Alfredo Altavilla, BYD’s special adviser for Europe, told reporters in Turin on 16 September that the company will eventually need three vehicle assembly plants and one battery plant in the region. It is the clearest number anyone at BYD has put on European manufacturing, and it arrived at a dealership opening rather than in an announcement.
Affected#
European buyers, on a long horizon. Cars built inside the European Union are not subject to the bloc’s tariffs on Chinese-built electric vehicles, and Altavilla tied the plan explicitly to coming EU local-content rules. That is the mechanism by which a BYD’s European price stops depending on trade policy.
Nothing here is a commitment. One plant exists, a second has not been chosen, and the other two are described as long-term need, not as projects.
Confirmed#
As reported from Altavilla’s remarks:
| Assembly plants needed, long term | three |
| Battery plants needed | one |
| Where he said it | press remarks in Turin, at a Denza dealership opening, 16 Sept |
| Preferred locations, second assembly site | Spain and France |
| Italy | “plan B” — Stellantis is unwilling to sell a plant |
| Decision on the second site | expected by the end of 2026 |
| Preferred route | buying and refurbishing an existing plant |
Altavilla’s own framing: “Over the longer term, we will need three assembly plants and one battery plant.” He added that this “is not something that will happen overnight”, and tied it to the volumes BYD wants while complying with European regulations.
On the plants that exist or were announced:
- Szeged, Hungary began trial production early in 2026 with about 960 employees, and vehicle assembly is expected in November or December — the year-long slip covered in BYD’s Hungarian plant slips a year.
- Manisa, Turkey, the $1 billion plant announced in July 2024 and once slated to produce by the end of 2026, has not broken ground and has no timeline.
Unconfirmed#
- That this is BYD policy. It is an adviser speaking to reporters at a dealership event, not a board decision, a filing or a press release. No capital figure, capacity or timetable was attached to any of the four plants.
- That the battery plant is news. Altavilla said much the same in Milan in September 2025, when BYD had “still to decide whether to prioritise a third assembly plant or a battery making facility”. What is new is the explicit count and the ranking of countries.
- Where the battery plant or the third assembly plant would go. No country was named for either.
- What happens to Turkey. Reporting in June put Manisa on hold with Hungary as the priority; nothing since has revived it, and nothing has formally cancelled it either.
- Any effect on prices. Local production removes a tariff. What BYD then charges is a commercial decision, and no European price has been attributed to any of this.