A new plug-in hybrid EV ute that could rival Australia’s top selling vehicles, the Ford Ranger and Toyota Hilux, has received almost 1,000 pre-orders within hours of going on sale. The BYD Shark 6, which has a range of about 80km on battery electric before switching to petrol, could be the start of China muscling in on the market dominated by diesel vehicles. Australian customers interested in the ute, which has an introductory price tag of $57,900, were asked to pay a refundable $1,000 deposit to secure a pre-order.
Almost 1,000 pre-orders were received but BYD expects the total to be higher because dealers were forced to manually log orders late into the night after the website crashed. David Smitherman, the chief executive of local importer EVDirect, said the interest had been enormous. “Over 20,000 people have expressed an interest in the Shark 6,” he said.
“In my 25 years in the car industry I’ve never seen interest like this in a new vehicle.” The Chinese carmaker, which sits second to Tesla on the EV sales charts, has clearly captured the attention of the big players. In the days leading up to BYD’s pricing announcement – revealed on the outskirts of Broken Hill and livestreamed to dealer events around the country – rivals ramped up their marketing activity.
On Tuesday morning Toyota announced it was trialing an electric Hilux with the mining company BHP. Within hours Ford confirmed it would this week reveal the plug-in hybrid version of its Ranger, a.
