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Chery's foot has already stepped into the threshold of South Korea's local automotive industry.
On August 2, at the signing ceremony at Grand Hyatt Hotel, Yongsan District, Seoul, Chery Automobile Chairman Yin Tongyue presented a robot dog to KG Mobility Chairman Kwak Jae-seon.
Behind this tech-savvy gift lies a $75 million strategic investment made by Chery through the purchase of convertible bonds issued by KG Mobility (converted at the current exchange rate, approx. 507 million RMB). If Chery converts all bonds upon maturity in July 2029, it will hold approximately 10% of KG Mobility's shares, becoming a key shareholder.
KG Mobility, formerly known as SsangYong Motor, is the third largest local automobile brand in South Korea after Hyundai and Kia. It's worth mentioning that SsangYong Motor has strong ties with the Chinese automotive industry. Back in October 2004, SAIC Group acquired 48.9% of SsangYong Motor for $500 million, becoming its largest shareholder and opening the trend of Chinese automakers acquiring foreign automakers.
However, the story between KG Mobility and Chery goes back even further.
In October 2024, both parties signed a strategic cooperation and platform licensing agreement. In April 2025, the 'SE-10' project was officially launched. This model, positioned as the successor to the Rexton, will be equipped with Chery's T2X platform developed specifically for plug-in hybrids, and will also offer a 2.0L gasoline version, scheduled to debut in January 2027. This is just an appetizer. The second global model is already on the way, and range-extended electric vehicles are also on the agenda.
The boundaries of cooperation are extending beyond whole vehicle manufacturing. Both parties decided to set up a special task force in the fields of robotics and automotive chips to explore the possibilities of joint verification and commercialization; regarding semiconductors, joint investment and development of automotive-grade chips will be discussed. Ambassador Dai Bing of the Chinese Embassy in South Korea commented on the spot, 'Economic cooperation between South Korea and China has shifted from existing vertical division of labor to a horizontal cooperation structure. The community of interests involving competition within cooperation and cooperation within competition is becoming the new normal.'
Money is spent, technology is given, what does Chery aim for?
Chery Automobile Vice President Zhang Guibing's answer was reserved. In an interview with Korean media, he stated, 'If there is a significant demand from Korean consumers to purchase vehicles, we will enter the South Korean market. However, at this stage, our primary goal is to rely on this cooperation to let KGM gain consumer recognition. The consumer atmosphere in Korean society, which values differentiation and pursues personal characteristics, is growing stronger. If Chery's sub-brands land in Korea, we can also tap into a consumer group with different preferences from KGM.'
When discussing the possibility of Chery models being produced at KG Mobility factories, he responded, 'Chery has multiple production bases globally. We believe these bases could become important areas of cooperation between the two companies in the future. For example, we can explore sharing global production capacity and carry out multi-faceted cooperation in the manufacturing field.'
After Geely obtained 34.02% shares in Renault Korea through subscription for capital increase, the Polestar 4 has already rolled off the production line at the Busan factory, handling both domestic sales and exports without missing a beat. With this precedent, Chery's calculations are not hard to guess.
And more than two months ago in Tokyo, Chery played a different game.
On May 27, the new brand EMTA was launched quietly. Chery did not stand in the spotlight, but instead partnered with Jiangsu Yueda Automobile Group, Autobacs, Gotion High-tech, and Anest Iwata to form a joint venture company in Singapore, with Chery holding 27.27% shares. The brand is Japanese, the design is done by a Japanese team, and even the sales channels use over 600 Autobacs stores in Japan, starting with setting up 100 branches.
But if you lift the lid and look, the three-electric system is Chery's, intelligent driving is Chery's, and whole vehicle production is placed in Yancheng, Jiangsu. The so-called 'Japanese shell, Chinese heart, global chain' is basically bypassing the hurdle of 'foreign brands are not trusted'.
Chery is targeting the fattest and most stubborn piece of cake in the Japanese market — the K-Car.
In recent years, the sub-market with annual sales exceeding 1.5 million units has been firmly held by Honda N-BOXes. Chery's approach is very direct: pure electric K-Car, rumored range between 155 and 220 km, with pricing on par with fuel version K-Cars. Deliveries are planned for spring 2027, rolling out four models by 2029.
This 'shell borrowing' strategy is essentially bypassing the trust barriers Japanese consumers have towards foreign brands. The Japanese automotive market has long been monopolized by domestic giants like Toyota, Honda, and Nissan, making it one of the most closed automotive markets in the world. Zhang Guibing, head of Chery's overseas business, previously told Japanese media that the enterprise will compete relying on differentiated characteristic products that Japanese automakers do not yet possess.
South Korean capital enters, Japanese brand incubates, behind these two strategies lies Chery's unhidden ambition to go global.
Chery official data shows that in 2025, the group's total sales reached 2.806 million units, of which exports were 1.344 million units, ranking first among Chinese brand passenger car exports for 23 consecutive years. Entering 2026, Chery's global expansion pace accelerated further. Cumulative exports from January to July reached 1.146 million units, a year-on-year increase of 71%; global market share in the first half reached 4.1%, tied with Ford for ninth globally.
The wind direction in nearby markets is indeed changing. First, look at South Korea.
According to South Korean automotive data agency Carisyou, from January to May 2026, a total of 146,278 new cars were registered in the South Korean passenger car import market, among which BYD reached 7,023 units, accounting for 4.8%, ranking fourth, just behind Tesla, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz, even surpassing the Japanese luxury brand Lexus.
Among the 70,078 new passenger cars registered in South Korea in the first quarter of 2026, 25,595 were produced in China, accounting for 36.5%. This includes not only Chinese brands but also Teslas produced at the Shanghai Superfactory — the latter significantly cut prices relying on the cost advantages of the Chinese supply chain, directly boosting sales growth.
The Japanese market is slower, but the ice surface is also cracking.
BYD opened its first store in Tokyo in January 2023, becoming the first Chinese brand to fully enter the Japanese passenger car market. In 2025, BYD's pure electric vehicle sales in Japan were about 3,870 units, a year-on-year increase of 62%; entering 2026, the growth speed accelerated further, with February single-month sales reaching 439 units, a surge of 153% year-on-year.
Of course, the road won't be too smooth.
In the subsidy list released by the South Korean Ministry of Environment at the end of June, BYD was excluded. Buying BYD after July 1 will not get government subsidies. The reason is low localization rate and limited contribution to local employment. Japan's subsidy policies have also been pointed out as 'double standards', the subsidy amount Chinese brands can get is far behind local brands. These are all obstacles on the surface.
But some things cannot be stopped by subsidies. Lee Hye-min, the sales section chief of BYD Seoul Mapo store, said a frank truth in an interview: 'Bias against Chinese brands still exists among South Korean consumers, but they are not stupid, and the proportion of consumers who decide to purchase after test driving is quite high.'
From BYD tearing open a gap with cost-performance, to Zeekr moving upmarket, and then to Chery walking on two legs with capital and technology, Chinese automakers in these two traditional automotive strongholds of South Korea and Japan are gradually turning 'impossible' into 'possible'.
Source: Car Observation
