved with sufficient foresight to be able to dominate the world of EV cars, especially since the EU, although it wants to ban the the entire industry that produces endothermic engines does not have an equally valid industrial plan and, in any case, remains lacking in all those essential materials for the production of batteries. Materials found in China or Africa, in mines long acquired by Beijing. At the same time, the quality of its cars has grown enormously, so much so that the full electric SUV Omoda, with which the Chinese brand will land in Italy, certainly has all the credentials to compete with Western but also Asian rivals, positioning itself on the the same path as BYD, which will arrive in Europe, also focusing on fully electric SUVs. And the West, as in the days of the most shameless clones, remains to watch. Indeed, he will start buying Chinese cars …
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/smartcity/tutto-su-chery-il-terzo-marchio-cinese-che-debuttera-in-europa-partendo-dallitalia/ on Tue, 11 Oct 2022 10:16:00 +0000.