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Chinese electric-car maker Nio will continue to push ahead with its plans to expand in Europe, even as its chief executive criticised an EU investigation of EV imports from China saying it did not “make sense”.
William Li, who is often referred to as China’s Elon Musk, said the company would consider partnering with a local manufacturer to build a factory in Europe, although it first needed to build sales volumes in the region.
“We are from China but we are also a global company,” Li said on Thursday after Nio opened its first showroom in Amsterdam. “We are against such an approach where the tariffs are used to stop the flow and trade of electric vehicles.”
“I think that many of the accusations by the European Commission do not make sense,” he added. When asked whether his strategy in Europe would change if Brussels imposed higher tariffs, he said the company would “make the most reasonable business decision”.
Brussels is investigating whether Chinese carmakers use subsidies to cut the prices of their vehicles, in a probe that is widely expected to lead to higher tariffs.
The US last week announced a quadrupling of tariffs on electric vehicles from China to 100 per cent, aimed at preventing groups such as BYD and Nio from building market share in the US.
On the investigation in Europe, Li said subsidies in China are also available to foreign carmakers, describing the country as “the most open market worldwide”.
Nio, which listed in New York in 2018 and has been in Europe since 2021, is building a reputation as a premium brand, but Li said the company also wants to introduce lower-priced models in Europe.
“In Europe, establishing a manufacturing facility will be a natural result. For us, the baseline is 100,000 units a year,” he said. “We are very confident, although we also know that in Europe we do have a long way to go.”
Earlier this month, rival BYD said it wanted to take “a leading position” in Europe before the end of the decade, promising “huge investment” in the region.
Despite its expansion plans, Nio shares are down 47 per cent this year after the company continued to record losses in the face of fierce competition from Tesla and BYD.
“We do have sufficient funds to sustain our continuous development,” Li said.
He added a global slowdown in the sale of electric vehicles was likely to be temporary and said hybrid vehicles, which have been more in demand, were “a transitional product”.
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