BYD built its 100,000th electrified vehicle in Brazil on 16 July, nine months after the first phase of the Camaçari complex opened on a former Ford site in Bahia. The number is real and the milestone is BYD’s biggest outside Asia. What it measures is narrower than it sounds: those cars were assembled from kits shipped from China, and the part that makes a car locally made starts only now.
Affected#
Nobody’s car in Europe or Morocco. It is worth reading beside the Hungarian delay and the Indonesian opening, because the three together show what BYD’s localisation actually consists of at each site — and Camaçari is the one where the distinction between assembly and manufacturing is being crossed in public.
Confirmed#
| Milestone | 100,000th electrified vehicle, 16 July 2026 |
| Since | first phase inaugurated October 2025 |
| The car itself | a Dolphin Mini |
| Direct employees | 5,500, of whom 86 % from Bahia |
| Site | former Ford plant, Camaçari, Bahia |
| Status | BYD’s largest industrial complex outside China |
The 100,000 were assembled from semi-knocked-down kits imported from China. BYD’s own announcement does not use the term, but it describes stamping, welding and painting as facilities the complex “will begin operating” in the second half of 2026, and trade reporting is explicit that the plant entered production as an SKD assembler.
What changes next, as reported:
- Pilot production using localised processes began in August 2026.
- Mass production of locally built cars for commercial sale is expected by the end of 2026.
- Brazil raised the import duty on SKD kits from 18 to 35 per cent at the end of January 2026, which is the most concrete reason on the record for the shift.
- The first Brazil-built plug-in hybrid, a flex-fuel Song Pro, went on sale in August.
Unconfirmed#
- Phase-one capacity. Sources disagree. BYD’s own July release gives “initial annual production capacity of 150,000 vehicles” rising to 600,000 at full completion; China Daily has 150,000, then 300,000 in a second phase, then 600,000; People’s Daily reports phase one reaching 300,000 by the end of 2026. We use 150,000 now because it is BYD’s own figure for the phase that exists.
- Whether Brazil is BYD’s largest market outside China. A May 2025 report says it is. Automotive World, in June 2026, places Brazil “among BYD’s three largest overseas markets, alongside the UK and Australia”. The stronger claim is a year old and we have not re-verified it.
- How much of a car will be Brazilian. Stamping, welding and painting are the difference between assembling and manufacturing, but local content is a percentage nobody has published, and battery supply is a separate question again.
- The 2026 output figure. One report expects about 180,000 vehicles from the site this year. That is a projection.