Plug-in hybrid utes sound great, but will Australians buy them? Big test coming for 2025 BYD Shark 6, GWm Cannon Alpha PHEV and Ford Ranger PHEV

“If you build it, he will come.”

It’s the famous line from the movie, Field of Dreams, about America’s love-affair with baseball. But the question some of Australia’s biggest car companies will be asking themselves now is - ‘if we build it, will they come?’

The ‘it’ in the question is a plug-in hybrid (PHEV) ute, with this week seeing the confirmation that the BYD Shark 6 will become the first PHEV ute available in Australia starting in October. But it’s likely to be followed relatively quickly by the Ford Ranger PHEV and GWM Cannon Alpha PHEV in 2025, giving Australia’s very large ute-buying population a new choice.

But just because they build them, will it lead to sales?

In Field of Dreams, the protagonist in the film plows his corn field to build a baseball diamond and then waits for a year for anyone to show up and play on it (spoiler alert: it’s ghosts). While on paper these PHEV dual cabs should be a sales hit, Australians have traditionally shown a hesitancy to adopt new, smaller powertrains. Will BYD, Ford and GWM be left waiting for people to show up and play with their new vehicles?

Ford knows it’s a challenge, with the local boss, Andrew Birkic, telling this reporter last year the company knows it will need to educate consumers on the benefits of PHEVs and how to maximise them.

“It’s a really, really interesting point,” Birkic said in an October 2023 interview. “If you look at the data clearly BEV has taken off at a rate of knots and there’s just not the breadth of PHEV cars in the market to do that. But I think there’s an opportunity for a greater education program.

“Yes, we’ve heard stories of people charging them once and then they just use the ICE. It’s going to come down to each individual person and as the education around this increases I think you’re going to see a shift.”

His words have proven prophetic in some regards, with sales of PHEV models up more than 127 per cent in 2024; albeit from a low base. Improvements in the technology, in particular the extended electric-only range, is helping to convince more buyers to try the plug-in hybrid option.

GWM Australia’s Head of Marketing and Communications, Steve Maciver, believes there is a strong opportunity for the Cannon Alpha PHEV (and its competitors) in part because of the booming ute buying population. Many modern utes are driven almost entirely in urban environments, rather than used for agricultural and business purposes, which means owners will be able to utilise the benefits of a plug-in hybrid more regularly.  

“I think that the key advantage of a plug-in hybrid, of course, is fuel efficiency,” Maciver said. “The larger the segment, the larger the car, quite often the more important fuel economy comes 'cause the cars are generally thirstier 'cause the size and weight and everything. Now our Hi4T plug-in hybrid system is a little bit different in that yes, we've got pure EV range, which at this stage is wider and larger than most of our competitors, so that's a key advantage.

“And when you think about the average commute distance from the [typical] Australian consumer living in a metro city, it's about 35 to 40 kays a day. So if you've got one of these cars,  you in theory can do your commute to work and back using absolutely no fuel and doing it purely on EV mode. Equally, if you're the type of person who has been traditionally a large four-wheel-drive buyer or even a large ute buyer and you like off-roading, you've got the opportunity to do a lot of that in pure EV mode as well and save fuel.

“So the market's changing,” he added. “I think one of the reasons that plug-in hybrids and EV take up thus far has been relatively slow is because there has not been a number of compelling options there for consumers, just in terms of the pure number of vehicles out there for customers to choose from, but then also price as well.”

Whether Birkic and Maciver are proved right will ultimately be a test of time and patience. But only then will they find an answer to the question - if they build it, will people come?