According to TrendForce data, total sales of new energy vehicles (NEVs including battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, and fuel cell vehicles) in 1Q22 was 2.004 million units, an annual growth rate of 80%. Battery electric vehicles (BEV) demonstrated the strongest growth with sales reaching 1.508 million units. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) sold 493,000 units. Growth in NEV sales did not come easy, as global auto market sales (regardless of powertrain type) fell by 7% YoY in 1Q22 due to factors such as the chip shortage, Russian-Ukrainian war, and China’s pandemic lockdown and prevention measures.

In terms of BEV brands, Tesla’s sales in 1Q22 exceeded 310,000 units, ranking first with a market share of 20.5%. Chinese automaker BYD ranked second with 143,000 units and a market share of 9.5%. BYD announced in April that it would stop producing fossil-fueled vehicles and transform fully into a NEV manufacturer. Its BEV sales rose sharply by 271% in 1Q22 compared to the same period last year. Wuling, a subsidiary of SAIC-GM, has been ranked second since the launch of the Wuling Hongguang MINI in 2020 but dropped to third place in 1Q22. The main contributor to this was the multitude of models positioned as miniature and low-priced launched in the past year such as the Chery Ant and Changan Benben. As similar products arrived on the market, sales competition hindered growth.

In terms of PHEVs, BYD once again broke its quarterly sales record. Sales volume in 1Q22 reached 142,000 units, with a market share of 28.8%. As more PHEV models gradually appear in the market, it has become increasingly more difficult to capture a large market share. It is worth noting that the sales volume of PHEVs in the European market was lower in 1Q22 both when compared with the same period last year and when compared to 4Q21, affected the performance of some European brands.

TrendForce expects that most automakers will adopt a strategy of prioritizing the production of EVs. Therefore, continued growth in the sale of NEVs is expected in 2022. However, automakers will be under greater cost pressure this year. In particular, the Russian-Ukrainian war has greatly increased the cost of power batteries. This has caused automakers to increase their prices. Some countries including China will withdraw car purchase subsidies which dampens the market for low-priced mini-cars that previously supported the rapid growth of NEVs. Factors such as global inflation will become variables in the future growth momentum of NEVs.

Due to the Russian-Ukrainian war, automotive factories currently located in Russia have shut down successively and stopped importing vehicles, TrendForce asserts. In addition, Russia has stated that if foreign-funded enterprises choose to permanently suspend business or withdraw from the market during this period, the Russian government will nationalize their business assets. Most automotive brands have factories in Russia and now face the dual pressures of international public opinion and corporate losses. According to TrendForce investigations, after Renault-Nissan acquired the Russian brand LADA, its market share reached 32%, making it the largest automotive brand in Russia followed by Hyundai-Kia at 23% and Volkswagen at 12%.

According to TrendForce, since Renault is the largest shareholder of local automaker AVTOVAZ and Russia is the company’s second largest market, whether AVTOVAZ is nationalized or sales are lost, the overall impact on Renault cannot be underestimated. In addition, even if production can continue, the depreciation of the ruble will greatly increase the cost of importing components.

Soaring costs not conducive to automotive industry recovery

The large number of components and the long supply chain inherent in the automotive industry makes mitigating geopolitical risk difficult. Almost all international or regional events will affect the normal operation of this industry. The Russian-Ukrainian war will not only affect automaker assets, supply chains, sales, and revenue in Russia and around the world in the short term but, in the long term, geopolitics will influence business planning, competiveness, and technology options. More broadly, geopolitical and economic conflicts are derailing automakers’ plans to recover from the pandemic and chip shortages.

According to TrendForce, there are three major factors impeding the recovery of the automotive industry and these factors will further affect automobile sales in 2022. First, the production of vehicle components in Ukraine has halted, affecting the production of complete vehicles. Volkswagen indicated that it intends to move production capacity to North America and China due to the shortage of vehicle wiring harnesses. Second, Russia produces various upstream raw materials such as nickel and palladium for vehicle manufacturing. Due to supply constraints, various costs have risen sharply and some car manufacturers have begun to increase the price of complete vehicles. Third, inflationary pressures have risen sharply, leading to rising costs of living and a reduction of consumer spending power.

In 2021, total sales of new energy vehicles (NEVs including battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, and fuel cell vehicles) reached 6.473 million units, with annual growth rate reaching 122%, the highest growth rate since the development of vehicle electrification, according to TrendForce’s research. Battery electric vehicles (BEV) accounted for approximately 71.6% of total sales and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) accounted for approximately 28.1%, while the scale of fuel cell vehicles remained small.

Tesla ranked first among BEV brands with total global sales exceeding 930,000 vehicles and a 20.2% market share. SAIC-GM-Wuling ranked second, posting strong sales numbers for their low-priced mini electric vehicles in 2021. Other BEV brands such as Ora and Chery have also greatly increased sales performance on the backs of mini-vehicle products. The significance of this segment in the NEV market is considerable. On the whole, a reinvigorated BEV market has birthed a number of new brands that have further fractured market share. The concentration of market share among the top ten BEV brands dropped from 64.4% in 2020 to 57% in 2022, indicating an escalation of market competition.

BYD ranked first in PHEV sales with 273,000 vehicles sold in 2021, accounting for 15% of the market. Both BYD and seventh ranked Li Auto posted multifold growth, suggesting China’s reduced PHEV subsidy policy exerted minimum impact on the market. In addition to a number of luxury European brands holding their spots on the sales ranking, TOYOTA moved swiftly into fifth place while Jeep, a part of the Stellantis group and known for its performance cars, ranked 10th with the lion’s share of sales coming from the United States and Europe.

From a regional perspective, NEV sales in China once again exceeded half of the global total in 2021 while NEVs accounted for 19.3% of China’s overall auto market. TrendForce states, in addition to fierce competition, the Chinese market also includes numerous new brands, accelerated mass production, joint venture brands adjusting strategies, and overseas deployment of domestic brands targeting Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.

In addition, with the European Union strongly promoting electrification, the penetration rate of NEVs in several leading countries such as Germany and France is expected to reach 20~25% in 2022. In terms of the currently trailing US market, the Biden administration’s many policy incentives have focused the actions of brands and supply chains which include the introduction of ever-popular (in the U.S. market) battery electric pickups by a number of automakers. In addition, many new brands such as Rivian, Lucid Motors, Fisker, and Lordstown Motors have successively entered the mass production and assembly stage of vehicle manufacturing or plan to enter mass production in 2022, making the future of the U.S. electric vehicle market worth observing in terms of quantity and competition.

As the global trend of energy conservation and carbon reduction remains unchanged and automakers shift greater proportions of their product lines to electric vehicles, the total number of NEVs is forecast to exceed 10 million in 2022. However, the international situation is turbulent, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict has caused the price of crude oil to rise. In addition, Ukraine supplies neon gas for the semiconductor process and Russia is a producer of nickel ore. Nickel is a key material for electric vehicle batteries. Once the war heats up, the automotive industry will bear the brunt of rising costs and unstable supply chains, which are variables for the development of NEVs in 2022.

Total global sales of NEVs (new energy vehicles) for the first three quarters of 2021 (January-September) reached 4.2 million units, with BEVs in particular accounting for 2.92 million units, a 153% YoY growth, according to TrendForce’s latest investigations. Total sales of PHEVs, on the other hand, reached 1.28 million units, a 135% YoY growth. Compared to the overall automotive market, whose growth has been constrained by the ongoing semiconductor shortage and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, sales of NEVs still remained relatively strong.

Regarding BEV sales, Tesla comfortably took the leadership position with a 21.5% market share. The automaker’s sales volume for the first three quarters of this year already surpassed its sales volume for 2020. Taking second place on the top 10 list, Wuling Hongguang was able to maintain its high volume of sales due to not only low retail prices, but also a gradual expansion of its target markets from tier-three and tier-four cities to tier-one and tier-two cities in China. This shift would seem to indicate a corresponding expansion of and shift in Wuling Hongguang’s customer base. BYD and Volkswagen took third and fourth places, respectively, with the latter aggressively consolidating its BEV offerings into the ID. Family this year. Vehicles in the ID. Family have accounted for nearly all of Volkswagen’s BEV sales since 3Q21. Despite the rapid growth of the BEV market, competition has been intensifying after traditional automakers began releasing their own BEV models at a faster pace while emerging automakers also began delivering vehicles.

It should be noted that, although the global semiconductor shortage has not damaged the NEV market to the same degree as it did the traditional ICE vehicle market, the NEV market is not entirely immune to the resultant supply-side issues. In addition, China’s power rationing and pandemic-generated transportation/logistics disruptions likewise affected automakers’ manufacturing operations to various degrees. Taken together, these aforementioned factors became some of the underlying causes responsible for the shifts in NEV automakers’ market shares.

Regarding PHEV sales, BYD put up a remarkable performance by leapfrogging to second place in the rankings, and this can primarily be attributed to the release of BYD’s DM-i vehicles, which feature a super hybrid technology aimed at reducing fuel consumption. Thanks to the DM-i vehicles, BYD’s PHEV sales began skyrocketing in 2Q21, and the automaker was able to overtake several European automakers with respect to total PHEV sales for the first nine months of 2021. Much like the BEV market, despite the growths in most automakers’ sales volumes, companies will find it increasingly difficult to raise their PHEV market share.

Looking ahead to the NEV market’s future, TrendForce believes that, as traditional global automakers gradually kick off mass production of vehicles based on the battery electric platform, more and more new BEV models will be released to market at an accelerated pace. Furthermore, the next one to three years will serve as the key timeframe for emerging automakers as well as new entrants that crossed from other industries to achieve mass production. Therefore, there remains much potential for changes to occur within the rankings of NEV automakers’ sales and market shares.

For additional insights from TrendForce analysts on the latest tech industry news, trends, and forecasts, please visit our blog at https://insider.trendforce.com/

As software and hardware technologies improve in the automotive industry, cars now have an increasing number of smart features in response to the demand for user friendliness; for instance, the Car2Home ecosystem was created as a natural extension of V2X (vehicle-to-everything) technology. Advances in automotive systems and technologies, however, do little to assuage prospective car buyers’ fears of instant depreciation and maintenance fees, which are both justified and frequently parroted by existing owners.

Recent years, however, have seen the emergence of a new technology known as OTA (over-the-air) that can at least address car buyers’ maintenance-related worries. Automakers can fix software issues in the car with OTA updates, thus saving the driver the time and effort it takes to perform a factory maintenance. Simply put, OTA is a cloud-based service that allows automakers to perform a host of actions, including software/firmware updates, OS upgrade, issue fixing, and security patches, through a cloud-network-car connection.

As such, OTA technologies are highly dependent on data encryption, decryption, and transmission, meaning OTA services involve not only software and cloud services vendors, but also cybersecurity companies as well. According to TrendForce’s investigations, about 72% of new cars sold in 2025 will be OTA-enabled vehicles thanks to advancements in V2X, automotive electronic/electrical architectures, and intra-vehicle communications.

OTA pioneer Tesla kicked off its OTA strategies in 2012

Tesla is perhaps the impetus responsible for the surge in OTA viability in the automotive industry. Elon Musk believes that cars should be appreciated, as opposed to depreciating, assets for the consumer. As part of that belief, all Tesla models are capable of OTA updates of software and firmware, reflected in Tesla’s revenues from “service and other”, which saw yearly growths from 2016 to 2020 (Tesla’s 2020 earnings from “service and other” alone surpassed US$2.4 billion). Therefore, Tesla’s sales volume will remain the key to the market size and penetration rate of OTA technology.

Other automakers, such as BMW, Mercedes-Benz, GM, Ford, Toyota, and Volkswagen, also began rolling out OTA updates in their models from 2015 to 2020, although it wasn’t until the year 2020 did most of these companies perform OTA updates on any appreciable scale. Furthermore, most OTA updates were software updates as opposed to firmware updates (for ADAS and powertrain functionalities), since issuing firmware OTA updates still remains a major issue for automakers at the moment.

TrendForce also indicates that, should automakers wish to improve automotive functionalities with OTA updates, they would need to completely overhaul their cars’ electronic and electrical architectures. In this light, one of the prerequisites of performing functional OTA updates is the availability of compatible hardware in cars.

For instance, in order to activate LiDAR functionality, automakers must first equip a car with LiDAR hardware. Once self-driving technology matures to the point when it is deemed appropriate to be enabled on a given car, then automakers can activate the necessary LiDAR functionality with OTA updates.

Of course, all of this hinges on whether automakers are willing to bear the cost of preemptively equipping their cars with the necessary hardware, as well as whether they have any faith in the success of new services/functions to be activated by OTA in the future. Most importantly, however, if consumers were uninterested in these services and functions, then automakers would have no way of recouping their preemptive investments in the aforementioned hardware.

On the whole, despite most automakers’ planned to roll out the capability of OTA updates to their vehicles, they still face bottlenecks in performing OTA updates safely and providing useful upgrades for users. Only by overcoming these hurdles will automakers effectively improve the driving experience and convince car owners as well as prospective buyers that OTA is a worthy investment.

（Cover imgae source: Pixabay）