Chinese EVs are here, and “Western” automakers are in trouble. That was the message EV journalists brought home from the CES show.

Prolific EV industry pundit James Carter noted that few of the legacy automakers had any EVs on display at CES—the Sony/Honda partnership Afeela rehashed a concept car that’s been kicking around the shows for a couple of years. In contrast, Chinese OEMs “wowed the show with production vehicles.”

Make no mistake, the Chinese are already helping themselves from the legacy brands’ lunch buffet. Chinese EVs are common sights on the streets of Europe, BYD just launched an Essential range of under-$30,000 EVs in Australia, and Chinese brands are steadily displacing long-time stalwarts such as Toyota  (with both EVs and stinkpots) in secondary markets around the world.

InsideEVs’ Patrick George perused the offerings of several Chinese automakers at CES—they seemed surprised at the amount of attention they were getting from Americans who have had little or no experience with China’s advanced EVs.

Mr. George was especially impressed with the new Zeekr 001 FR. He noted its “remarkably quiet” cabin and its impeccably-built high-res touch screen, which “felt more like a supercomputer on wheels than any car you can buy in the United States right now.”

Zeekr is part of the Geely Group, which owns Volvo, Polestar, Lotus and others.

The FR is a hot version of the five-door hatchback Zeekr 001, which shares a platform with the upcoming Polestar 4. And it sounds like a mean machine, sporting a 100 kWh battery pack and four electric motors that deliver 1,282 horsepower. Its 800-volt architecture supports charging speeds of up to 550 kW (350 kW is about the highest generally available in the US at the moment).

Zeekr also showed off the Mix “luxury minivan,” the RT robotaxi, and the 009 Grand MPV, a top-end minivan that drew such crowds that Mr. George couldn’t even get a close look.

Source: InsideEVs