China now ranks behind Korea as Australia 4th biggest source of cars, MG biting Nissan
Hans Β· Dec 6, 2021 11:28 AM
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Ever since Holden’s Elizabeth plant was shut down in 2017, Australia has been a 100 percent import-only car market. Ford, Toyota, Mitsubishi too had shut down their respective manufacturing plants there earlier.
Australia now imports most of its cars from Japan (33.9 percent), followed by Thailand (21.8 percent), and South Korea (13.6 percent).
As of October 2021, Australia has sold a total of 890,790 units of passenger cars and commercial vehicles this year, up 22.7 percent from last year, according to data compiled by the country’s Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries.
Toyota is the market leader, with a 20.6 percent market share, followed by Hyundai (8.2 percent), Ford (7.3 percent), Mazda (6.9 percent) and Kia (6.5 percent).
The big surprise however, is the rapid rise of Chinese brands. Five years ago, China-made cars constituted just 0.2 percent of Australia’s new car market. Today, China-made cars make up 7 percent of Australia’s new car sales. The figure is still just half of Korea’s, but keep in mind that the Chinese went from 0.2 percent to 7 percent in just 5 years.
The actual market share of China-made cars is a little bit higher than FCAI’s report, because the data doesn’t include Shanghai-made Tesla Model 3, as Tesla doesn’t share its sales data with Australia’s ‘combustion engine-driven’ industry lobby group.
MG is now among the top-10 brands in Australia, with a 4.2 percent market share, ahead of Volkswagen (3.9 percent), but more importantly, Nissan (4.6 percent) is within MG’s firing range.
Ranking outside the top-10 but making big strides are Great Wall (Haval) and LDV (Maxus). Great Wall sold 14,892 units in the last 10 months, up 273 percent, while LDV sold 12,128 units, up 85 percent.
Also included in the China-made cars sales tally are some 3,000 units of Volvo, mostly XC60.
Over 15 years of experience in automotive, from product planning, to market research, to print and digital media. Garages a 6-cylinder manual RWD but buses to work.