By Gary S. Vasilash

Although some people are on pins and needles and potential massive tariffs regarding Chinese vehicles coming to America, in Europe, where there is active concern on behalf of some of the OEMs on that subject, things are really not all that whelming, over- or otherwise. At least not yet.

According to Schmidt Automotive Research, during January and February, the shares of the Western European market are:

• 13.3% Japanese OEMs
• 7.8% Korean OEMs
• 2.9% Chinese OEMs

However. . .

When looked at from the point of battery electric vehicles, the “Chinese model volumes combined share was 3x as large.”

So clearly Chinese OEMs are gaining some traction in the Western European market when it comes to that tech.

One interesting aspect of the penetration of Chinese vehicles of all powertrain types there is which country is most interested in acquiring them:

Italy.

Of the ~52,000 Chinese vehicles sold during the first two months, Italy took some 12,000 of them.

Which probably doesn’t make the folks at Fiat feel good.