The Chinese EV industry may have little choice but to square off in a potential fight to the death, according to the billionaire co-founder of Xpeng. No matter who wins, though, their Western peers stand to lose.
As China’s carmakers pursued profitable growth in the West, the country took Japan’s crown as the largest automotive exporter in the world last year despite punitive trade tariffs.
Unfortunately for car executives like Xpeng’s He Xiaopeng, they pushed too hard too fast and sparked a sudden awareness that China could overwhelm foreign markets with a flood of cheap EVs.
Now a trade probe in Europe could diminish exports at a critical juncture.
“This year marks the beginning of a fierce competition that may end in a ‘bloodbath’,” the Xpeng co-founder wrote Sunday following the end of the Lunar New Year holiday in a staff letter obtained by CNBC.