BYD Delays Mexico Plant Plans Until After US Election

Temporary Hold on Plant Construction

• BYD is putting a temporary hold on its plans to build a plant in Mexico, a report claims.
• The Chinese automaker now wants to wait until after the US election in November before making a move.
• Donald Trump has previously threatened to apply tariffs to vehicles made in Mexico and exported to the US.

BYD’s Decision

BYD has decided to put a hold on plans to build a factory in Mexico until after the US election in November, reports say. Sources close to the Chinese automaker say it wants to see who gets to spend the next four years in the Oval Office before it spends any of its cash on establishing a car factory south of the border.

Consideration of Sites

Teams from BYD, which already sells Chinese-built models in Mexico, had been considering three sites in the country, including one near Guadalajara, a tech-hub city Bloomberg likens to California’s Silicon Valley. That selection process has now been paused, though it could be restarted or axed in the future, the website’s sources say.

Implications for Chinese EVs

Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers are less than enthusiastic about Chinese EVs coming to the US from any country for both economic and security reasons. The Biden administration has already announced it will apply steep tariffs to EVs that are imported from China and is considering ways to stop automakers from skirting the ban, such as building cars in Mexico. And Trump said he would consider applying tariffs on cars coming from Mexico, even though the country is part of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) pact.

Future Export Possibilities

But the prospect of one day being able to export cars to the US from Mexico should opinions change, even if that’s 10 or 20 years down the road, must be playing a role in shaping BYD’s plans.

Comparison to Tesla

BYD rival Tesla has already committed to building a plant in Mexico, but the factory was meant to be finished in mid 2024 and now won’t be completed for at least two more years. Work is progressing, but at a far slower rate than Tesla CEO Elon Musk predicted when he announced the project in spring 2023.

“I think we want to just get a sense for what the global economy is like before we go full tilt on the Mexico factory,” Musk said on an investor call last October.