France January 2015

How high will it get?

Edition La Vedette Golf GTE 

For the first time the French EV market had a January above the 1.000-mark, outselling the 837 units sold two years ago, which could mean that it might be on for a positive year. 

Looking at the models ranking, the front runners have a slight change in their the usual 1-2-3-4 distribution, the Bolloré Blue Car ending in #3, its best position in the ranking since last July, ahead of the usual Bronze medalist, the Nissan Leaf, while in #5 we have a surprising newcomer, the Volkswagen Golf GTE lands with 69 units, stealing immediately the  Best-Selling Plug-In Hybrid title away from the Outlander PHEV, will this be an indication that the GTE is going to make an impact in the French Market?

Looking at the manufacturers ranking, Renault is still comfortably ahead, but with 50% of the market, one has to go back to 2012 to see the french manufacturer with such small share numbers. 

Pl	France	Jan.	YTD 15	%	'14Pl
1	Renault Zoe	297	297	28	1
2	Renault Kangoo ZE e)	200	200	19	2
3	Bolloré Blue Car	120	120	11	4
4	Nissan Leaf	111	111	10	3
5	Volkswagen Golf GTE	69	69	6	N/A
6	Smart Fortwo ED	39	39	4	7
7	Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV	36	36	3	5
8	Renault Twizy e)	35	35	3	8
9	Goupil	30	30	3	9
10	Tesla Model S	26	26	2	10
11	Volkswagen e-Up!	17	17	2	11
12	Peugeot iOn	14	14	1	13
13	Citröen C-Zero	10	10	1	14
14 15 15 18 19 20	Volkswagen e-Golf BMW i3 * Toyota Prius Plug-In Volvo V60 Plug-In Kia Soul EV Nissan e-NV200 / Evalia	9 8 8 5 3 1	9 8 8 5 3 1	1 1 1 0 0 0	15 6 21 18 19 12
	TOTAL	1.069	1.069	100

e) Estimate

 * - Only Bev accounted

Source: Avere France; Avem.fr

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Battery Makers - Full Year 2014 (Updated)

Build Your Dreams Edition 

Another positive year for EV battery makers, with plug-ins selling more and more, the demand for batteries just keeps on growing, with an increase of 54% regarding the previous year. The Big Three continue to call the shots, but BYD is closing the gap...

- The leader Panasonic is following the market growth, mainly thanks to battery-hungry Tesla, with VW now playing with the Big Boys, 2015 will be another great year for Panasonic

- AESC, the joint venture between NEC and Nissan, continues to lose share (36% in '12, 28% in '13 and 23% now), despite the success of the Leaf (Renault is to blame), and with Nissan outsourcing to LG in the future, it looks that the market share will keep on going down;

- LG Chem has been losing share, but with a new Chevy Volt coming along and the New Gen batteries coming in 2016, the future looks promising;

- BYD is this year star, with the Qin propelling sales and doubling share in the battery market, from 3% last year to the current 6%, while surpassing GS Yuasa at the same time, becoming the largest of the small. Now with the battery-heavy Denza hitting the streets, it sure looks that BYD will continue to outperform the market and win even more market share; 

 - Lithium Energy Japan (GS Yuasa / Mitsubishi), it benefits from the success from the Outlander PHEV, but the 12kWh only can do so much to help improve sales;

- Samsung has a partnership with BMW, and with the bavarian maker plug-in sales getting better and better, Samsung is experiencing a sales surge, it's now #6 with 4% share. 

- Beijing Power Pride (BPP), battery supplier for BAIC, is first on a series of chinese battery makers, growing from insignificance to a small player status, BPP is now #7 with 2% share, but there are others, like Air Lithium in #9 (Kandi provider), Tianneng in #10 (Chery provider), and Wanxiang in #11 (That's right, those of Fisker deal, they supply batteries for Zotye) . 

A final remark for batteries chemistry, Li-Ion batteries dominate the market, but now they only own 88% vs 92% the year before, because chinese battery makers (Like BYD or BPP) prefer LiFePo4 (8% share now vs 4% in 2013).

Pl	Battery Makers	2014 MWh	2013 MWh	%14	%'13
1	Panasonic	2.726	1.700	38	35
2	AESC	1.620	1.289	23	28
3	LG Chem	886	812	12	18
4	BYD	461	117	6	3
5	Mitsubishi/GS Yuasa	451	293	6	6
6 7 8 9 10	Samsung Beijing Pride Power (BPP) ACCUmotive Air Lithium Tianneng	314 121 103 102 77	N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A	4 2 1 1 1	N/A  N/A  N/A N/A N/A
	TOTAL	7.167	4.667

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