CHINA: BYD Great Tang, SAIC/Huawei Unveil Shooting Brake and Li Auto Trolls VW | 05 Mar 2026

Welcome back to EV News China, today BYD's Great Tang, the SAIC Huawei unveiling of

a shooting break and Li Auto trolls VW on social media, plus they tuned because later

in the show I'll tell you how Lotus split out the design of its new car between the

Chinese and British teams.

Welcome to EV News China, the podcast dedicated to the world's largest EV market.

Every day I bring you the latest headlines, insights and analysis from the heart of China's

booming EV industry and decode how fast moving developments in the east shape the global

landscape.

Well we'll start with news of BYD's, so if you listen to this spin off show regularly

you've heard me talking about the 5th of March being BYD's Tech Day, as of writing

and recording this, it was still ahead of my time, it's going to be in Shenzhen later

so that'll be either a bonus show in your feed or pretty much probably a large chunk

of Friday's EV News China.

But BYD did release interior images of its new flagship, ahead of the debut of the company's

disruptive technology event in Shenzhen, they showed off the inside of their flagship SUV

the Tang or the Great Tang in Chinese the Datang and the timing matters because it's

going to be one of the first BYD models to showcase several of their new technologies.

Firstly this is a very large vehicle, it's 5.3 meters long, it's 2 meters wide and 1.8

meters tall with a 3.1 meter wheelbase.

BYD says it's the largest dynasty series SUV and it's positioned against large premium

family SUV's like the Li Auto L9 and the Aito M9.

Inside is what we got to see, it is as opulent and luxurious as perhaps you're imagining

the front cabin uses a wraparound layout with three dashboard displays, digital instrument

cluster, floating central touchscreen and for the first time in a dynasty model a passenger

entertainment screen, also a rear screen for passengers in the back mounted to the ceiling.

So a rear ceiling screen, also tables for the rear chairs, a refrigerator and a two

plus two plus three layout.

BYD is targeting second row comfort with zero gravity seating, wide headrests and one touch

recline functions while the third row adds dedicated storage and cup holders, the model

is planned in both pure BEV and plug-in hybrid forms.

So the Bev will have a thousand volt architecture to make the most of the new BYD charging,

we'll get into that on tomorrow's podcast and so that's going to be, you know, at least

we think probably 1500 kilowatts of charging for some BYD models, possibly even quicker.

Okay, let's move on, all the BYD stuff will come either tomorrow or in a separate show

if there's loads of it to get to.

Now, Huawei and SAIC have revealed their first Z7 range, a five meter high tech coupe and

shooting break.

The shooting breaks called the Z7T that trades the fastback rear for more cargo space and

rear headroom and also it just looks really nice, here's the details, they publicly unveiled

the first models from their joint venture and so it's a, the coupe and the option of

having the shooting break is kind of common actually in China, probably the nearest we

can get is probably the German manufacturers, Audi will do their events version, etc., everyone's

got their version of that.

So the colour they chose to promote this was an electric purple pink exterior with diamond

lighting signatures.

They've gone bling with this by the way and it does really stand out while the cabin

combines a two tone layout, three spoke steering wheel and a slim driver display just enough

to show the real time data that you need.

Now the main talking point is Huawei's sunflower screen and this slides forward and back.

It rotates side to side and tilts towards the driver automatically, I need to see this

in action.

A separate front passenger display sits above the recessed storage area and there's a magnetic

base designed to hold small display items like figurines, okay the Z7T is the same,

it's the shooting break at the front and all the way up to, well the C pillar, the roof

line obviously continues all the way to the back replacing that steep fastback rear with

a longer roof line, it's a better boot space, second row headroom, has the full width light

bar at the back as well and in terms of comparisons, well I try not to do too many lazy comparisons

but there is definitely some lineage I would say you could draw a line between these and

the Porsche Taycan.

They're different cars, it's not a rip off copy but there is some similarities and if

you like the look of the Taycan and obviously the Taycan Cross Charismo, the kind of lifted

version with that shape then I think you'll like the look of these, alright let's move

on.

Let's talk a little bit about this incredible story because normally in China I would say

they play pretty nicely, CEOs turn up to competing CEOs keynote speeches or reveals

and say, oh I've bought one of their cars, they talk about Tesla in quite revered terms

saying that their self-driving technology is very good, largely I would say that the executives

of Chinese car makers play really nicely actually, at least publicly, this is a bit of shade

being thrown, let me tell you the story and then what happened, first of all, Volkswagen

its first range extender off the line yesterday and it will debut in the ID Era 9X, pre-sale

start at the end of this month.

The engine dates back to 2011, like the family name of the engine and they've made 20 million

engines in China with the SAIC joint venture so they know how to make engines there but

this is a range extender based on the Evo II engine, they say that this has all of the

technology needed to be a great range extender, 1.5 turbocharged engine at 105 kilowatts,

it'll have a battery pack of 65 kilowatt hours and they say 400 kilometers of CLTC electric only

range, they've done some cold weather testing and we know in the MIIT filing that the ID

Era 9X is going to be a large vehicle, it's a nine series which is a signifier in Chinese

naming of many EVs to be top of the line, so 5.2 meters long, almost two meters wide,

1.8 meters tall and a three meter wheelbase, so the exterior details including the full

width LED light strip, illuminated logo and rectangular daytime running light elements

also look very distinctive too, so that's the story, that's the range extender engine that

VW has shown off, they did one of those those pressurly shots of all the workers, the engineers

in the factory gathered around the engine as it came off the production line, one of those,

all the robots and factory machines in the background, one of those shots, now Leauto

picked up on that on social media and jumped on the moment congratulating Volkswagen for

and I quote, successfully mass producing a technology that is outdated, very environmentally

unfriendly and had little development potential six years ago, wow, that points back to a previous

statement that Volkswagen had made on their views of EREVs in China, the views at the time were

blunt, in September 2020 the Volkswagen China CEO called EREV technology very environmentally

friendly and the head of R&D said it's outdated with limited development potential, exactly the

phrases that Leauto just used right back at them, of course Leauto has gone big on EREVs and didn't

probably appreciate at the time Volkswagen throwing some shade at them, so they waited

and salved their hands and then when the moment was right, they pointed out perhaps some hypocrisy

on Volkswagen's part, Leauto responded at the time by challenging Volkswagen to a real world

comparison, saying that the Li-1 was better than an Audi Q7 e-tron or a Porsche Cayenne E hybrid

on fuel consumption and in December 2021 the CEO Li Xiang said that Li-1 volumes exceeded

the combined sales of all Volkswagen SUVs in China and you know wasn't shy at pointing that

out, Volkswagen's product plans put the shift in clear view in 2026, it plans six EVs including two

EREVs, three plug-in hybrids and one BEV, so six years on the limited development potential

is a long forgotten strategy, all right let's move on, let's talk about GAC groups new vehicle,

the A800 being launched today is a mid to large range extended electric sedan, it's going to be

sold in four variants from about 27,000 us to about 44,000 us, the A800 uses a 35 kilowatt hour

lithium ion phosphate pack, this is a low slung saloon, think model S, a clean front end like a

Lucid, okay that's better, think Lucid air sedan, long and low, one of those kind of cars, it's an

EREV, it's an engine with a generator, rear wheel drive versions, single motor, all wheel drive

flagship, we'll do both of them over a hundred miles on the China cycle electric only, now inside

Huawei supplies the cabin tech, so the variants of the car get the Harmony Space 5 cockpit with

cross-device connectivity and voice control, while higher trim levels add the Huawei Chiankun

drive resistance system with four LiDAR sensors, inside the A800 has a 12.3 inch digital instrument

cluster, a 15.6 inch floating central display, a wraparound cockpit, three spoke steering wheel,

theater style rear seating, loads of legroom in the back by the way and napper leather interior,

the pictures they put online were of a four-seater or maybe they just, maybe it's a five-seater but

they folded down the central section of the rear seats, that could be it possibly, they haven't

advertised it as a four or five-seater, normally it would be a five-seater, get three people in the

back but maybe it has one of those four center things that flip down with you know the kind of

cup holders and phone chargers and stuff, but that's the picture they put online and the you know

the the the two rear seats as it were with loads of legroom, do look really really nice, all right

let's move on and talk about Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance, HEMA announcing upgrades to

its top-end models, now these are really special, the Maestro S800 and the Ito M9, centered on the

Huawei ADS 4.1 system, now HEMA spans five brands, Ito, Luxead, Stilato, Maestro and Sangui,

under Huawei's partnership umbrella, cumulative deliveries of 1.28 million so far and HEMA has

led Chinese auto brands in the average transaction price for the last 14 consecutive months, it

outsells BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi combined on both volume and on average selling price,

the Ito M9, now that's delivered over 280,000 units in under two years and the segment crown

if you like for cars costing over about 70,000 US dollars equivalent, there are pure electric SUV

versions of these and it's got the highest EREV resale value at 83% of its new value,

now the Maestro S800 has done about 15,000 units in the last nine months which isn't a lot by China

standards but it is a lot when you think about how much it costs and the kind of cars it's up

against, Porsche Panameras, even Mercedes-Benz S-Class and it costs over a million you want,

that's 137,000 US, the core upgrade is its new LiDAR, it's 896 line LiDAR system which they claim

is the highest line count in mass production of an EV in China delivering four times image

detail resolution on other technology, its dual optical path architecture can detect an object

as small as 14 centimeters, that's just under six inches at long range, improving low reflectivity

obstacle perception by 190%, irregular obstacle recognition by 77% and doubles the overall

durability, we'll take a break, we'll come back, we'll talk about China's charging boom and the

first ones to go for the Canadian import license stick around back in the moment.

All right welcome back to EV News China our spin-off podcast making sense of what happens

in the east and what it means for the global EV landscape, now we'll talk about one of the

western countries that will be having more Chinese made EVs in a second that'll be Canada but first

of all China closed off January with 20.7 million EV charging connectors thanks to the wonders of

the way that China goes about its business, they keep count of these kind of things including

private charges, that is a 50% year on year increase from January 2025 after adding 606,000

new points in January alone, private charging drove the bulk of the growth in January's additions

with 522,000 private charges up 143% year on year, China now has 15.9 million private EV charges

that is 77% of all the infrastructure with installed capacity 138 million kilovolt

amperes never thought about that in that way but there you go this sounds like a lot of

chargers, so looser installation rules and tighter developer partnerships that means that

home charging is a default ownership experience for anyone that can, public charging is growing

a little more slowly there's 4.8 million public charges in China up 31% year on year from January

2025 and the average power per public charger is 47 kilowatts which is interesting because China gets

a lot of headlines for 800 1000 soon to be 1500 kilowatt fast charging and you could assume that

actually all of the chargers are really fast chargers but there you go there's the stat the

average power per public charger is 47 kilowatts all right let's move on Canada will allow up to

24 and a half thousand Chinese made EVs in the first six months of the new rules at 6.1% tariff

rate so that's from now until the end of August and then they'll do the same again for the next

six months it uses an import permit quota system first come first served so obviously the ones

that have already got relationships and the paperwork in China the poll stars of the world

and the volvos and the Teslas BYD has been quick off the mark to file their Transport Canada

registrations for vehicles which they make in Shenzhen and Qian though models must still meet

Canadian safety rules battery charging and data compliance standards Prime Minister Mark

Carney has indicated that within five years over half of Chinese EV imports will be those below

35 000 Canadian dollars Volvo already shifted EX30 production to Belgium to sidestep duties

now Honda's Dongfeng joint venture will export the new SUV to Japan the ENS2 this is an electric

vehicle they're going to call it an insight so the insight name plate which you may or may not

be familiar with is coming back the first time Honda's used it as a badge on an EV the sales

will start this spring and priority reservations open March 19th exports will be capped at 3000

units sourced from Dongfeng Honda's plant in China marking a notable shift for Honda which has

always relied on domestic Japanese manufacturing rather than importing

China built vehicles the ENS2 is the fourth model in Honda's EN series that's pure electric

and part of the second phase of its China rollout it shares the platform with the GAC Honda

Honda the ENP2 that one the Honda launched the EN series in China in 2022

with the ENP1 and the ENS1 followed by the second generation ENP2 and ENS2

two years ago it's a single motor vehicle with a just short of 70 kilowatt hour NMC battery pack

and finally Lotus has unveiled the interior of its new SUV this is a hybrid SUV and I've had

to double check the name that they've called it they've called it Lotus for me as in it's for you

FOR ME for me it's a thing for me not the number four so okay well the car is I mean I like Lotus

is naming like Emeya Eletra no this one's called for me all right we'll see how it sounds when

people say oh what's what's your new car oh it's a Lotus for me all right um it's confirmed

for a China launch by the end of March this year Europe follows mid-year before a wider

rollout in North America the Middle East and Asia-Pacific regions the cabin obviously borrows

heavily from what they've got already in the locker that's the all-electric Eletra a slim

digital instrument cluster with a large head-up display Lotus fits a four spoke non-circular

steering wheel and a stepped center console adding a multicolor ambient lighting and

floating touchscreen element honestly the inside of the Eletra very beautiful

they could just carry on the the inside of it but it's no secret that Lotus's

all-electric cars have not sold in the numbers which they would like so they're going back to

engines Lotus frames the car around the new philosophy of Lotus tuned specification LTS

it says LTS channels 78 years of racing and that's interesting because I grew up in a part

of the country I don't live anywhere near there now but it's the easterly bit of Great Britain

it's called Norfolk it's a county of Norfolk and there is somewhere called Heffel which I've

grown up not too far away and that is where Lotus has been based for much of Lotus's life

so I kind of feel like I kind of grew up near Lotus's being built there is some affinity so

I don't know why I want to see Lotus do well even though it's owned by

you know entirely new owners these days now underneath the for me still can't get used to

that name okay I'm willing the Lotus for me uses a 900 volts architecture a 2 litre engine dual

electric motors almost a thousand horsepower 0 to 62 in 3.3 seconds 124 miles per hour that's

200 kph in 10.5 seconds and you know it's rapid when they give you the quarter mile time of 11.1

seconds they say that even with a 10 percent battery charge you'll still do 62 miles an hour

or under kph in 3.5 seconds not 3.3 and that's impressive because normally when battery packs

get down towards the lower state of charge the performance can slip it's a 70 kilowatt hour

pack with an 11c discharge rate Lotus claims the combined range is over 870 miles or 1400

kilometers when you add the gas guzzler in it has 150 kilowatts on board power generation system

using the engine to always keep the battery in the 30 to 80 percent

window it says it can replenish 25 kilowatt hours per hour at highway cruising interesting metric

interesting way of describing it haven't come across that before so I like that how many kilowatt

hours per hour can you replenish with your engine in an e-rev interesting and Lotus split the

development so they used the british base which I'm so familiar with to lead chassis dynamics and

the chinese engineers leading powertrain and that to me seems like a really sensible way of splitting

it because well as a western buyer what are all the bits that you want well it's the chinese powertrain

stuff we want the 11c battery and we want the fast charging and we want the you know all the crazy

tech but how do we do you want a lotus to drive well I want it to be tuned by people who love

experience doing that so that seems good the all-wheel drive system has four energy modes

electric priority fuel priority forced electric and intelligent drive they say well optimized

power distribution even using the navigation system and road condition data that'll be interesting

when we get more details on that coming very soon it looks you know suitably bonkers like a big

expensive lotus but yeah they've had to go back to a bit of gas guzzling on that as their pure bevs

didn't hit the audiences that they were hoping for and that is your podcast for

today thanks for listening see you on the next one

CHINA: BYD Great Tang, SAIC/Huawei Unveil Shooting Brake and Li Auto Trolls VW | 05 Mar 2026

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