The world's carmakers are struggling to compete with China

[Jazzik]

BYD has just been barred from some US owners as a security risk

Right... a lot to read (and learn) here:

"The Pentagon has added several prominent Chinese businesses, including the tech giant Alibaba, electric car maker BYD and search engine Baidu, to its list* of Chinese military companies, preventing them from getting U.S. defense contracts."

* "the list seeks to identify Chinese companies that the Pentagon considers to have links to the Chinese military"
https://www.fastcompany.com/91556345/pentagon-just-blacklisted-tech-giant-alibaba-electric-car-maker-byd-heres-why

"The Pentagon has not provided direct evidence for its claims."
https://electrek.co/2026/06/10/byd-threatens-sue-trump-administration-pentagon-military-list/

"For instance BYD, which does not export its cars to the US , surpassed Tesla earlier this year to become the world's top EV maker."
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c75y6e5p9reo

That was the Pentagon. But we also have to do with ehhh...:
"President Donald Trump said in January that he would welcome Chinese carmakers such as BYD if they built plants in the U.S. and hired American workers."
https://www.fastcompany.com/91556345/pentagon-just-blacklisted-tech-giant-alibaba-electric-car-maker-byd-heres-why

BYD: ‘We will use our legal weapons’
"Li didn’t hold back in comments to The Telegraph. She framed the designation as an attack on BYD’s success rather than a security finding:

Because you are too strong, somebody challenges you – they cannot challenge your products so they will challenge this kind of perception. But we will use our legal weapons to protect us. Everybody should know in the world: BYD is not a company that can be pushed around, [where] you can give some false claim.

Asked directly whether BYD intends to sue the US government, Li said the company will first try to talk “very openly, transparently,” but added: “if everything’s getting worse, we have to use our legal protection.”

The timing is notable. BYD officially overtook Tesla as the world’s largest all-electric vehicle maker in 2025, selling 2,254,714 BEVs against Tesla’s 1,636,129 deliveries — a gap of over 600,000 vehicles."

and the commentary from electrek:

"The pattern here is hard to ignore. The US can’t compete with BYD on product, no American automaker sells an EV anywhere near BYD’s price-to-capability ratio, so the response has been tariffs first, and now a military designation delivered without published evidence. Maybe the Pentagon has solid intelligence behind the listing, but “trust us” is a tough sell when the same designation conveniently lands on the company that just dethroned Tesla globally."
https://electrek.co/2026/06/10/byd-threatens-sue-trump-administration-pentagon-military-list/

PS And what about (American) Tesla...?

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/apr/17/tesla-elon-musk-privacy

[stefan]

BYD and co are heavily subsidized by the Chinese government and operate at a heavy financial loss. What will happen when the party’s priorities change and subsidies disappear? Will dealers remain? And BYD likely doesn’t have as old of a fleet in the EU as other brands, so this isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison. I’m skeptical. It’s not exactly a KIA/Hyundai story.