Daimler-BYD tie-up will create new brand

In March 2010, Daimler signed an agreement with Chinese battery and carmaker BYD to design and build electric vehicles for the Chinese market. A new brand will be created for a range of small cars that Mercedes-Benz and BYD are already product planning.

BYD is a world leader in mobile phone batteries. The company (BYD stands for Build Your Dreams) is highly attractive to Daimler because it has subsequently developed an electric car battery that is a global pace-setter for other would-be manufacturers. Such is the importance of battery technology in electric cars that it was a relatively short step for BYD to extend its core expertise into the manufacture of entire electric vehicles.

At the March 2010 Geneva car show, BYD showed its e6, five-seater MPV/crossover model powered by the company’s Fe lithium-ion phosphate battery providing a range of 205 miles – well in excess of the range of other electric cars that are waiting in the wings. It will launch in late 2010.

The agreement with BYD gives Daimler access to the world’s most advanced electric car battery technology and it is likely that BYD batteries will have a role in the jointly-developed electric models emerging from the Renault-Nissan Alliance and Daimler linkage. BYD’s ability to design, engineer and manufacture low cost small cars will be a further major benefit that Daimler can bring to the strategic cooperation between the two groups.