BYD says it plough USD 580 million into a new factory on the premises of an old Ford facility in Camaçari, Bahia, Brazil which closed in January 2021. The factory will consist of three separate facilities, one will focus on chassis production for the electric bus and truck market, the second will build electric passenger vehicles and the third, components for both commercial and passenger vehicles.

This mid-sized low-floor urban city electric bus has been developed for the European bus market. The bus ranges from 8.7 to 9 metres and builds on the 12-metre Higer Azure series imported by the Harris Group in Ireland.

The CV market’s recovery picked up momentum in August, as the economy continued its recovery following last year’s Covid lockdowns.

Sales of commercial vehicles in China continued to recover moderately in July 2023, with sales rising by 17% compared with the same month a year earlier.

Higer completed the delivery of 780 Higer Buses worth USD55m to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia under the “Belt and Road Initiative”, signifying the largest ever bus export from China to Saudi Arabia.

The 69-seater buses also feature 30 USB charging ports, built-in WIFI and air conditioning along with a total capacity of 97 passengers.

The new test centre, jointly operated by FEV Group, in Oued Zem complements two cold weather sites in Finland, north of the Arctic Circle.

The GTe14 is set to make its debut in the UK in the first quarter of 2024.

At the company’s East Asia Research & Development Centre, the upcoming ‘X15H’ engine was presented alongside Meritor axles, aftertreatment systems, and ‘Endurant’ transmissions.

The 1500th electric bus was a BYD–Alexander Dennis Enviro200EV, one of 299 joining Go-Ahead London.

In the first half of 2023 the joint venture, based in Taiwan’s capital Taipei, sold 50 battery-powered buses (e-Bus) based on the ‘Model T’ prototype that was developed by Hon Hai based on its MIH purpose-built open platform.

The CV market in China continued to recover in June 2023, with sales rebounding by more than 26% from weak year-earlier sales, according to wholesale data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM). As we report this news, August 9, saw many leading newspapers around the world announce that the Chinese economy, the second largest in the world, had dipped into deflation, as the economy slowed.