4 Popular Chinese Electric SUVs I’d Love to See in the US

Made in China products can be found in almost every aspect of our daily lives, even the American flag that is outside of my house is made in China, yet one place that I do not see anything fully made and designed in China is on the road. While many cars available in the US are partially manufactured or assembled in China, we have yet to see Chinese auto brands take on the US market the way that Korean and Japanese brands have.

I recently wrote about the Chinese auto brand Kandi which just launched in the US and in the article I shared that I found this a disappointing choice, especially when Chinese brands are coming out with so many cool electric SUVs that would align well with the demands of the US market where consumers prefer larger vehicles.

Below I’ll share four popular Chinese SUVs that have great potential for international markets:

HongQi E-HS9      

The first model is the HongQi E-HS9. The Hong Qi brand dates back to 1958, and it is the oldest car brand in China. Hong Qi means red flag and this car maker has always provided the official government vehicles.

While HongQi has a long history, it was never exactly a cool or trendy brand, but that has been changing. The E-HS9 is a looker, with its chiseled front fascia and slick side profile, it gives you an immense presence. Despite its massive size, this all-wheel drive offers plenty of power.

The front axle motor produce 215 horsepower (160KW) and the rear has 329 horsepower (245 kW). A combined 544 horsepower (405 kW) and that should be enough power to glue you to the back of your seat for about 4 seconds while it reaches 60 mph. Furthermore, it can travel approximately 300 miles on a single charge.

Not going to lie, this SUV is not cheap. It looks expensive and it is, with a starting price roughly around $110,000 US dollars.

NIO ES8        

Coming back to reality, we have the more affordably priced NIO ES8. NIO is one of the most promising newcomers of the EV industry. Only 6 years old, the company has set five world records for the fastest lap for an electric-powered car with their EP-9 model.

Now the ES8 it is probably not going to set any records, but with the success of the EP-9, the company has proven to the world the technology behind their product is solid. The ES8 can last 311 miles on a full charge and, if that’s not enough, NIO also has around 122 battery Swap Stations around China, and more are coming.

This has been a smart move for the brand because a common problem in the EV industry is range anxiety, where people choose not to buy EVs because they are afraid of running out of battery if they try to go long distance or go on a road trip. And even with fast charging it still takes up to 30 to 40 minutes to fully charge an EV battery, which is a long wait in comparison to filling up at the gas station.

To combat this problem, NIO designed its battery pack, which is under the floor of the vehicle, to be easily accessible for fully autonomous robots at Swapping Stations to swap the battery while owners can stretch their legs or use the bathroom at a rest stop. The entire battery swap will be done in under 3 minutes. That is the official time that the brand has posted, which is quite impressive, I mean quite frankly I would be more than OK if it was done in under 10 minutes.

No doubt the NIO ES 8 is the most popular full size electric SUV that’s currently on sale in China. The Tesla Model X is also popular, but because of the pandemic and the fact that taxes on imported vehicles are really high, the average Chinese consumer has shifted from international brands to domestic brands which have lower taxes.  

Li Auto ONE                          

Next is one of my favorite Chinese automakers – Li Auto, named after its CEO and Chairman Li Xiang who founded the company in 2015. The company boats some heavyweight investors, including top Chinese tech company Bytedance.

Li Auto came out with its flagship model in 2019 and it quickly became one of the bestselling full-size SUV’s in China. The hybrid Lixiang can cover 497 miles on a single charge and has an acceleration from zero to 62 mph in 6.5 seconds. It also has a 1.2-liter three cylinder turbocharged direct injection gasoline engine/generator that produces 130 horsepower.

Like other hybrid models, the 1.2-liter engine solves the range anxiety issue among EV buyers, and according to Autohome, Li Auto delivered 21,852 units between January and October 2020, making it the best-selling full-size Hybrid SUV in China suring that time period.

Xpeng G3     

Last but not least, we have a good example of value for money. Coming in around $20k USD, the Xpeng G3 is packed with safety and technology features. The company was founded by former Alibaba executive He Xiaopeng (hence the name Xpeng).

The G3 is incredibly competitive in the Chinese midsize SUV market. The G3 can go 320 miles on a full charge with its 65.5 KW battery pack, and the low cost combined with the trendy exterior makes it especially popular among young buyers just starting a family.
Tn November this year Xpeng shipped its first 100 units of G3s to Europe, making it the first Chinese EV start-up to take on the European auto market. Hopefully the US will come next!

The Advantages of Chinese Electric Vehicles

There are many other Chinese EV startups offering interesting products, however, in my opinion all the brands mentioned above are the most capable of becoming successful internationally. Obviously, there are some areas that Chinese automakers could improve on, such as the quality of the materials they use, but I think one area where they have an edge is in their software.

With traditional internal combustion engine vehicles there are many ways to change the parts of the car to upgrade performance, but when it comes to EVs, the key way to improve performance is through better software.

Unfortunately, over the past 5 years or so, as Chinese companies have become more successful and US working visas have become harder to get, vast amounts of Chinese engineers and scientists have chosen to return to China to work.

When you combine the massive numbers of talented software engineers with the break-neck pace of product development that Chinese companies are becoming known for, well it’s not hard to predict where we will see the best EVs being built in the future.