BYD inks preliminary land purchase in Hungary for plant that will build EVs for Europe

Two months after announcing it had selected Hungary as the desired location of its first passenger EV production facility in Europe, Build Your Dreams (BYD) has completed a preliminary sales agreement for the Hungarian land those facilities should eventually sit atop. It should come as no surprise at this point that BYD is looking to get European EV production up and running quickly and is now moving one step closer.

BYD enters 2024 as the global leader in EV volume, recently usurping Tesla and showing no signs of slowing down. The Chinese automaker is now entering its fourth year in the European market, where it continues to roll out new EV models to compete with the American EV leader amongst legacy automakers in the EU. Still, there appears to be good blood between two of the most prominent EV automakers in the current space.

In 2022, BYD began seeking European production suitors before announcing official plans to establish its footprint in November 2023. One month later, we learned those first Europe-built BYD EVs will come from Hungary.

BYD expects to be building EVs in Hungary within 3 years

Per BYD’s Weibo page, it officially signed a preliminary sales and purchase agreement for the land in Hungary alongside the Szeged Municipal Government on January 30, 2024. The ceremony was attended by BYD Chairman and President Wang Chuanfu and Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó.

As reported back in December, the BYD facility in Hungary is enabled by subsidies from the local government. However, we still need to learn the scope of those investments and will likely only learn more once the European Commission officially approves the deal.

If and when approved, BYD’s first production footprint for passenger EVs could serve as a vital hub in cracking the European EV market. When complete, it is expected to produce up to 200,000 EVs annually via a phased expansion program.

In today’s update, BYD expects the Hungary facility to be up and running within three years and will join an existing facility in the country that manufactures electric BYD buses.