Is BYD making a kei EV for the Japanese market?

The bid for world domination continues for BYD, with its next move set to steamroll the Japanese market with a curious new model – an electric kei car.

A spyshot posted on Car News China show a minicar exactly in the mould of Japan’s smallest cars – short and tall with an upright glasshouse, flat sides to maximise interior room and even rear sliding doors, in the vein of the Honda N-Box, Daihatsu Tanto and Mitsubishi eK Space. The blue camouflage on the prototype marks it out to be a BYD, as it’s similar to what the carmaker has used previously.

The existence of this car adds weight to a report by Nikkei Asia from last month, which stated that BYD is set to enter the kei car segment – a specialised category for cars that measure 3.4 metres long and just 1.48 metres wide, affording buyers attractive tax incentives. No foreign carmaker has ever built a car specifically to meet kei car regulations, although smart came close by fitting narrower rear fenders to the original fortwo to meet the width restriction, creating the smart K.

According to the said report, BYD’s foray into the segment is meant to broaden its cars’ appeal in Japan’s famously nationalistic car market, having sold just 4,530 vehicles as of March since entering the island nation in 2023. The car, the design of which has apparently already been completed, would mark the first time the Chinese EV giant is developing a model specifically for a single market.

Japanese carmakers have been notoriously slow to build EVs, and the kei segment is no different. Just two electric models are currently on the market – the Mitsubishi eK X EV and Nissan Sakura, both with a single front motor making 64 PS (47 kW) and 195 Nm of torque, along with a 20 kWh battery delivering a WLTP-rated range of just 180 km.

We can expect the BYD kei car to comprehensively surpass that range figure, given that it’s designed from the ground up as an EV. With a much larger Blade lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery and a more efficient electric powertrain, a range of about 300 km certainly sounds doable.

As for outputs, while kei cars are currently limited to 64 PS, that’s due to a gentlemen’s agreement among members of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA) to prevent a horsepower war; since BYD is obviously not a member, it presumably won’t have to adhere to this limit.

The potential for vastly more range and an unfair performance advantage means this yet-to-be-named model could be the death knell for Japanese kei EVs when it enters the market sometime next year, with a targeted starting price of around 2.5 million yen (RM73,400).

The post Is BYD making a kei EV for the Japanese market? appeared first on Paul Tan's Automotive News.