By Greg Gao

Chinese EV giant BYD rose to the second place in global EV sales with a market share of 11.2%, behind Tesla in the 2^nd quarter of 2022, according to the latest data of market research firm TrendForce.

The global total sales of new energy vehicles (NEVs) in the second quarter of 2022 reached 2.192 million units, a year-on-year increase of 53.5%.

The new car market remained under the shadow of supply chain shortages and the pandemic in the second quarter of 2022. But NEVs, including battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, and fuel cell vehicles, still outperformed gasoline vehicles and maintained positive growth.

Sales of battery electric vehicles (BEV) reached 1.608 million units, a year-on-year increase of 64.9%, and sales of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) were 580,000 units, surging 29% year-on-year, showed  the TrendForce data.

BYD ranked second after Tesla and its global market share has risen from 9.3% in the first quarter to 11.2%.

With a string of car models, BYD landed the sixth of the top 10 ranks in the second quarter of 2022 due to their huge market advantages. It is worth mentioning that luxury automakers BMW and Mercedes-Benz have climbed to 12th and 14th place after accelerating their transition to BEVs.

In terms of PHEVs, BYD ranked 1st with sales of 173,000 units in the 2^nd quarter, and a market share of 29.8%. In addition to Li Auto - another automaker  focusing on PHEVs that made it into the ranking, the top 10 also includes MG (acquired by Shanghai Automobile) and LYNK & CO - a joint venture established by Geely Automobile and Volvo, thanks to the booming demand in China’s domestic market.

In BEV brand rankings, although EV pioneer Tesla still tops the list, its market share has dropped sharply and the company’s single-quarter market share has dropped from 20.1% in the first quarter to a new low of 15.9%.

Due to the loss of production capacity in Tesla’s Shanghai plant in April caused by the city’s COVID-19 lockdown measures and the fact that mass production has yet to begin at the company’s Berlin plant and Texas plant, capacity allocation has become a headache for Tesla. At present, in addition to industriously increasing the mass production capacity of its new plants, Tesla is also upgraded its Shanghai plant in July to increase production capacity.

However, TrendForce believes that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Tesla to recover greater market share as traditional automakers are narrowing the gap with Tesla including in accelerating vehicle launches, increasing the model varieties,  strengthening factory manufacturing capabilities, and accelerating iterations of assisted driving systems.

Although many obstacles remain for the production processes of the automotive market, TrendForce remains optimistic, expecting conditions to gradually improve in the second half of 2022. The penetration rate of NEVs in the overall automotive market is to reach 13% in 2022, TrendForce noted.