Terry Woychowski, former chief engineer for several General Motors pickup truck models, says that the extremely affordable yet allegedly high-quality BYD Seagull EV from China is a “clarion call” to American automakers to make electric vehicles for the everyman, noting that “things will have to change in some radical ways in order to be able to compete” against low-cost Chinese EVs.
The BYD Seagull EV is built by BYD or Build Your Dreams, a Chinese automaker that, like much of the sector in the Asian country, is backed by financial support from the state, Associated Press reports.
Woychowski, who worked at GM from 1978 to 2011 and was vice president of global quality and launches before his departure from the company, identifies “efficiency” as the factor making the BYD Seagull EV highly affordable, with pared-down features such as a single windshield wiper instead of two – saving on both costs and weight – making the vehicle “an exercise in efficiency.” These reductions in bulky gear give the Seagull an overall 2,734-pound weight, or almost half a ton less than the Chevy Bolt EV.
Cutting down on weight improves range, with a single charge able to propel the BYD Seagull 252 miles at maximum. While such a design requires that “you better park your paradigms at the door” according to Woychowski, the Chinese EV still has a number of key features, including airbags, electronic stability control, and disc brakes at the rear.
Woychowski also says production of the entire suite of BYD Seagull components is “all in-house and vertically integrated,” describing this manufacturing setup as “an incredible advantage that they have.” Producing the Seagull in quantities of 3 million vehicles per year also gives BYD considerable economies of scale. The vehicle costs the equivalent of $12,000 in China.
Even if a U.S. version of the Seagull was somewhat more expensive, the Chinese EV clearly has a strong price advantage over U.S. automakers. The cheapest GM electric vehicle will be the upcoming 2026 Chevy Bolt EV, which The General’s CEO Mary Barra says will be “even more affordable” than the discontinued Chevy Bolt, but will not be able to pare costs down to the level of its Chinese rival.
While U.S. tariffs are currently excluding the BYD Seagull EV from American shores, with the Biden administration imposing a 100-percent tariff on Chinese EVs this week in place of the previous 25-percent tariff, Woychowski and others see the affordable, high-volume EVs as an existential threat to the U.S. auto industry.
Elon Musk remarked that Chinese EVs “will pretty much demolish most other car companies in the world,” while the Alliance for American Manufacturing described the Chinese vehicles as a potential “extinction-level event for the U.S. auto sector.”
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Comments
Come on GM Authority. The Seagull also has almost half the pack of the Bolt which would reduce the Bolt about 500 pounds if it had an equivalent pack. Given the Bolt is larger, the weight difference isn’t that much given its larger pack. I guarantee if you compared the two cars back to back the BYD will feel cheaper. GM could have made the Bolt cheaper, but people already complained about its torsion axle rear suspension. Basically GM can’t win. If they make cheap car people will try to compare it to a CRV or RAV4.
Criticize it all you want, but if you read (or watched) actual reviews, you’d know that this car is the real deal.
If it was just a cheap little piece of crap, then Ford and now GM wouldn’t have been crying about it.
From the much better AP article:
“BYD makes many of its own parts, including electric motors, dashboards, bodies and even headlights. It also has the advantage of its huge scale — 3 million vehicles sold worldwide last year.”
GM sold over 5 million last year. GM makes its own EV and ICE motors, battery packs, cells, etc. They don’t make their own headlights or seats, etc. There are benefits to vertical integration, but let’s not pretend there aren’t negatives.
gm and Ford have nobody but themselves to blame. They were quick to jettison Delphi and Visteon whose greedy executives led the charge toward outsourcing American work lock stock and barrel to China. Then we have the Envison and Nautilus and rumors of more cars from China to be sold by gm and Ford.
Exactly. Boeing sold their Wichita manufacturing plant to a private equity firm, which became Spirit AeroSystems. How’s that working out? The private equity M.O. is to buy publicly traded companies, load them with debt, strip them for parts, and then bankrupt them when there’s no blood left to squeeze out.
Most of Delphi was brought back into GM under GM Components Holdings LLC, which is owned by GM.
Only FOUR plants out of thirty-something where brought back under the gm umbrella- one in Indiana and Michigan, and two in New York.
Remember when GM was vertically integrated also (Delco which was spun off and became Delphi now long gone). GM blamed all their troubles on Delphi and couldn’t wait to get rid of them. Now vertical integration is great? GM just doesn’t get it and never will.
Whatever is “great” is “great” when GM isn’t doing it and then when GM does it, its no longer “great” it’s now dumb, because GM is doing it, I recall reading the Delphi and Delco etc were albatrosses and that they took longer to design components, and at a higher costs….and all the other companies were moving faster than GM by outsourcing components and the outsourced components were cheaper and higher quality than Delco, wash, rinse and repeat.
Though I’m really stunned by that single wiper on the BVD….no one has ever done that before, totally revolutionary.
Americans won’t even drive hatchbacks!!! As I said before, a car stamped with “Made in China” under it, inside or wherever you can see it could only be sold to a damn fool in America. I’d take a Bolt over a DIY or BYD piece of mess any day. Get a second job and buy something that won’t fall apart while driving or roll backwards on a steep hill. JC!!!!!!
I’v never experienced anything machined in China of quality. The tools are garbage from hand tools to milling machines. They are ‘tool shaped objects’. I don’t have confidence that a car would be any better. I’ll be sticking with American, German or Japanese engineering when it comes to mechanical products.
Never thought I’d see the day when Chinese cars take over America and finish off the domestic automakers… maybe make better reliable choices. If this was to happen, it would be the 2nd time GM,ford,whoever now got best in their own country.
Ric,
The Japanese took over the car market in the 1970s and the Koreans are doing it in the 2020s, so it is not a surprise that that the Asians have killed the domestic brands. The Chinese can kill the other Asians.
Most Americans are never loyal to their own national products anyway. The wealthy buy German and Italian, and the poor buy Japanese and Korean. I bet even you buy Chinese TVs, electronics, and other cheap products at Walmart.
I will remind you that the Japanese didn’t have it easy in the US market initially. They struggled at the start but then had personnel travel to the US to study the auto industry and then work on improving what the US customers wanted (Toyota is especially notable for doing this. They also did this with Lexus). They then started developing cars that could target the issues the domestic brands were neglecting such as fuel efficiency and reliability. In doing so, they started getting noticed. The Koreans also came into the US market and struggled initially (more so than the Japanese). Those who had their bulletproof Japanese cars wouldn’t bat an eye at the Korean newcomers and the initial cars paled in build quality (I had a 96 Accent, and while I loved that little car and was pretty reliable, the interior build quality was abysmal next to Hondas, Toyotas, and Nissans of the era. The car also had nothing. No powered steering, no ABS, not powered windows or locks). Eventually around 98 they started offering better warranties and their build qualities improved over time until today, where they pride themselves as a more tech loaded reliable alternative to the Japanese. And what were once value packed cars, good luck finding a Telluride or Palisade without a markup.
The point I am making, in both cases, the Japanese and Koreans had to work hard at establishing themselves in the US market as market leaders. Just coming in with a cheap car doesn’t cut it. Especially when China is a planned economy and is trying to bolster production while demand at home is low due to the housing crisis and Zero Covid disaster of a lockdown, to prevent it from imploding, now they are dumping their excess production globally where they can.
BTW. You use the example of TVs. Well look up best selling TV brands in the US. 52% of the market is dominated by Korean Samsung (33%) and LG (19%). Next comes American Vizio at 11%, then Japanese SONY at 7%. The Chinese brands, TCL and Hisense, hold 5% each. Still decent numbers, but it goes to show being cheap doesn’t always lead to market domination. And TCLs get high marks on consumer reviews. But it isn’t Samsung, LG, or Vizio.
Surely you intended to give some credit to the 1973 Arab oil embargo, which doubled the price of gas overnight in the US. The exact time Toyota and Honda began to sell their tiny cars in volume.
True. But as I like to say, once they switch to Japanese, they NEVER go back. Only in certain circumstances do people go back like in my case. I love my Rav, but I can’t get past what an taxicab the car is. So this time when buying my second car I went for something with more appeal. So I got a Cadillac.
The thing is that items like TVs and electronics are not even made in the USA anymore. So, you buy what is availabe or do without.
you guys are all missing the point. they don’t need to make a profit. Its basically owned by the Chinese government. So they just tax people to make a profit and can sell it cheap.
If you want that, start buying them if they ever come here. if not, refuse to buy them and be happy we have the freedom in the US to buy what we want. However when trump wanted to raise the tariff it was racist.
First off, this particular model will never make it stateside. And if it did, regardless of how cheap it is, Americans won’t buy it. Its too small and too econo car for American tastes. The Bolt in its EUV form atleast feels like a nice economy SUV. At best this will be bought as a runabout vehicle for large campus institutions.
Secondly, for all the talk of how “high quality” these BYD cars are, I want to see how long they will last. If there’s one thing the Chinese have gotten good at is making initial quality of what you can see look good. But I want to see how long these cars last. I had a “high quality” Lenovo laptop and it has gone through three batteries already. The computer feels high quality but the batteries swell up overtime and my IT guy has to keep changing them. The same with my colleagues Lenovo. So I want to see how these “extinction inducing” cars last.
BYD is selling hybrid busses in NA for at least a decade. They know a thing or two about making reliable transportation.
At work I used Dell laptops for the longest time. My last Dell laptop was replaced by a Lenovo ThinkPad and it is at least at the same level as the Dell laptops of my coworkers.
At my work, my IT guy has a preference for Dell because they have a solid backing and support system. HP as a close second. Lenovo on the other hand, he said has an abysmal support system. The Chinese aren’t interested in backing their products. They want to sell it to you and if it breaks, you replace. And there are already reports that BYD has abysmal product support in Europe.
“Terry Woychowski, former chief engineer for several General Motors pickup truck models, says that the extremely affordable yet allegedly high-quality BYD Seagull EV from China is a “clarion call” to American automakers to make electric vehicles for the everyman, noting that “things will have to change in some radical ways in order to be able to compete” against low-cost Chinese EVs.”
Just a quick question. Why does it take an overseas competitor to make auto industry officials (former or otherwise) to call for building cars for the everyman?
They tried that and they found out everyman wants a Silverado or Suburban apparently, even if they need to lease it for 150 months……
The Yugo of the 21st Century.
All these Chicken Lil’s and their doomsday prognostications. If any automakers will be hurt, it will be the Koreans and the Japanese since our brilliant gm and Ford executives abandoned the low-price segment.
You can offer this car for $10,000 out the door but it does not resolve several fundamental issues:
1) The same things that keep people from buying electric vehicles today will apply to this vehicle: range anxiety, charging infrastructure (or lack thereof), and long-term durability of batteries.
2) Americans do not like mini cars. That is why vehicles like the Spark and Fiesta are no longer offered. Offer this vehicle in the size of an average vehicle the American customer buys today, it will cost more money and not be nearly as competitive.
This vehicle would be perfect for college campus run abouts, small businesses like pizza, flower businesses the like. Also for inner city driving for those who don’t have to commute far. Perfect for SO many low income people too who could finally afford $120ish monthly payment.
Just look again at the negative comments about the new Chevy EV pickup truck. It’s not a mini car it is a pickup truck made in USA and most of the guys posting here are throwing negative reviews at it, before it even hit the dealerships. It is expensive and not for everyone’s pocket but it is a good start.
To be honest its a decent little EV, with emphasis on little. If BYD wants to sell their Seals Seagulls and Dolphins here, they have to build em here with a known American firm as a joint venture. Reciprocal trade, see how it works? Win win Chinese style.
I watched a video and China is able to produce an electric vehicle every minute because of vertical integration. It’s the largest mfg in China. Mind blowing. Everything is robotic and only 2000 employees work in the place.
oh wow, 60 jph on an assembly line. GM and Ford make more full size pick-ups per hour than that. At one point Ford was building 75 Focus per hour. Vertical integration has exactly zero relationship to the vehicle assembly rate, only the cost of the components.
i can remember back in the 1970’s Chevrolet was producing 100 Vegas per hour in the Lordstown Assembly Plant. It’s not unheard of but it can be done if the market can support it.
FMVSS compliance is a barrier to off shore OEMs. Mahindra tried for years and decided it wasn’t worth it for the economy vehicle market. Once the cost of infrastructure to establish sales, service, and delivery is added to the cost of regulatory compliance, 12k turns into 24k real fast.
It’s time to stop whining and get the Equinox EV to market…. The 1LT….,Stop being greedy and save your market while you can. Nobody wants a 60k EV, wake up.
100% Tarriff is all you need to know about the whooping the domestics would endure. Even EV juggernaut Musk is scared and would be crushed as BYD is now the world leader in EV production.
Both GM and Ford were once vertically integrated (Ford more so than GM) and it made them great. Due to many ill conceived accounting games, it was deemed that spinning off the component divisions was a wise choice. Unfortunately most of the intellectual property left with the component divisions. In the end, both GM and Ford wound up buying premium components and assembling them into non-premium vehicles. While many of the component divisions struggled under corporate misdirection, they thrived under their own leadership. (Detroit Diesel, Saginaw Steering Gear, American Axle to name a few). With electrification, some critical components are now returning to the vehicle manufacturers.
Cheap cars and models are not that attractive to American buyers–it sounds great, but in practice many of those vehicles disappear in the market place after a couple of years. BYD had a disastrous fling with entry level electric vehicles in the US. Even entry level models of American cars don’t sell well and disappear quickly from the line up.. China can produce high quality vehicles, but growing political attitudes are a major deterrent.
Your comment reminds me of Daewoo and their short lived US run. But you are totally right. In the US, cheap doesn’t always sell. It helps in certain circumstances like the Chevy Trax but we are talking an established brand in the US. Even budget Japanese brands don’t do well in the US. Look at Suzuki and Isuzu. Both are long gone and Mitsubishi will probably join them too.
Maybe we the American people are going to have to except stock market returns that don’t gut out industries that compete with dislike systems. Greed is good?
100% Tariff, if Biden can make it stick, will kill the GM and FORD EV vehicles imported from China.
If they also put a 50% tariff on Chinese Solar Panels, that will be saving the American panel manufacturers and China will have to allocate their panels to other countries….
Looks like Solar Panel tariffs will go from 25% to 50%. That’s probably adequate.
GM does not import EV’s from China–only ICE
Yet….
The 100 percent tariff should apply to ALL Chinese vehicles. To counter this, extend tax breaks to repatriate production.
American companies have dragged their feet making affordable EVs, but there’s a market out there, especially with a growing charging network. Just in case there’s any question about reliability and room for these vehicles to sell, in Germany BYD has successfully taken on budget and higher end brands – they’re owned by upper middle-class down to budget buyers. They cover the full spectrum from tiny car to premium SUV. They’re nice, reliable, and trusted.
The US car makers are not ready for the influx (why the government’s pushing back), why even bringing them into Mexico is a threat, and probably has something to do with the recent discontinuation of the Malibu (‘to focus on EVs’). Detroit and US car makers are well behind the power curve and have to figure this out within the next three years, or so.
My analysis based on the news and living in Germany for a year. Given dealership/network of maintainers and access to the charging networks, I wouldn’t mind an affordable EV.
Single wipers are nothing new and have been used by Mercedes, Audi, Citroen just to name a few.
Were you born without sarcasm or did you lose it in an accident?
BYD vehicles catch on fire all the time. The Seagull is an unreliable, low quality clone of the excellent Chevy Bolt.
BYD lies about a super low price that isn’t available outside of China. The rest of the world has to pay close to $25,000 for a very dangerous piece of junk.
GM has the best engineers in the world. They invented the EV many years before other manufacturers. Too bad GM management refused to manufacture EVs in huge numbers.
I think that people are thinking this is a Tesla or even a Bolt when its more of an Ez-Go with doors and a/c, its got 70hp and probably a 100 mile real world range, all for probably $25K after everything is said and done, if it doesn’t catch fire.
GM is years behind electric car technology and optimizations along with Ford. Why should I read about a former chief engineer…
This only makes 74 horsepower more of a city car. Electrics, no matter how affordable they are,doesn’t solve range anxiety or the lack of supercharger stations. I purchased a phev vs a pure electric. Best of all worlds, we can still take extended trips and not be reliant on an unpredictable charger situation.
Companies within the system cannot compete against the subsidized products. The money invested into products within the system in turn help future products and jobs. When subsidies start to erode those investments it hurts competition and it does not help future products. I think they could literally give the product away for free and many Americans would still not see what’s going on.
All the criticisms here about the BYD Seagull without knowing anything about it are ridiculous. There are countless videos on YouTube from Seagull / Dolphin Mini owners in Mexico, Chile, and Brazil who’ve examined and taken the car to its limits to show what it can and can’t do. For a small and affordable EV, with a 250 mile range, the Seagull / Dolphin Mini should be scaring automobile execs.
I hate to break it to you, but given the Seagulls 30kWh or 38kWh battery, its range is a maximum of around 170 miles. The 250 miles you quoted is the CLTC range, not EPA. In the winter this range will be under a 100 miles. This battery capacity is close to what the Leaf had 8 years ago.
The only thing worse than a regular EV is a POS from China
It’s like if you ordered a Bolt from TEMU.
Shop like a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiilionaire………………..
Chinese auto companies actually listen to their consumers! “I WANT AN AFFORDABLE CAR THAT IT IS SIMPLE, WITHOUT ALL THE NANNIES: BYD .. HERE IT IS!
And yet they also provide with more luxurious products also!
GM doesn’t care, they killed the Spark.
They killed the spark because Americans do not want mini cars.
Not sure about that! With the high car prices, small cars could make a comeback! Americans don’t want cheap cars ? Really…
Hope Detroit is prepared for the turbulent seas that the automobile business will endure in the next ten years. ICE, PHEV, BEV all in play. Quality, costs, dependability, tariffs, and more on display. I would never buy Chinese but many Americans could.