BYD aims for total zero emissions solution

The Chinese company known as BYD—that’s Build Your Dreams—has an audacious plan to solve China’s energy and environment problems. Readers of this site might know BYD as the carmaker backed by famed investor Warren Buffet—and as the top contender to bring Chinese-made electric cars and plug-in hybrids to the United States.

But it may come as a surprise that BYD views the U.S. market as somewhat irrelevant, and doesn’t see high-volume sales of its all-electric e6 or the BYD F3DM plug-in hybrid as that high of a priority.

That’s because BYD’s Chairman, Chuanfu Wang, has a much bigger vision. “The goal is to create a zero emissions ecosystem,” said Michael Austin, a Chicago-based BYD vice president with marketing and public relations duties. “And you don’t create the zero carbon zero emissions ecosystem by just producing a whole bunch of electric vehicles.” BYD’s electric and plug-in hybrid cars, now available in China, will go on sale to U.S. private consumers as early as 2012.

Vertical Integration

I recently spoke with Austin, a former Motorola executive who began working with BYD about a decade ago, when he was looking for an affordable source of commodity batteries for Motorola cell phones. Of the three-dozen or so Chinese companies making cell phone batteries at the time, BYD was the only one with durable and safe battery chemistry—backed by its own intellectual property regarding battery technology. Moreover, the company’s philosophy of vertical manufacturing integration allowed the company to reach an enormous scale.

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