Toyota’s most affordable electric vehicle, which starts at around $15,000, is off to a hot start in China. With a new locally-built EV motor, Toyota is already cutting costs to keep pace in China’s fierce EV price war.

Toyota secures a new China-made EV motor to cut costs

After launching the bZ3X in March, Toyota’s joint venture, GAC Toyota, claimed the new electric SUV was “so popular that the server crashed.”

The electric SUV is selling faster than expected. In May, its second full month on the market, the bZ3X was the best-selling foreign brand EV in China, outselling the Volkswagen ID.3 and ID.4 Crozz, BMW i3, and Nissan’s new N7.

GAC-Toyota’s general manager of sales, Peng Baolin, announced the bZ3X retained the title in June with 6,030 units delivered.

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Toyota has already sold around 20,000 models, a new record for joint venture electric SUVs. Thanks to a new, locally made EV motor, the Japanese automaker can offer the bZ3X at such low prices.

Japan’s Nidec built a “made-in-China” EV motor to help Toyota compete in China’s intense EV market. Nidec’s president, Mitsuya Kishida, said in an interview (via Bloomberg) that around 99% of the materials and parts are sourced from China.

According to Kishida, building the new electric motor was “incredibly tough,” but it’s already helping Toyota cut costs in China.

Nidec began supplying the new EV motor for the bZ3X in March, a key factor in the electric SUV’s starting price of roughly $15,000.

The bZ3X is available in seven different trims with prices ranging from 109,800 yuan ($15,000) to 159,800 yuan ($22,000). It’s offered with two battery packs, 50.03 kWh and 67.92 kWh, providing a CLTC driving range of 430 km (267 miles) and 610 km (379 miles), respectively.

Despite the low price, the interior is surprisingly luxurious and equipped with advanced technology, including a 12.3″ infotainment screen and an 8.8″ driver cluster screen.

Powered by Momenta’s end-to-end intelligent driving model, the electric SUV offers nearly 50 advanced safety features, including Level 2 assisted driving.

Toyota promotes it as a budget-friendly family SUV. With all seats folded down, the bZ3X has nearly 10 feet of space.

At 4,645 mm in length, 1,885 mm in width, and 1,625 mm in height, Toyota’s electric SUV is about the same size as the BYD Yuan Plus (sold as the Atto 3 overseas).

Electrek’s Take

Toyota is showing signs of a recovery in China with a series of new electric vehicles rolling out. Last month, the company launched another electric SUV, the bZ5.

The bZ5 is about the size of a Tesla Model Y, but it’s about half the cost in China, with prices starting at 129,800 yuan ($18,000).

During GAC-Toyota’s EV Tech Day in June, the company announced partnerships with “car industry bigwigs,” including Xiaomi, Huawei, and Momenta.

Through the first five months of 2025, Toyota’s sales in China are up 7.7% with over 530,000 vehicles sold. With several more EVs on the way, including the bZ7, the Japanese automaker aims to catch up.

Toyota also broke ground on a new Lexus EV plant in Shanghai last month, the second wholly owned auto plant in China from a foreign automaker, following Tesla. Kishida said Nidec could cooperate with Toyota on the project for supply.

Tesla has announced the new ‘Model YL’, a larger 6-seater Model Y with a longer wheelbase, coming to China this fall.

We first heard about this new version of the Model Y through hacker Green last month.

Today, Tesla officially announced the new Model Y variant, called Model YL, on China’s Weibo, stating that it will be available this fall. The automaker also released these two images:

It looks like Tesla announced the new model today, despite not being available until this fall, because it was officially posted on China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) website for regulatory approval.

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The filing gives us a little more detail.

Here’s a comparison table between the new Model Y released earlier this year and this new Model YL:

As you can see, the new Model YL is slightly longer, ~180mm or 7 inches longer, and 24mm or about an inch taller.

The wheelbase is also 150mm, or approximately 6 inches, longer.

Here are pictures of the new Model YL released through the MIIT filing:

Electrek’s Take

This appears to be in response to several new all-electric third-row SUVs launching in China in the last few months.

Most recently, the Onvo L90 has been launched at a very competitive price compared to the Model Y.

However, this is expected to be priced closer to the equivalent of $50,000 in China as it uses LG battery cells and it is bigger than the current Model Y. In comparison, the Onvo L90 starts at the equivalent of $39,000.

Tesla needs to go down market with the Model Y in China if it wants to stop the bleeding. Not up market.

Buzz Bicycles has just launched its newest electric tricycle model, pushing prices even lower as older riders continue to gravitate towards electric three-wheelers as accessible e-bikes for both recreation and transportation. Now with the Buzz Cerana T2 hitting the road, the lower end of the market is heating up even faster. And Buzz may now have one of the best-priced mid-drive e-trikes in town.

There’s no shying away from the massive competition in the electric trike space. After Lectric eBikes launched the second generation of the US’ best-selling electric trike model last week, everyone now has a new target to beat. Priced at $1,499, the Lectric XP Trike2 sets a new standard for any retailer that wants to compete on price.

In the weeks since, we’ve seen other e-bike companies roll out their own next-generation models in an attempt to keep up with the driving force in the growing three-wheeler market. But the Buzz Cerana T2 is the first “second-gen” model I’ve seen since the XP Trike2 launch that has actually managed to undercut Lectric’s price. With a $1,399 sticker, the Buzz trike is a solid $100 cheaper.

So what does one Benjamin less get you? Let’s dive in and find out.

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First of all, the Cerana T2 rolls on relatively large wheels, with a 24×3.0″ front tire and 20×3.0″ rear tires. The trike is also powered by a mid-drive motor mounted at the bottom bracket, offering 500W of power.

The product page claims a 20 mph top speed, though that’d be pretty fast for a trike and may be a copy/paste error from another product page, which I’m entertaining as a possibility because right next to it is a graphic touting the rear hub motor – which this trike clearly does not have.

What it does have though is torque, and a lot of it! The mid-drive motor is rated for 130 Nm of torque, which is pretty far up the chart and exceeds the torque output of the vast majority of e-bikes on the market today.

With a throttle on the handlebars, the Cerana T2 qualifies as a Class 2 electric bike, though the five different levels of pedal assist and the cadence sensor mean that riders can also still get a nice workout at varying levels of effort if they choose to ignore the enticing throttle.

Considering the battery is a 48V 10.4Ah unit with only 500 Wh of capacity, pedaling is going to be important if riders want to achieve the claimed 40 miles (64 km) of maximum range on a single charge. If using the throttle frequently, a range of closer to half of that figure is more likely.

And for those who like to keep an eye out for UL certifications, you’ll be happy to hear that Buzz reports full UL2849 certification for the bike.

Other features on the Cerana T2 include the fender set, LCD display, 7-speed shifter, mechanical disc brakes, LED lighting in the front and rear, and an included front rack with matching rear basket.

There’s also an oversized saddle that features a manual drop post. It’s a hand lever found under the saddle that can instantly drop the post down several inches – a great way to quickly lower the seat when coming to a stop to dismount. It’s always a great way to get people to raise an eyebrow the first time you fiddle around for it in a fairly… intimate location.

Electrek’s Take

On the one hand, it feels a bit unfair to compare the Buzz Cerana T2 to the Lectric XP Trike2 instead of discussing this new model in its own right. But on the other hand, it’s one of several second-gen trikes to recently hit the market in the wake of the Trike2’s groundshattering unveiling, so I’d be doing the journalistic version of closing my eyes, putting my hands over my ears and shouting “La la la la!” if I pretended the two unveilings weren’t at least somewhat related.

Of course everyone is looking to save a buck (or a hundred of them) where they can, and the Cerana T2 even offers some cool things the XP Trike2 doesn’t, such as that dropper seat post and the mid-drive motor – though I’m not sure if the cadence sensor is worth it, not to mention that the XP Trike2’s jackshaft motor is essentially a hub motor functioning as a mid-drive. And while the Cerana T2’s lack of suspension is disappointing, the 3″ tires will help earn back some of the cushion lost to a rigid fork and frame.

On the other hand, the Cerana T2 has a few downsides, such as the lower-end mechanical disc brakes and the lack of a folding frame.

But hey, if it can really do 20 mph on the straightaways, then that might be its biggest selling point right there – other than the $1,399 price. Just watch out for those turns…