President of BMW China Voices Optimism over the Development of New Energy Cars

The Chinese government is pledging to increase its non-fossil fuel energy supply to 15 percent of demand by 2020, up from 8 percent in 2009.

The largest auto-consuming market in the world, China is promoting the development of new energy vehicles with leading auto makers. BMW is one of them.

CRI had an interview with Christoph Stark, President of BMW China, and discussed the brand's cooperation with Chinese enterprises in the field of new energy cars. Yingying has the story.

As a world famous auto maker, BMW, has been developing its new-energy cars, and changing its focus from hydrogen vehicles to electronic cars.

According to Christoph Stark, Chinese consumers can field test a new series, MINI E series and their responses will be collected as an important database for the brand to explore the Chinese electronic car market.

"The MINI E series are stepping stones for BMW to enter the Chinese market on new energy cars. Like in other countries, we aim to collect consumer's driving habits, for example how long do they drive on average daily, where would they charge their electronic cars and so on. All information is helpful to upgrade our new energy cars."

Christoph Stark says to meet the needs of Chinese consumers, BMW's China-based researching centers will be in charge of most research projects, and strive to produce electronic cars that comply with Chinese regulations and standards in a couple of years.

It is widely-believed that the development of green energy vehicles is the best way for China to reduce oil import, which has exceeded 50 percent, and to tackle environmental problems.

However, electronic cars have its loopholes. Currently, batteries of electronic cars are usually of low capacity and must be recharged frequently. However there are few recharging stations available and the after-sale service system is unsatisfactory due to the lack of technicians in this industry.

As such, China has listed the industry of new energy car as one of the seven strategic emerging industries last year to support its development.

Zhang Laiwu is Vice Minister of the Ministry of Science and Technology.

"China has made the development of new energy cars an important aspect for promoting clean energy and it is utterly important. Actually, China started the development of new energy car in its 863 plan, which was launched ten years ago, and grasped key and core technologies in developing new energy cars. "

A recent report by the consulting firm, Accenture, suggested that, China could lead the race to roll out electric vehicles and is poised to deploy new transportation technologies faster than the United States.

The report says China's focus on electric vehicles, along with its domestic supplies of lithium and current battery production capability, will create a competitive advantage over the U.S. in electric vehicle production.

Christoph Stark, President of BMW China, says that besides the technical advantages, he is more optimistic with this industry as the Chinese government is determined to develop new energy vehicles

"It's impossible to upgrade the current infrastructures according to the needs of electronic cars in a short period of time.

However, we can see that China is resolute in this field and we believe China will pioneer in this field with faster development speed than other countries."

To step up its pace, BMW has cooperated with several Chinese auto enterprises, mainly on how to improve the current infrastructures.

"We have cooperated with several Chinese enterprises, universities and institutions, like the China Automotive Technology and Research Center, on how to upgrade the current infrastructure system and how to set up relating standards."

According to the country's latest plan for the auto industry, which was drawn up at the end of last year, new energy vehicles are top priority.

China has earmarked about 150 million U.S. dollars to subsidize new energy vehicles by the end of last year, and another 15 billion U.S. dollars will be committed toward the development of electric vehicles over the next 10-years.
Christoph Stark expresses his optimism on Chinese consumers and the potential market here.

"Nowadays for auto makers, the Chinese market is a key point to determine global success. The Chinese market is an important part of BMW's global strategy, and BMW's third largest market worldwide, and we hope that China can maintain its development momentum."

Since 2009, more than 70 models of new energy vehicles have hit the Chinese market.

By 2015, China aims to sell over 1 million new energy vehicles a year. The target is pitched at 100 million by 2020.

For CRI, this is Yingying.