The Old Diocesan Issue 12 - Magazine - Page 70
HOT TOPIC
BYD fan Alan Ramsay
talks to China car-brand
specialist, Chris Scoble.
particular, with the technical
range concerns close to being
solved. Around town, EVs are
now a no-brainer, and if you have
solar panels on your roof at home
or at work, suddenly you’re driving
– in summer, at least – for next to
nothing. And while hybrids are
still best for long-distance driving,
“the technology is advancing at a
ridiculous pace”, in Chris’s words.
Soon, EVs will make light work of
a roadtrip to Plett. The argument
gets harder and harder to ignore.
So what are the possible
downsides to Chinese cars?
Looks? Potentially. They’ve been
criticised for being ugly or, at least,
derivative. But brands like BYD,
Omoda, Haval and MG are going a
long way to putting this one to bed.
MG, for example, is now an entirely
China-owned brand (under SAIC
Motor) but still retains its British
design heritage – the best of both
worlds for its modern fans.
Resale value? Impossible to tell.
Watch this space over the next
five years. Concerns about longterm build and reliability? Those
are offset by very favourable longterm warranties. Which leaves
SA’s 15 best-selling passenger vehicles in 2025
28 000
26 000
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after-sales service and parts
availability, currently something
of an unknown quantity. But with
dealers like Chris increasingly
investing in the Chinese segment,
it’s likely to be a temporary concern.
The main battle, then, seems
to be one of value and novelty
versus prestige and status. And
increasingly, in the middle, there
will be compromise options. While
the Europe vs China battle rages
on, the Japanese brands of Toyota
and Suzuki are reaping incredible
success. Where Chery was the
third-best-selling brand in January,
they were one and two. Toyota –
miles out in front – has offered
legacy, value and reliability to
South African drivers for decades.
It’s no wonder, as Tim notes in
our initial conversation, that you
see so many Fortuners parked at
school sports events.
There’s another option we might
start seeing more of – for two-car
families. Here, the workhorse SUV
or daily runaround would come
from China, while the more
emotional European performance
car would satisfy that intangible
need for marque appeal.
Whatever happens next, the
fact is the China wave has surged
in the last 18 months to two years.
And given that the average South
African driver replaces their
vehicle every six to eight years,
we might expect the full revolution
to hit us by the end of this decade.
Chris Scoble is certainly backing
that trajectory.
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66 | THE OLD DIOCESAN
Brandon de Kock
(1986K) is
an author,
photographer
and editor.
Most relevantly
here, he also runs WhyFive Insights,
the company behind the annual
BrandMapp survey.
GRAPH INFORMATION CARS.CO.ZA
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