BYD to manufacture electric cars in Indonesia from 2026

BYD has now officially confirmed plans to build an electric car factory in Indonesia. To this end, BYD is purchasing a 100-hectare plot of land in the Subang Smartpolitan Industrial Area in West Java. Construction is set to begin this year, with operations scheduled to start in Jan 2026.

BYD itself has not yet provided any information on production capacity, but Indonesia's Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Airlangga Hartarto, spoke of 150,000 vehicles per year and an investment by BYD of around 1.3 billion US dollars at the beginning of this year. In Jan, BYD also celebrated its market entry in the Southeast Asian country.

After Thailand, Uzbekistan, Brazil and Hungary, the vehicle plant in Indonesia will be BYDs fifth e-car factory outside China. However, the Chinese manufacturer's expansion course is still fundamentally stuck. Last week, it was reported that BYD is finding it fundamentally difficult to transfer its domestic success abroad: exports only account for 8% of total sales. However, the aim is to export no fewer than 500,000 electric vehicles this year and one million by 2025.