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Sunday, 26 February 2023

Dongfeng’s E70 EV is here

Dongfeng EVs land in Egypt: Chinese auto firm Dongfeng’s E70 500 Pro electric vehicles are now being sold in the Egyptian market, courtesy of distributor Misr Helwan Automotive. The car was presented (pdf) to the local market at a presser over the weekend (watch, runtime: 28:08).

The details: Only one model of Dongfeng’s E70 EVs — the E70 500 Pro — is currently available. It will set buyers back some EGP 897k, according to Al Mal. The car can cover a maximum 420 km on a full charge with some 160 horsepower. The car saves owners some EGP 200k-250k per 100k km on lower fuel and maintenance costs, according to Dongfeng.

Charging stations in the works: Misr Helwan Automotive will construct EV charging stations, starting off with Greater Cairo and then focusing on highways and other governorates.

We were expecting Dongfeng EVs to hit the market a bit differently: State-owned El Nasr Automotive had signed an agreement with Dongfeng in 2021 to locally assemble electric vehicles in El Nasr’s factory through one of the Chinese group’s subsidiaries. The plans fell through a few months later due to an import pricing dispute with the automaker.

AVV will handle all maintenance needs: Misr Helwan Automotive inked an initial agreement with the Arab American Vehicle Company (AAV) to handle service, maintenance, and spare part provision for E70 owners, Dongfeng Egypt said last month.

The second new EV to hit the market this month: Our friends at Abou Ghaly Motors introduced Chinese automaker Geely’s Geometry C electric car to the local market a couple weeks back.

REMEMBER- The government is still working on its long-awaited automotive strategy, AKA the Automotive Industry Development Program (AIDP). The strategy is expected to offer incentives to carmakers to increase local assembly and component manufacturing, increase the sector’s competitiveness, and raise exports. Stellantis, Nissan and Almansour Automotive told cabinet last week that they would separately invest a total of USD 145 mn to expand their local assembly capacity here.

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