Beijing motor show 2018: The five best and five worst Chinese cars

The highlights and lowlights of the China-market only offerings, starring the reborn Ford Escort, a car maker that can’t spell its name right, and the rise of the Chinese sports car

Mark Tisshaw

by Mark Tisshaw

25 April 2018

Follow @mtisshaw

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BEST - Dongfeng Aeolus

You couldn’t move for SUVs in Beijing, typically electric ones from new start-ups. So bravo Dongfeng for creating the kind of car to really get your brand noticed: a sports car concept. If it was from a European car maker we’d be clamouring for them to make it. With the progress made in recent years in design and quality with Chinese cars, who’s to say they won’t make a credible sports car one day?
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BEST - Ford Escort

On sale in China since 2011, the Aussie-engineered small saloon has been facelifted and didn’t look completely out of place next to the larger new Focus. There remain no UK plans ever to relaunch the name, due to previous damage done, but Chinese buyers can get one of the better resolved small saloons that rights some of the wrongs of the late 1990s abomination.
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BEST - Geely Icon

Geely is the one Chinese car maker the lay man will know soon if it doesn’t already, but to this point has had no concrete plans to launch its own brand models further afield. Now it has the Icon concept, based on a Volvo XC40 and surely the kind of car with mass export appeal. Geely says it’s never made a concept that’s not gone into production within a year; watch this space.
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BEST - Wey R57

Wey has already revealed it wants to be on sale in Europe and the US by the start of the next decade, and the R57 looks the model with the greatest perceived quality yet. Wey already has pleasing design and branding yet not the driving dynamics, so it’s here where the R57 will live or die for a launch further afield.
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BEST - Honqi concept

FAW-owner Honqi makes the state limos for China’s ruling party and ruling classes. It’s got an eye now on diversifying into big coupes, as previewed by this Beijing concept. This, then, or that Maybach SUV? No contest.
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WORST - KDC Regato

The McLaren 12C design was largely criticised when it came out for being too dull and derivative. Kudos to KDC then for ripping the McLaren Super Series design it introduced off to the point where the 12C looks to be a design icon. A real low point for the show among a sea of genuine creativity for Chinese car makers.
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WORST - Venucia The X

Pretty this thing is not. We’ll leave it there.
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WORST - Zotye i-across

Ripping off Porsche designs isn’t really funny anymore. No wonder the stand was so empty - Chinese car buyers want something much more original than this.
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WORST - Besturn (or is it Bestern?)

Come on chaps, when you’re launching a new concept car, at least spell the name of the company right, especially when you blast it across the front and back in such large script and design a special flourish for the ‘e’.
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WORST - BYD concept

Build Your Dreams was no doubt expecting a design revolution when it appointed ex-Audi design boss Wolfgang Egger as its design chief. What’s it got is a couple of also ran production cars, a saloon and an SUV, and a particularly uninspiring concept car. Compared to the work of Geely, which has similar star quality in ex-Ford and Volvo design chief Peter Horbury, there is no content.

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