Here we are, then: a proper Chinese-funded, designed, developed, engineered and manufactured car that will be sold in the UK. Welcome, Borgward.
You could argue that MG long since got there first, and to a fairly chunky extent that’s true, but MGs have been built in the UK before and the whole brand’s existence and branding is still so rooted in the UK, so we’ll gloss over that for the next couple of hundred words or so.
So, when Borgward makes it to the UK by the end of next year, it will be a pioneer. But what can we expect?
For starters, Borgward makes an international ploy of its own in being for a large part a German brand. While the cars are made in China and the company is Chinese-owned and funded, Borgward is historically German and has a design and engineering centre in Stuttgart.
The cars are styled by Anders Warming, the man behind the current generation of Minis. Make of that what you will.
I drove a Borgward BX7 last year. It feels like a previous-era Korean SUV, well equipped and decent to drive in an honest, unpretentious way. Yet at €44,000 (£39,000), it's priced alongside premium rivals like the Audi Q5 and Mercedes-Benz GLC. Borgward claims to be a premium brand, but the BX7 feels a long way from being premium.
Borgward will live and die in the UK by its pricing. That price needs to take a £10,000 haircut for UK sales, at which point the brand gets more interesting.
It gets more interesting still with news of the electric version of the BX7, the BXi7, and its 310-mile range. Rather than any internal combustion engined-cars, this is where Borgward can really make some headlines.
If it could offer such a car for £35,000, it would have something no-one else has: an electric car in that class at a really compelling price. Just look at the positivity surrounding Kia and Hyundai with their respective e-Niro and Kona Electric models to see what such a car can do to a brand. Yet that’s all a big if, and, judging by Borgward’s pricing elsewhere, I wouldn’t hold out hope.
We’re not in the 1920s anymore; Borgward is a new name and brand here, not a rival to Mercedes-Benz. It should instead be positioned of a maker of big-range electric SUVs that look up rather than down towards in their quality and feel but absolutely win on price.
Borgward’s UK importer, International Motors, has been shrewd before with other challenger brands, and it has a chance to offer something truly different to the UK marketplace if it chooses to – or, more pertinently, is allowed to.
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I emailed Borgward twice a year ago . .
. . . to see whether I could become a dealer when they put together a network, and they didn't even bother to reply. I think I'll take my investment elsewhere, maybe a Volvo dealership. More chance of success.
Well done Mark...
For writing something that makes this piece of junk remotely interesting, when it clearly isn't.
At least MG has some cache in Europe and America to pillage, but Borgward??
It needs to take a £39,000 haircut and stay away as I don't see it offering anything different to any marketplace.
A slap in the Face...?
Show how the British Goverment let theUK Car industry slowly drown, and now we’re getting Cars not even built here and are expecting to roll over for something in its own Territory as a premium Car and expect prospective British buyers not to cough loudly at the asking price of a not a premium auto in the West...!
The prop that finally broke
The UK government poured massive amounts of money from the public purse into the automotive sector. However, the customers had been so badly burnt they never returned in large numbers across the planet. By not cultivating the Honda/ Rover alliance was either xenophobia or stupidity. Manufacturing would have stayed in Britain. Does it matter ? Everything in the UK has been for sale for decades. Capitalism at its finest.