11:59 am, July 27, 2026
Chinese brands could soon account for 50% of the UK new car market, Geely’s sales director has told Car Dealer.
Andrew Stuart spoke as the brand launched its new electric EX2 in the UK and said that he could see Chinese brands ‘being 50 per cent of the market in one guise or another’.
The EX2 was already one of China’s best-selling vehicles, and now its heading to the UK to take on other small electric cars like the Renault 5.
‘I think people can see which way it’s going’, he said. ‘I think people can see that the legacy brands are under huge pressure. And so I think that does make us very attractive.
‘You look at the new entrant brands, and you look at what some of the really well-established legacy brands have talked about around how the Chinese have approached the market, how quickly they’ve approached the market.
‘I think one of them described it as humbling.’
Stuart, who was previously sales director at MG and worked within a series of roles at Volkswagen, said that there was a ‘restless energy’ which came from working for a Chinese brand like Geely.
‘Is there pressure? Yes. Is there desperation? Absolutely not.
‘Whereas some of the other brands I know are in that desperate state where there is volume coming, and you’ve got to find a place for it.
‘We’re really, really fortunate that we’re ahead of the plan. We have this ambitious plan that we set out at the beginning of the year, to do 20,000 units. We’re already 600 units ahead of where we should be year to date.’