Price parity is HERE: BYD launch 3 new models in NZ!
Good day Kiwis. You join us for an EOTricity exclusive. I’m in a studio which doesn’t happen often because we’ve got some big news. Joining me today is Warren Wilmont, general manager of BYD New Zealand. Warren, why are we here? We’re here because this is the moment New Zealand has been waiting for. Probably the biggest moment of my career. We’re launching not one but three new cars today. Now, of these three new cars, I’ve already driven two in China. And it’s not just the cars that are being launched cuz you know there’s a lot of new EVs coming to the market right now. But what sets this apart is the price. That’s right. This is this is the moment that everybody’s been waiting for. True price par with EVs versus petrol cars. And it’s here today. And this piece of paper here. I actually know the prices ahead of you. In a few seconds you’re going to know these prices, too. And when Warren told me these prices, I like I was like, are you serious? Let’s Let’s do it. Let’s rip off the band-aid. First car. What is it? Well, it’s the one that everybody’s been asking us for since we launched BYD. It’s known in other markets as the BYD Seagal, the BYD uh Dolphin Surf or the Dolphin Mini. Here in Altoa, we’re calling it the ATO1. Uh now, I preferred the Dolphin name. I know there’s going to be people who agree with me, people who disagree with me. Okay, so it’s no longer the Dolphin. It’s now the ATO1. The AT1. Do we do it? Do we announce the price? Do we just rip off the band? Let’s rip off the band. That’s what everybody’s tune in for. Okay, here we go. Starts at $299.90. That’s under 30k for a full battery electric car. This is like I I looked at some prices before we started. Like a Honda Jazz, $30,700. It’s cheaper than a Honda Jazz. Toyota Yarus $33,490. It’s cheaper than a Toyota Yarus. Never have to go to a gas station ever again. I mean, ever in your life, unless for some reason you want to buy an $8 pie. It looks like I’m selling it. I’m not paid to sell this. I’m not paid to say this. War, your job to sell it. Absolutely. But you know, this 801, it’s not a poverty pack car. It’s just been awarded five stars by your end cap. Euro endcap. So, it’s one of the safest new cars you can buy. You get vehicle to load. So, if the power goes out at home, you can keep your fridge running, give it all that stuff. This is a true entry for clean mobility for a lot of people. For the general public and for fleets as well, you know, whether it’s a pool car or whether it’s a a runabout car around the city, this car changes the game. And I think we’re going to draw a lot of people who were used car buyers. Oh, yeah. This might be their very first new car. Yeah, that’s a good point cuz the cheapest comparative vehicle was I remember Nissan had some demo models that they sold for $29.99 I think it was a few months ago but you know this is technically a used car with you know a non-liquid cooled battery and all that. This isn’t this man. I mean like I’ve driven this car in China and uh actually it was a lot of fun. I can tell you a matter of fact there’s plenty of room in the boot. That’s right. Yes, we stuffed you in the boot and you drove around the track backwards. But you know all everything BYD you get all those features. You get the warranty. You’ve got that uh super efficient battery. um and a full dealer network supporting you right around the country. One thing I wanted to mention is the fact that at the launch in China or the launch the test drive we did in China, all the journalists that were there from Australia and New Zealand, the one car that everyone loved was all different kinds of car reviewers there. We drive big cars, small cars, but everyone was in unison saying they love the 801. People are trying to climb in it more than the Yang Wang U8. Yes. Yes. It got more attention and more love than the supercars. Yep. That’s right. I I think a lot of it comes down to this expectation of price. So here we here we have it and uh I’ve been waiting all my career to launch something like this. Game changer is overused phrase but actually this is this is it. It’s one of those times you can use the word game changer. It is. Look, Time magazines just uh or Time Media have just announced it as um one of the best inventions of 2025. So what a great thing to launch here and we’re doing it here live on Eotricity’s channel. It’s fantastic. Yes. It’s $29.90. That’s for the entry level one. Correct. We have two we have two variants, right? So, we have uh essential, which is the entry level, and we have a premium version with a lot more features on it, 360° cameras, a bigger battery, more power out of the out of the motor. Um, and that one is $ 3590. That’s 35,990. Okay. What about range for those two models? So, 2990. What’s the range of it? So, um, that has a WLTP figure of 220ks. So, it is a it is a a round town car and the bigger battery one um over 300. But it’s not just about the other one. It is a big deal. And we started off with it, but it’s not our only bag of tricks here. No, no. There’s there there’s two more cars coming, but I just want to just savor the moment for a sec cuz and cool colors. Bright, nice popping colors. I like that. I like that, man. I know you give the impression that I’m being paid by BYD to say this. I’m not. I’m just I just love the fact that we’ve got price parody and in 2025, which isn’t wasn’t supposed to happen until 2030. That’s right. We’re here. We’re here now. Okay. Okay. Let’s carry on. Carry on. Next car. Next car. All right. So, this is another car that I’ve driven while I was in China. It’s a larger car. It’s going to be competing, I think, with um well, you could you can compare it to the Leap Motor B10 that I just drove. That’s right. Uh what is it? So, this is the ATO2, and it’s not a car that there’s been a lot of press about, but again, you have driven it, Gavin, and you’ve given your initial thoughts on it. Very comfortable. I think prioritize comfort. It’s if you’ve got kids in the back, they’ll fall asleep, be warned. It’s like automotive, you know, chloroform. Absolutely. And I was a little unsure about this car until I took the journalist over and we drove it and you guys did tell me to bring this in. So, we’re very fortunate we’ve made that decision and BYD have been so supportive on the pricing of this car. I’m very pleased to announce again we’ve got two grades. Um, this the entry level one will be $3990 full battery electric car with a 51 kWh battery over 400 km of range and this is a much more traditional car for your for your Kiwi driver. Well, see, I was doing a little price comparing before and this is like $3990 for the BYD2. The Leap Motor B10, nice car that I just drove, that’s that’s 43 grand. That’s 30 4290. The MG5, that’s $449.90. Battery electric cars are getting cheaper. Like, I don’t I don’t expect you to answer this on on microphone, but you can’t be making a heck of a lot of profit out of these cars. Surely not at these prices. Look, there’s no uh we’re car dealers, right? We don’t do this for love. We do this for the um to make a profit on the way through, but we are keeping these cars affordable. So yes, there are reduced margins for our dealers on these, but we’re expecting that there’s going to be a big take up for these. Um, for us, there’s also that mission to cool the earth by one degree. The more people we can get into our cars now, the better. BYD’s got a strategy to have a car for every part of the market, right? So, we’re going to have entry- level cars, and we’re going to have some luxury high-end cars coming to market as well soon. So, we’re going to have the whole market covered. If I was in the market to buy an EV, new or used, I’m not sure I’d bother buying used. If I can get a new EV for $29.90. Yep. Honestly, with a with a with a six-year warranty, the connected services, the BYD app, all of that stuff. Of course. Oh, wow, man. Okay. You think digital road user chargers is just around the corner. Have to worry about paper on the on the windscreen. We’ve got all that technology in these cars. We’re at the forefront of tech. But wait, there’s more. As I say, we have one more car. Now, the baby I was in love with was this, the 801. That’s my little love child, electric love child. I’m more excited about this car though because there’s more cars in the segment. Um the bestselling car in New Zealand falls into the segment and we absolutely crush them on pricing. So this is the Cine 5. It’s a midsize SUV and it’ll it’s going to be one of the best priced plug-in hybrids in New Zealand. How much does it cost? Again, entry level $3990. Okay, $39.90. Brand new plug-in hybrid. If you watch my videos, you know that I’m not a massive fan of hybrids. I prefer electric, but there are, let’s be honest, there are some areas in which hybrids do make sense. In New Zealand, for example, there’s South Island, there still some areas that haven’t got their charge network developed. Peace of mind, a hybrid does make sense. Well, given that your average Oakland commute and most car 50% of 50% of cars are sold in Oakland, your average commute in Oakland is 30 km. The entry- level car here, the essential, will do 70 km of range on pure EV mode before it goes into hybrid mode. Oh, okay. That’s So, that’s all of your daily commuting. I didn’t know it was that good. I thought it was like 20ks. 70, right? Yep. And it never runs out of juice cuz we’ve got that super hybrid technology. And the high range one does over 100ks range in EV. Again, I did some price comparison to put it in perspective. $39.99. Kia Sportage, brand new. The the hybrid one $499.90. That’s right. $10,000 more affordable. The cheapest RAV 4 you can buy. Toyota, one of the most popular selling cars, the RAV 4, $48790. Why would you buy one? And if you’re in Oakuckland or a major city, you might never even use that petrol engine, but it’s there if you need it. Like, man, if you love a bargain, if you’re a tight wad like I am, and I can feel my tight wad gland throbbing, that’s not bad. Do you know when these are going to land? So, all three of these cars will land basically on Christmas Day. So, from this very moment, you can now place your pre-orders. Now, I’ve ordered what I think is enough, right? So, the first shipment will arrive around Christmas. We expect customers probably want to take delivery in the new year. So, new car, new year. Um, and that’s our very first shipment. We have a second shipment arriving at the end of January. I’ve ordered what I think we have enough for the market. I could be wrong. People might want to order more. And also, I don’t know what the Australian market’s going to do cuz they’re launching these cars as well. And Australia’s a bigger brother. They might bully BYD into grabbing some of our cars. So, if you Aussies, hands off. If you want to secure your order, it’s simple. A $500 fully refundable deposit from our dealers. They can take the credit card over the phone, secure it, you can have it delivered in the new year, right? But we’re very lucky with BYD. We have absolutely no constraints in capacity. I could order 100,000 cars and they’ll be built in 3 months, ready for us. Right? So, we we’ve got no supply constraints. My constraint is only how many cars we can fit on that ship. And we do have to fight with all the other brands that are making cars in China, how much space we can get on. So, if you want to secure a car, as I said, get in, put your $500 refundable deposit in now. Um, otherwise, you might have to wait a little bit. As I said, I don’t know how the Australian market’s going to going to um react when their pricing comes out. They’re a market 10 times bigger. And as we know, um, the more volume order, the more attention you get. So, look, I’ve secured enough for the moment. Just make the advertising two syllable words. They won’t understand. All right. Sorry. Sorry Aussiey’s watching this. Bottom line is we’ve got three new cars coming in. At least there’s more coming, right? Oh, absolutely. I’ve always said BY is going to have a car for every part of the market. And um you can register your interest today on the Cine 8, which is a beautiful car. You might have um seen it in China. They call it Tang in other markets. Um and everybody’s been asking us for a sevenseater. We’ve probably got more interest than that um than a lot of the other cars cuz you know, Kiwis love our sevenseaters. We’ll release pricing on that before Christmas. So you might have to tune back in to Gavin again. So there we have it. November 2025. Price parody with combustion. Five years ahead of schedule and it’s BYD that’s brought it to New Zealand. No compromises. You’re not compromising safety. You’re not compromising tech. This is a big deal, man. It may not sound this is a big deal. I mean, you know it’s a big deal. I know it’s a big deal. Now, you watching, you know it’s a big deal. Hit subscribe because full reviews on those cars are coming soon. [Music]
BYD is launching three new vehicles to the New Zealand market with prices beating combustion-powered rivals; five years ahead of expectation.
In this Ecotricity exclusive, Gav sat down with Warren Willmot from BYD New Zealand to discuss these three new models and what you’ll get for your money.
