Are these road-legal in the west? If the off-road farm and construction-site applications are the only use-cases, that would seem to rather limit the impact on the market.
> which could explain why it costs more than 3x outside China.
Yeah, this has to be more than just western-market markup:
>> Kaiyun will start selling its “Pickman” electric pickup in the US, Germany, and Italy as soon as next month. The base Chinese model sells for 16,800 yuan ($2,500). The US version will start at $8,950, Fox News reports.
These I'm not sure, but overall yes they can be street legal: The Renault Twizy -- I've seen them in France and in Cambridge, MA (https://www.bonzer.rocks/) They're in use and cost ~10k. Last time I checked you can get a 25mpg and a 50mpg version. While the 25mpg versions are street legal and available now in the US market, I believe the 50mpg version is still only available in europe.
The trick with Renault Twizy is that it is not registered as a proper car, but rather as some kind of motorcycle with a roof, so it does not have really stringent safety requirements.
Because it is not a motor vehicle by insurance and Legal standards in the USA it does not require a license or insurance to operate. If you are hit by one of these, you’ll find there’s no insurance to cover you other than your health insurance. Underinsured coverage on your auto policy will not apply either, as it would if you were hit by a motor vehicle. Source: this just happened to me.
Generally, while your insurer (health, auto, homeowner, or otherwise) would cover your initial costs, you would get reimbursed by suing the driver of the golf cart that hit you and they would either personally be liable or pay through their insurance company.
The difference is that it’s illegal to drive a motor vehicle without liability insurance. With other vehicles, that can be just as lethal to pedestrians or cyclists, there is no such requirement. In my case, the driver who hit me was homeless with no insurance of any kind.
That's awful, I hope you're recovering and can be made whole quickly. Regarding your under/uninsured coverage, were you outside of your vehicle when you were hit?
According to an owner I had a chat with a while ago, the catch with the Twizy is the monthly battery pack "insurance" which isn't that cheap. IIRC there are two options for a buyer: either pay this insurance that covers everything, including getting a new pack once the old one is depleted, or buying the new pack as a spare part which will cost about half of the car price. All things considered, it's a nice vehicle that is getting some success (I've saw a few during last years) yet still not economically convenient compared to traditional cars.
For a website servicing the US market (Bonzer in Cambridge MA), the website sure doesn't seem like it was written by someone who understands English, and the pictures are written in French and have km/h. I undersand Renault is a French company, but Bonzer's American-facing website doesn't give me much confidence in their commitment or quality in this market.
A lot of European companies are like this and don't get really good translators and often don't really grok the internet - most of the content in PDF form is common.
That means this version has some more safety features than the the base model in China, which could explain why it costs more than 3x outside China.