Wang Chuanfu Elected Unanimously, New Strategic Framework Clarified

On September 29, the first meeting of the 9th Board of Directors of BYD concluded. Wang Chuanfu was elected Chairman unanimously and will continue to concurrently serve as President.

This marks a new three-year board term for Wang Chuanfu. The 8th Board of Directors, whose term just expired, served from September 2023 to September 2026. For this rotation, the 9 votes of the Board unanimously passed key personnel appointments: Lyu Xiangyang appointed as Vice Chairman, Li Ke, He Zhiqi, and 10 others appointed as Vice Presidents, Zhou Yalin serving concurrently as Vice President and Financial Director, Li Qian serving as Board Secretary. The core executive team largely continues without drastic personnel changes, confirming shareholder approval of the operational performance report for the 8th term.

When the 8th Board took office, BYD was already standing on the results of the explosive electric growth era. During the 7th Board term, from 2021 to 2023, BYD completed the most critical sprint for scale transformation. In 2021, BYD revenue was 216.142 billion yuan, net profit attributable to shareholders 3.045 billion yuan; by 2022, BYD new energy vehicle sales surpassed Tesla, topping the global new energy sales list. This vertically integrated system built by Blade Battery, DM-i hybrid, and e-Platform 3.0 released huge dividends in this phase, supporting rapid domestic capacity expansion. The Denza, Yangwang, and Fang Cheng Bao high-end brand matrix also began laying out plans sequentially.

Entering the 8th Board term, after taking over in September 2023, the company continued to fulfill the expansion rhythm. In 2024, BYD revenue grew to 777.1 billion yuan, net profit attributable to shareholders 40.254 billion yuan, with gross margin reaching up to 19.44%. In four years, revenue and profit achieved several-fold growth. Strong cash flow supported nationwide capacity expansion and early overseas layout.

The sales curve, without a doubt, is the most impressive report card of the 8th term. In 2024, BYD new energy vehicle sales reached 3.024 million units. During that period, overseas business was still in the starting stage of product export. In 2024, overseas vehicle exports reached 420,000 units, and the proportion of overseas revenue was still not high.

R&D investment continued an upward trend during the 8th term. In 2024, R&D investment was 53.195 billion yuan. Funds were used to consolidate electric hardware foundations such as Blade Battery, DM-i hybrid, and e-Platform 3.0 on one hand; on the other hand, resources began shifting to frontier fields like automotive grade semiconductors and self-developed intelligent driving chips. Talent construction focus was initially on manufacturing and supply chain engineers, hiring in large batches to quickly fill capacity gaps and handle explosive domestic orders.

After the dividend window closed, the underlying market logic has completely switched. In 2025, the closing year of the 8th term, financial report data already reflected cycle changes. Full-year revenue was 803.96 billion yuan, only growing 3.46% year-on-year; net profit attributable to shareholders was 32.62 billion yuan, a year-on-year drop of 18.97%, gross margin fell back to 17.74%. Net cash flow from operating activities was 59.135 billion yuan, significantly down year-on-year. Funds were consumed heavily in overseas factory building, intelligent R&D, and continuous high-end brand investment. Fortunately, cash reserves were sufficient, leaving enough capital to continue adding.

Comparing the income statement, changes in the sales structure are more worth examining. In 2025, BYD new energy sales were 4.6 million units; overseas exports 1.05 million units, breaking the 1 million mark for the first time, with a significant increase in the proportion of overseas revenue. Domestic market growth slowed significantly, and the growth focus completely shifted to overseas localization production. Denza, Yangwang, and Fang Cheng Bao high-end brands continued to expand volume, and structural improvement for brand elevation is happening, but high-end brands are still in the investment ramp-up phase, and it is difficult to significantly pull overall profit margins in the short term.

The R&D focus also underwent a fundamental shift in the second half of the 8th term. In 2025, R&D investment was 63.4 billion yuan, with R&D personnel reaching 120,000. Funds were no longer focused solely on three-electric hardware; the focus extended to automotive grade semiconductors, self-developed Xuanji A3 intelligent driving chips, whole vehicle software stack, flash charging system, and second-generation Blade Battery. Overseas localization layout accelerated, with Thailand and Brazil factories put into production, and the Hungary European factory under construction. The model upgraded from simple export sales to heavy-asset globalization involving local factories, local supply chains, and local channels. Along with this came EU carbon tariffs, anti-subsidy investigations, trade barriers in various countries, and geopolitical risks.

The brand matrix also showed a differentiated pattern typical of a transition period. Denza steadily increased volume, with losses continuing to narrow; Yangwang and Fang Cheng Bao completed product launches, opening up brand visibility, but high-end brand R&D and channel construction investment was huge, making it difficult to contribute positive profits in the short term.

Talent and governance structures also adjusted synchronously with globalization and intelligent transformation. The 9th Board revised the Rules of Procedure for the Strategy and Sustainability Committee and formulated the President's Work Rules in this session, institutionalizing the flexible management model during the high-speed expansion period. Talent recruitment directions shifted from absorbing manufacturing engineers in large batches to composite talents in software, intelligent driving, overseas compliance, and local operations. The market competition for high-end talent in software and intelligent driving is fierce, and building overseas local management teams also requires a long cycle.

Looking at the industry overview, the market environment has entered a saturated competition stage. Domestic new energy market growth has slowed, and price wars continue to compress profit per vehicle; in the intelligent driving track, BYD has a strong hardware foundation, and whole vehicle software and advanced intelligent driving capabilities are still in the process of continuous improvement.

As early as the starting stage of electric transformation, Wang Chuanfu released clear medium-to-long-term goals: relying on vertical integration to gain new energy cost advantages, quickly seizing market share, pushing for the global new energy sales leadership, and steadily promoting passenger vehicle exports. At the 2025 Shareholders' Meeting, Wang Chuanfu further clarified long-term goals: achieving number one in global automotive scale by 2030.

Looking back at the fulfillment of the 8th term: the status as the global new energy sales leader was continuously consolidated, overseas exports started from a low level and broke through 1 million units at once; the high-end brand matrix was built; R&D investment fulfillment intensity even exceeded expectations. However, when setting goals early on, the industry had not yet entered deep saturated competition. Continuous domestic price wars and large-scale long-term investment in the intelligent track were variables not fully predicted at the time.

The nearly 20% drop in net profit attributable to shareholders in 2025 was not a collapse of traditional whole vehicle business. Profits were consumed in two directions: one is large capital expenditures brought by overseas localization factory building and channel layout; the other is continuous R&D investment in intelligent chips, software, and high-end brands. Management defined the profit pressure as necessary investment during the globalization and intelligent transformation period. Whether the investment can be converted into stable profit increments will be the core observation item of the new 9th term.

The strategic framework for the new term has been clarified: dual drive for domestic and overseas, continuously increasing the proportion of overseas sales; relying on Denza, Yangwang, and Fang Cheng Bao to increase average price per vehicle, hedging against domestic price wars; promoting the landing of self-developed intelligent driving chips and flash charging ecosystem, expanding the second growth curve of energy storage, laying the foundation for achieving global automotive sales number one in 2030.

Focusing on short-term operating goals, the focus is very clear: continuously landing overseas localization capacity, expanding overseas market share; making up for whole vehicle software and advanced intelligent driving capabilities; optimizing high-end brand profitability, balancing capital expenditure and cash flow. In the next three years, R&D investment will continue to maintain a high level, continuously investing in intelligent platforms, overseas capacity, and new generation battery technology.

Wang Chuanfu continues to serve concurrently as Chairman and President. This highly unified decision-making model proved extremely high execution efficiency during the past industry explosion period. But for these three years of the 9th term, it is no longer a stage of simply "expanding total volume" during the industry dividend period.

In past board cycles, BYD grew from a domestic manufacturer selling 600,000 new energy vehicles annually to a car company with 4.6 million units scale and number one in global new energy sales. Domestic market profits are under continuous pressure, while overseas heavy asset investment and long cash-burning cycle of intelligent R&D officially commenced. Over the next three years, BYD needs to continuously verify: relying on vertical integration, global layout, and continuous investment in self-developed technology, stabilizing profit levels, making up for intelligent shortcomings, steadily promoting the long-term plan of being number one in global scale by 2030, and continuously optimizing operational quality beyond sales.

Holding sufficient cash reserves, two major long-term investment blueprints of globalization and intelligence are spread out before. For this new term of Wang Chuanfu, the core task is to continuously polish the profitability of the BYD technology system after scale dividends gradually peak, and calmly respond to the complex trade and technology competition cycles of the global automotive industry.

Source: Car Observer