Autobayng News Team
Welcome back to Critical Materials, your daily source for the news driving the high-tech evolution of the car business.
On the menu today: BMW has a new CEO to steer it through the minefield that is electrification. Tesla is headed for a down year in the crucial Chinese market. And VinFast isn’t having a great time scaling up its business in America. We’ll break down why that matters.
Let’s dig in!
25%: Meet BMW’s New Top Boss
BMW’s new chairman, Milan Nedeljković
Photo by: BMW
BMW on Tuesday announced that a new CEO will take the reins next year. Longtime top boss Oliver Zipse will step down in May, and Milan Nedeljković, BMW’s head of production, will step up.
So let’s take a step back and recap where BMW is right now and what sorts of challenges Nedeljković, a 32-year veteran of the automaker, faces going forward.
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Electrification is tricky business for any legacy car company, but BMW has gotten a lot right. Maybe that’s because the automaker has actually been in this game a long time. The i3 city car, which you could call BMW EV 1.0, launched way back in 2013. In any case, the current lineup of the iX, i4, i5 and i7 has been pretty well-received.
Most importantly, BMW has run circles around arch-nemesis Mercedes on the electrification front. What comes next is critical, though.
Nedeljković will oversee a key product offensive of EVs (and other vehicles) built on the new “Neue Klasse” technology platform. He’ll be tasked with ensuring that BMW gets its next-generation EVs and software capabilities right, a mission that’s growing more crucial as Chinese competitors gain ground domestically and abroad.
Here’s Reuters with more:
Nedeljkovic, 56, will take over on May 14 and be expected to steer BMW back towards sales growth, particularly in China, the world’s biggest auto market.
“The success of the Nedeljkovic era will be decided in China,” said Moritz Kronenberger, portfolio manager at BMW shareholder Union Investment.
BMW will need to navigate changing electrification policies around the globe.
And then there’s the issue of tariffs. While BMW has a huge manufacturing presence in the U.S., it’s not immune to Donald Trump’s erratic trade policy. It aims to make the iX3 SUV in Mexico, which suddenly became more expensive shortly after Trump took office. We don’t get the latest electric Mini either (a BMW product), since it’s made in China.
Finally, a word on Nedeljković’s EV street cred, which stuck out to me. He ran the i3 factory back in the day. More recently he’s overseen BMW’s shift toward production lines that can make EVs, hybrids and gas vehicles.
Reuters also describes him as “one of the architects” of the Neue Klasse platform. And if the iX3 I drove recently is anything to go by, this guy knows a thing or two about making great EVs.
50%: Tesla’s China Sales Stumble
Tesla Model Y L
Photo by: Tesla
It isn’t just the old-school automakers that are struggling in China. Barring a miracle, Tesla is on track for its first-ever year-on-year decline in vehicle sales in world’s biggest car market. Through November, Tesla’s China sales are down a little over 7% year over year.
Barron’s reports on the latest numbers:
Through November, Tesla sold about 537,000 cars in China. If Tesla wants to avoid its first-ever annual sales decline in the country, it needs to sell 120,000 cars in December. That’s unlikely. Tesla’s peak monthly production from its Shanghai plant is about 100,000 vehicles.
And remember, Tesla’s Shanghai plant also produces vehicles that get exported to markets outside of China. So that’s a tall order.
On the one hand, it was always clear that Tesla would lose market share as overall EV sales grew. On the other, it just hasn’t done enough to compete in the ruthless Chinese EV market that it helped create. It’s rolled out a couple of variants of the Model Y, like a three-row version, but hasn’t launched a truly new vehicle in years. Right now, Elon Musk is betting the farm on robots and autonomous cars.
Will a decline in China be the shock to the system that Tesla needs to start caring about making cars again? We’ll have to wait and see.
75%: VinFast Dealers Are Closing Up Shop
Vinfast VF8
Photo by: Kevin Williams/InsideEVs
The Vietnamese automaker VinFast had big dreams to sell electric cars in America. It’s not going according to plan, Automotive News reported in a deep-dive on Tuesday.
In 2023, the company said that it expected to have hundreds of dealers on board by the end of 2024. Now, dealers are walking away, the outlet reported, leaving VinFast with fewer than two dozen locations. Some of those dealerships have zero or few cars on sale.
Sales have failed to take off and then some, as Automotive News points out:
VinFast dealership shutdowns coincided with a 57 percent drop in U.S. registrations through October from a year earlier to 1,413 vehicles, according to the latest data from S&P Global Mobility.
In contrast, overall electric vehicle sales rose 11 percent in the same period to over 1.1 million vehicles. The data includes only new battery-electric vehicles and not hybrids.
VinFast is dealing with lots of headwinds, including the end of sweet lease deals subsidized by the EV tax credit, tariffs and slower growth in the EV market.
The automaker’s chairwoman addressed the situation on a recent earnings call: “Given the tariff situation and the instability in the EV market, we just need to see how that settles before we kind of push hard in the U.S.,” Thuy said.
Stepping back, VinFast’s troubles show how hard it is to launch a new car brand in the U.S. And especially one that specializes in EVs. Why would first-time EV buyers take the plunge with an unknown brand, when at this point they can buy a Ford or a Chevy or an Audi?
VinFast has some specific issues on its hands, like cars that haven’t exactly dazzled reviewers. But the whole situation makes me wonder whether it will be harder than everybody thinks for Chinese players to gain a foothold in this market.
100%: Do New EV Players Have A Chance?
2025 BYD Seal
Photo by: Andrei Nedelea
Whether they’re from China or home-brewed here in the U.S., do you think new EV companies can make a dent in the American car market? Or is that era over?
Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com More EV News We want your opinion! What would you like to see on Insideevs.com? – The InsideEVs team
