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Chinese cars are still cheap, but they're no longer ugly
- kalleboo 8y agoBut what about safety? My lasting impression of Chinese car manufacturers are those YouTube videos of crash tests in Australia where the passenger compartment is the crumple zone. That's the department where they need to convince me.
- kimjongman 8y agoNot bad https://www.haval.com.au/ancap-high-five-for-haval/ https://www.haval.com.au/ancap-high-five-for-haval/
- taneq 8y agoI'm sure they can produce crash-worthy cars. The question is whether they'll continue to do so once they're past the crash testing stage. I seem to recall reading quite a few cases in a range of industries where Chinese manufacturers substituted cheaper, lower-grade materials when the thought they could get away with it.
- latch 8y agoPersonally, I would feel bad making such a negative characterization based on something I seem to recall. I'd look it up. If I was right, I'd provide the source, if I was wrong I'd be silently embarrassed.
- eastendguy 8y agoMany Chinese make the same negative characterization. The most famous of these cases is probably the milk powder scandal. Now, Western companies are no saints (e. g. VW Diesel scandal). But a better system of checks and controls keeps them accountable.
- fucking_tragedy 8y agoI wouldn't. They prefaced their statement with "I seem to recall", which is a sufficient acknowledgment of the author's own uncertainty toward the statement that follows. I applaud the poster for stating that the veracity of his memory is debatable instead of certain. I wish people would do it more often.
- SyneRyder 8y agoIt's a fairly well known phenomenon. There is a book called "Poorly Made In China" about it, and the term for it is "Quality Fade". The concept is that after winning the contract (sometimes at a price below their own costs, in order to beat competing manufacturers), the Chinese manufacturer increases their profit margin by "optimizing" the product design - using cheaper components or omitting parts without the knowledge of the buyer, until the products are rejected. Here's an article I found from a random search on "Quality Fade" [1]. For a counter-viewpoint, the China Law Blog [2] argues it isn't Quality Fade if customers still buy the products. It was written in response to a recall of 23,000 Chinese-made cars in Australia after they were found to have asbestos in their engine gaskets. Great Wall Motor had argued that "their own in-house testing [had] concluded that the asbestos was not a danger to human bodies" [3]. [1] https://sourcingjournal.com/topics/sourcing/apparel-production-quality-fade-124208/ https://sourcingjournal.com/topics/sourcing/apparel-producti... [2] https://www.chinalawblog.com/2014/03/chinas-quality-fade-is-there-really-such-a-thing-and-so-what-if-there-is.html https://www.chinalawblog.com/2014/03/chinas-quality-fade-is-... [3] https://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2012/08/17/chinese-asbestos-in-australia-blame-quality-fade/ https://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2012/08/17/chinese-asbes...
- taneq 8y agoThanks for posting this! I was on mobile and didn't have the time to dig up sources, but the asbestos-in-vehicles incident is one of the specific examples I was thinking of. The baby formula example that a sibling poster mentioned is another. Where I live the supermarkets have had to limit customers to 1-2 tins of formula each because people were buying trolleys full of it to ship to China, where middle-class Chinese buy it because they can't trust locally sold formula to be safe for their babies. The argument in [2] that if customers still buy products then everything is fine, when in fact both the immediate client and the end customer are being defrauded, just underscores the mindset behind the problem. Any company (local or foreign) doing serious fabrication in a country like China needs their own comprehensive QC system in place to oversee the entire build process.
- schuke 8y agoThe Geely and Lynk & Co brands share technology with Volvo so at least those should be fine.
- rapsey 8y agoBut are they still death traps?
- ggm 8y agoThere are a fair few "great wall" utes in Australia. Somebody might have differential on fatal accident rates but I'm not hearing tales as bad as the GMC/Chevy petrol tank problem (if we're talking death traps)
- lancewiggs 8y agoThe main change that China is driving is the shift to electric vehicles - buses, cars and bikes. They already make and buy about have of the car EVs each year.
- lazyjones 8y agoDon’t forget to mention that they are forcing foreign car manufacturers to switch to EV in order to have a chance at keeping their market shares, by imposing EV quotas. This will likely do a lot of damage to unprepared giants like VW, who are selling 20-30% of their cars in China today.
- yoz-y 8y agoI think that this is a good thing in the long term. It's VW's fault that they are unprepared, and the writing was on the wall for the China's switch to EV.
- sveme 8y agoThe VW Neo is coming out this year, and that‘s a far more relevant market segment than any of Tesla‘s offerings so far.
- lazyjones 8y agoThe Neo is competition for the Renault Zoe and Nissan Leaf segment, only 6-7 years too late and without the learnings from several iterations. Whether they will be able to hit their announced price targets, remains to be seen. But in 2020 they will have fierce competition in every segment, from Tesla to Hyundai and BYD. Perhaps they’ll succeed in the home market, but worldwide - probably not.
- jdietrich 8y agoChina has a horrendous smog problem. Volkswagen cheated on emissions tests for years. It's not a market they deserve to succeed in, at least not until they credibly clean up their act. China's commitment to climate change is lukewarm, but they're all-in on fixing their air pollution problem. It's abundantly clear that internal combustion has a very short future in China. Western manufacturers need to face up to the electric future in a real hurry.
- guidedlight 8y agoHyundai hired some Audi designers in the mid-2000’s to give their vehicles a more European look. It worked!
- jtokoph 8y agoHyundai isn’t Chinese though. It’s Korean.
- ggm 8y agoWhat happened in Korea can happen in China and India
- combatentropy 8y agoYes, I remember thinking how good they looked. I didn't know they involved Audi. But it makes sense.
- nobrains 8y agoSpecifically, KIA (owned by Hyundai) hired Peter Schreyer (designer of the Audi TT) as their chief design officer and gave him a free hand. The result was KIA's first good looking facelift on the KIA Optima. After the design (and evantual business) successes at Kia/Hyundai, Peter Schreyer was then named as one of the presidents of KIA. The designs won many iF and RedDot design awards. Check these out: https://www.motor1.com/news/99708/10-best-kia-designs-list/ https://www.motor1.com/news/99708/10-best-kia-designs-list/
- tlb 8y agoThat one in the picture is still ugly. The stretched-out-of-proportion chrome grill reminds me of the dentist's daughter in Finding Nemo.
- rasz 8y agoone in the first picture is a direct Lexus RX 200t ripoff :)
- xenihn 8y agoI would love to see Chinese cars drive the cost of vehicles down significantly. I've been semi-looking for a new car for a year now (now rush since I walk to work), and it's ridiculous how expensive everything is. After taxes and fees, I haven't found anything that I'd be happy with for less than $20k used or $25k new. It would be amazing to reach a point where you could get a decent new car for around $15,000.
- jdietrich 8y agoEurope has a decent choice of basic, cheap cars. Dacia are well known for selling outdated but reliable cars at silly prices - their Duster crossover SUV starts at $13,000 (including 20% Value Added Tax) and their Sandero subcompact starts at $9,200. https://www.dacia.co.uk/vehicles/our-range.html https://www.dacia.co.uk/vehicles/our-range.html
- beezischillin 8y agoI drive a 13 year old Dacia, simply because I paid for it with a single paycheck and if anything goes wrong, replacement parts are around $30. First owner, mint condition, both mechanically and visually. Sure, it sucks from a feature standpoint but I just installed an iPhone compatible media player and use my iPad for most of what I want. And at least I didn’t feel too bad when a moron dinged it the first week I took it out on the road. And I can mess around with it by installing things, drilling into it without feeling bad for ruining an expensive purchase. Tax on it was $15 for 2018 and it barely uses any gas. I’m fine with buying a luxury car until after I buy my own house.
- tjoff 8y agoWhy not buy a used car? I would never dream of buying a new car. It comes with greater risk but a 3 year old car does not have significant risk attached to it, but it is significantly cheaper.
- pishpash 8y agoThere is a reason why the prices are different, warranty being one. Are you suggesting the market in cars is inefficient?
- gd2 8y agoGAC currently has a nice display booth at the NADA show, National Automobile Dealers at Moscone Center in San Francisco, showing about 6 cars. Which is probably some sort of a confirmation of what the article says about them coming to US dealers soon.
- MichailP 8y agoI think it is done. There is no way China doesn't become number 1 in every way that is possible. The stupidity and shortsightedness of western companies that partly enabled this is really staggering. I guess that initial thinking was let's do the clever part of making a product: design, IP, etc. but use cheap labor from China. But obviously the know-how was also unintentionally transferred. And now you have a behemoth with know-how, educated people, mega-cities etc. There is just no way to compete. I guess you can impose sanctions, ban sales, sabotage deals etc. but it is done anyway. On the other hand, I don't think that China rising is a bad thing, and it will make a world a better place, since USA and its allies can't compete with China with wars (though there are some pathetic attempts) but you probably must put all that war budget money and effort into research and infrastructure. Possibly this is a huge win-win for the whole world. Or we end up in flames if there is enough stupidity and solving things by war and force.
- gmueckl 8y agoThe knowledge transfer was maybe unintentional for western companies, but it was also incredibly naive. It was (and is) China's big aim to acquire as much knowledge as possible. Western companies were naturally transferring knowledge to China when they built new factories there and this was exploited ruthlessly. Also, China does a lot of industrial espionage. None of this is exactly secret.
- jsmith99 8y agoMany economists disagree, as there is no reason why companies should not share intellectual property when it is profitable for them to do so, e.g. https://johnhcochrane.blogspot.com/2018/08/intellectual-property-and-china.html?m=1 https://johnhcochrane.blogspot.com/2018/08/intellectual-prop...
- gmueckl 8y agoThis argument as presented in the blog post seems incoherent and poorly thought through to me. Companies innovate because this gives them a competitive advantage in a market that has strong protections for trade secrets and patents. This is essential for all kinds of tech companies to survive in healthy, competitive markets. Thr flaw in the argument is that China essentially does not honor these protections. So if a foreign company invents something and wxports this knowledge to China, a purely Chinese run company will soon after build an essentially equal product without having to spend mony on any of the expensive R&D to actually develop that tech. This potentially ruinous asymmetry is not accounted for at all.
- miguelmota 8y agoImproved cosmetically? sure. "no longer ugly"? Define ugly
- The_suffocated 8y agoI always wonder why India couldn't catch up. Although I don't know about its engineering sectors, I have the impression that the country is at least not that bad in scientific research. And it has cheap labour too.
- speedplane 8y agoChina will eventually be able to build safe and inexpensive vehicles that can compete in the global market. However, unless they open up their society, allow civil liberties like freedom of movement, freedom of speech, and unimpeded markets, they will always be playing catchup. The U.S. should not be afraid of China emulating our technological prowess, we should be afraid when they start challenging our values.
- vbezhenar 8y agoI'm living in a country near China. While most of people don't take Chinese cars seriously, this perception is slowly changing and I expect that Chinese cars will eat a huge chunk of local market after 10 years. We don't use US cars either, but that EU and Japan cars will give up some of their profits. I have no knowledge about other markets, but I expect it to be the same. It's especially important during migration to electrical cars. While mechanical cars are very complex to produce reliably, I think that electrical cars will be much easier to produce because you could reuse a lot of parts easily, motor, battery, electronics and so on. You only need to develop an unique chassis and interior. And Chinese cars will deliver much more value compared to western ones for the same money. Now something like autopilot is another thing where US could lead the market. But it seems like science fiction to me, I don't believe that I'll see it on my streets anytime soon.
- hyperbovine 8y agoAmericans tell themselves that so they can sleep at night but who knows if it is really true. China is on an impressive run compared to the US and has been for some time.
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- closeparen 8y agoWhat are the major social problems in the US right now? - Freedom of speech gives corporate and foreign agents unlimited influence over the democratic process. - Freedom of movement is devastating communities in both the sources and sinks of mass internal migration. - The free market is delivering greater and greater returns to a smaller and smaller group of people. Those freedoms aren’t, like, self-evidently good for outcomes. If we are to stay committed to the principles, we’re going to have to acknowledge and accept thier costs, because those costs are going to be the top political issues for the foreseeable future.
- justtopost 8y agoYou guys have a different value of ugly. Also a LOT of astroturfing in here.
- known 8y agoEvidence suggests Toyota produces superior cars https://www.yourmechanic.com/article/the-most-and-least-expensive-cars-to-maintain-by-maddy-martin https://www.yourmechanic.com/article/the-most-and-least-expe... But its share in Global car sales is just 9.2%