CleanTechnica announced the global new energy brand sales data for 2021, which shows that the cumulative sales of global new energy models in 2021 is nearly 6.5 million units, an increase of 108% over the same period last year, of which 4,763,400 units were sold by TOP20 brands, accounting for 73.3% of global sales; and Tesla became the world’s best-selling EVs manufacturer for the fourth time.
Why it matters
This chart reflects the importance of China as the world’s largest electric vehicle market, with Tesla and BYD not surprisingly taking the top two spots.
But SGMW’s third place ranking reflects the diversity of Chinese consumers’ demands. SGMW has opened up a blue ocean in the EV market by attracting a large number of Chinese consumers with its low-priced Hongguang MINI EV, and it only costs around $4500 USD
This proves that to succeed in the huge Chinese market, you need to be different from other electric vehicles. And SGMW has succeeded, with its model being the best-selling EV in China.
But it’s a bit surprising that NIO isn’t on the list, and that’s largely due to the brand positioning of NIO, which is to be a luxury electric car.
Sales are important, of course, but it’s not hard to figure out why NIO didn’t make the list.
Sales of new energy passenger vehicles are reported to grow 108% in 2021, making it the highest annual growth rate since 2012.
In 2021, the volume of the new energy passenger car market close to 6.5 million units, of which 320,810 units of pure electric models and 272,935 units of DM plug-in hybrid vehicles will be sold, with sales of pure electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids increasing by 69% and 31% respectively year-on-year.
In December of last year, Tesla managed to take another global monthly sales title and record 170,000 volumes. This is the first time Tesla has reportedly surpassed a monthly average of 100,000 volumes in a single quarter, thanks to the Shanghai Superfactory.
China EVs manufacturer performance
BYD also hit a record 93,293 units last December, not far off the average, and the Chinese automaker is expected to continue its rapid growth this year to go head-to-head with Tesla in 2022.
Among others, SAIC-GM-Wuling reached a record 61,306 units as of Dec. 3, a rapid growth rate. There were also two surprising car companies, Great Wall (22,414) at rank 8 and Chery, a state-owned enterprise in the People’s Republic of China, headquartered in Wuhu City, Anhui Province, at rank 9.
In addition, China ranked first in 2021 with sales of 2,939,800 new energy passenger vehicles, occupying 45% of the global new energy passenger vehicle market share. Overall, the Chinese market is performing very well in terms of new energy vehicle sales.
