A staffer charges an electric vehicle (EV) using a mobile charging pile at the Guangling service area on the Beijing-Shanghai Expressway in Taizhou, East China's Jiangsu Province, on January 26, 2022. The mobile charging pile - a special vehicle - has four 30-kilowatt charging piles, which can serve four EVs simultaneously. It takes one hour to recharge an EV. Photo: cnsphoto

Sales of passenger cars and new-energy vehicles (NEVs) in China saw rapid growth in June, latest data showed. It demonstrated the resilience of China's industrial chain and supply chain, which resumed normal operation soon after the latest wave of COVID-19 outbreaks was contained, as well as consumption potential.

Total retail sales of passenger vehicles reached 1.943 million units in June, up 22.6 percent year-on-year. Out of this, retail sales of NEVs totaled 532,000 units, up 130.8 percent year-on-year, according to data released by the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) on Friday.

Domestic NEV brands took a share of 61.6 percent, while joint venture brands took 5.9 percent in June. Tesla took a market share of 14.6 percent, CPCA data showed.

Tesla's sales in China stood at 78,906 units in June, up 138 percent year-on-year. Deliveries from its Shanghai Gigafactory came to 77,938 units, up 177 percent year-on-year. Both sales and deliveries hit record highs, according to statistics sent from Tesla China to the Global Times on Friday.

Despite the severe challenges posed by the COVID-19 epidemic, the Shanghai Gigafactory's monthly sales performance after production resumption once again demonstrated the strong resilience of the Chinese economy, Tesla China said.

Consumers shop at a Tesla store in Chengdu, Southwest China’s Sichuan Province on June 23, 2022. Photo: VCG

In the first half of 2022, Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory produced nearly 300,000 cars, of which nearly 100,000 were delivered overseas. The half-year delivery volume is equivalent to more than 60 percent of the annual delivery volume in 2021.

In the first half of 2022, domestic retail sales of NEVs totaled 2.248 million units, up 122.5 percent year-on-year, per CPCA.

China's auto industrial chain was hit hard during the COVID-19 outbreak in Shanghai starting mid-March, as the city and surrounding region are home to a major cluster of car industries including auto parts, chips and assembly workshops. Auto firms gradually resumed production in mid-April in Shanghai.

According to an action plan released by the Shanghai Municipal government on Friday, the output value of intelligent connected vehicles is planned to exceed 500 billion yuan ($74.6 billions) by 2025 in Shanghai.

Global Times