China’s biggest electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer and the world’s 10th best-selling car brand BYD Co. Ltd. plans to capture a 35-percent share of total EV sales in the Philippines in 2024.
AC Motors president Toti Zara said the Chinese EV maker is committed to attracting more EV users in the Philippines, leveraging on the brand’s high performance and affordability. AC Motors, Ayala Corp.’s automotive unit, is the local partner of BYD.
“We are under the assumption that the local EV industry is ramping up to 5,000 units in 2024. We want 35 percent of that, the passenger EV. This year, sales were only in the hundreds,” he said.
BYD vehicles are distributed in the Philippines by the Mobility Access Philippines Ventures Inc. (MAPVI) under AC Motors.
AC Motors, together with MAPVI, is introducing a different dealership format for EV dealers to give more value to investments required of BYD dealers.
A typical dealership capital expenditure (capex) is about P50 million adding to an operating expense (opex) of P50 million to P100 million within the contract period.
“The margins of BYD for cars is higher than the traditional ICE [internal combustion engine]. In the traditional ICE dealership, dealers earn a little from the car and more from after sales. But for EV, there is no after sales. We only expect about 20 percent of the normal maintenance cost. As the official and exclusive distributor of BYD in the Philippines, we made sure that dealers get higher profit from car sales,” Zara said.
He said potential BYD owners would be drawn to the fuel savings as the cost of daily usage could save EV owners 80 percent of total fuel cost compared to using a traditional car.
The challenge is to increase the number of dealerships, he said, as there are only 2 BYD dealerships in Quezon City and Makati City. Zara said the goal is to have 19 dealerships by 2024.
BYD also intends to invest in 130 charging points in the Philippines, a proposal forwarded by AC Motors to the Ayala board on Friday.
EV charging stations at shopping malls and Ayala estates will be equipped with 22-kilowatt AC chargers, and faster charging stations powered by DC chargers will be rolled-out in transient points for those who are traveling long-distance.