Tesla, Polestar and BYD are now leading the way in Australia’s early transition to electric vehicles
Newcomer EV brands are dominating sales of electric vehicles as traditional car-makers scramble to catch up.
Tesla, Polestar and BYD – three brands with little or no market presence a few years ago – are now dominating the early transition to electric cars.
Between the trio they accounted for 70 per cent of the 33,410 electric vehicles sold in 2022, according to sales figures released this week by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI).
Unsurprisingly, it was Tesla taking the lion’s share of EV sales, with 19,594 sales across its two models – Model 3 and Model Y.
Tesla Model 3
But Polestar (1524) and BYD (2113) also performed strongly in their first year, the latter only beginning customer deliveries in the past few months.
Polestar says the result reflects an increasing appetite for EVs in Australia.
“Polestar is seeing strong demand for Polestar 2 and also the waitlist for Polestar 3, which demonstrates a huge appetite for electric cars in Australia,” said Polestar Australia spokesperson Laurissa Mirabelli.
“The Volvo heritage of Polestar certainly gave the brand credibility in market in its first year, but the product now speaks for itself.”
Mirabelli said she expects EV interest to snowball.
Polestar 2
“Having now sold over 1500 cars, our owners are now our biggest ambassadors for the brand,” she said.
The luxury market is another segment where EV demand has been strong.
Of the 5608 cars Porsche sold in 2022, 430 of them – 7.7 per cent – were the Taycan EV.
For Volvo, 13.8 per cent of the 10,715 cars it sold this year were EVs.
Conversely, big brands have lagged the EV field, despite in some cases having multiple models on offer.
Of the 73,345 cars Hyundai sold in 2022, for example, just 2432 – or 3.3 per cent – were battery-electric vehicles, many of which are sought-after but only in short supply.
Porsche Taycan
And top-selling brands such as Toyota, Volkswagen, Ford, Subaru and Mitsubishi didn’t sell a single battery-electric vehicle in 2022.
Number-two brand Mazda is believed to have sold only a handful of MX-30 Electric SUVs, which have been slow to shift from dealerships since arriving in mid-2021.
It means that between them, seven of the top-selling brands accounted for more than half a million sales (about half the overall market), but made little contribution to the EV sales tally.
Of course, that’s set to change for some brands in 2023.
Volkswagen, Toyota, Subaru and Ford will start selling EVs this year with plans to ramp up quickly.
Volkswagen, for example, plans to be selling more EVs than ICE vehicles in Australia by 2028.
Keyword: Newcomer brands dominating EV sales in Australia