BYD Comes To America?

Wait, an Asian automaker is coming to America to establish a foothold in a market that American car makers have largely ignored? What is this? The 1980s?

No, it’s the twenty-first century, and the carmaker in question is BYD, an automaker that specializes in battery powered vehicles (which makes sense, as they’re owned by a battery company). And, yes, just like Eddie Murphy, they are coming to America. But it might surprise you which automakers are more annoyed about it.

BYD is mostly notable for two things: those aforementioned battery-powered cars, which they think will be huge in America, and the fact that they continue the grand Chinese tradition of shamelessly ripping off designs and technology from non-Chinese companies. Their most popular car, the BYD F3 is basically a Corolla knock-off.

Why, precisely, China feels this is still OK, especially since whenever they have an innovative idea, they get all upset when someone steals that, is totally beyond us, but it’s unlikely to be beyond the circuit court Toyota takes BYD to over stealing its designs now that they’re in America.

Either way, we’re about to have more choices with battery-powered cars, and that’s a good thing. Unless it’s the Cherry Amulet, that you need to avoid.