Technology

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Since Tesla Inc. and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. started developing the first mass-market electric cars in the late 2000s, battery vehicles have struggled with a higher cost structure that even subsidies and manufacturer losses haven’t been sufficient to surmount.

That’s come on the back of a price war, instigated by Tesla, so savage that the government last month induced automakers to sign a pact pledging to compete fairly and refrain from “abnormal pricing.” (The latter commitment was retracted two days later.)

Tesla’s Model 3, which previously retailed at twice the price of comparable premium mid-sized sedans such as the BMW AG 3 Series, is now the more affordable option.

BYD’s Dolphin, likewise, comes in about 5,000 yuan ($693) cheaper than a comparable compact sedan such as Volkswagen AG’s local Jetta variant, the 125,000-yuan Sagitar.

Just three years ago, Deloitte — in a report that was generally extremely bullish about the prospects for EVs — predicted this level wouldn’t be hit until the end of the decade.

Closing that gap has depended on falling costs for batteries, a process that’s been delayed as the commodity price inflation of the past few years pushed up expenditure on raw materials.

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