Watch out Toyota: BYD’s bold prediction

BYD said it could be a top-three automaker in Australia by the end of next year.

Currently ranked eighth in the charts, the quickly rising newcomer expects it will climb the ranks off the back of a slew of new products, which it hopes will help it dominate even more market segments during 2026.

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“For this year we’ll do around 55,000 units, whether that lands us at number eight or number seven, I’m not obsessed with that, but the way I look at it, this time last year we were number 16 and we’re going to finish this year at seven or eight-ish, and we just want to keep that momentum going.”

“So, you know, we haven’t settled on what we think the number will be for next year because it’s still a bit fluid, but you know, I think we’ll be aiming around top three,” he said.

Collins said it wouldn’t just be new product that would help propel the brand to a position where it might unseat brands such as Hyundai, Kia and Mazda, with only Ford and Toyota in front.

“It's the cars we’ve shown today, improving the core models we’ve had on the market for a while, as well as getting service right and getting it all right.”

“We think its ambitious, but we think it’s possible. We want to be a top brand, we want to be a top player,” he said.

BYD recently confirmed for Australia the long-awaited Atto 2 small SUV and its Atto 1 city car sibling, which will serve the entry-level of the electric car market. BYD will also pad its line-up with the Sealion 5 — essentially a lower-cost version of the Sealion 6 — as well as the flagship three-row Sealion 8 large SUV.

Collins said BYD was “moving its mindset a little” as a brand.

“We want to move from a challenging brand to more of a leadership position.”

He added BYD had a role to play in making plug-in hybrids popular country-wide and that was part of the brand’s sales surge. 

“I think there’s still a lot of people who don’t really understand plug-in hybrid and the benefits of that, and I hope we’re playing a role in that sort of education piece,” he said.

“Shark 6 is a good example — the packaging, the tech — the moment you get people in the car they’re like, 'wow this is cool'.”

“Customers are coming out of an SUV or coming out of a HiLux or Ranger or whatever and sitting in [the Shark 6] and learning about the tech and they’re just ready for that change.”

“I’ve heard over the last few years there’s mild hybrid (MHEV) and plug-ins (PHEVs) and BEVs and you know a whole different gamut of acronyms so I think people are only just figuring out what it all means and yeah, once you get them in one of these cars it’s actually a pretty easy sell.

Newly appointed head of Denza Mark Harland added the Shark 6 was the product that had the right tech at the right time for our market to prove the usefulness of PHEV.

“I think for Australians who love to get out and travel and have that capability of not being bound by [battery size], I think that’s kind of where we’ve hit that perfect chord if you will,” said Harland.

“I think the timing is right - people are ready for and I think are more open than they have been in the past for a disruptor, a challenger brand, and now we’re an emerging market leader in what? Three years?”

“We’re a company that - not just here but globally - wants to have a crack just in every segment. It isn’t any more complicated than that, the brand just wants to win,” he said.

Harland added on BYD and Denza’s range expansion: “Toyota has something like 95 per cent of the segments in Australia covered by at least one variant, and if we want to ever be number one we need to have vehicles available in those segments too.”

Taking a shot at the behemoth Toyota, which accounts for nearly a quarter of all vehicles sold in Australia, would be a “slow burn”, said Collins.

“I think there’s a few segments, particularly in the fleet sector where we just have a huge opportunity. We know it and we’re working on it. We’ll get there.”

Even with its expanded range, which Collins hinted could include more Shark 6 variants, the brand has a long way to go to knock off the tightly held top positions in the Australian market.

As of the end of September, beneath the market-dominating Toyota (181,809 units), Ford (70,881 units) and Mazda (70,242 units), the next two positions are closely fought over by Kia (62,884) and Hyundai (58,458), with a big gap between them and the next automaker down in sixth position — Mitsubishi amassing 47,650 units so far this year.

All are under threat with the explosive rise in popularity by challenger automakers from China. BYD itself is up 149.8 per cent year on year, but its success is being repeated by Chery, which is up a whopping 220 per cent, while GWM’s slowly-but-surely approach has seen it gain ground, up 23.7 per cent year-on-year.

MG is struggling with its transition to higher price-points, having taken a 9.6 per cent decline in 2025 off the back of the discontinuation of its previously popular cut-price MG3 and first-generation ZS SUV.

The rise of these automakers has notably recently booted old favourites Subaru and Nissan out of the top-10, with Mitsubishi’s position looking particularly precarious as GWM is rapidly closing the sales gap between them.