Transportation Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. Follow Targeting the Tesla Model Y The Zeekr 7X was my final test drive, the battery-electric crossover that clearly has the Tesla Model Y in its crosshairs. The 7X is built on the Geely SEA platform that also underpins the Volvo EX30 subcompact hatchback — though its wheelbase is a significant 4 inches longer, so its rear seat will hold adult-size humans. The 100kWh battery powers either a 416hp rear motor or a pair of motors totaling 637hp. Our test EV didn’t have the strongest regenerative braking in Sport mode, and I couldn’t test other modes in my limited time. The ride quality is considerably smoother than a Model Y, however, perhaps due to its curb weight of 5,313 pounds, fully 1,000 pounds more than the Tesla. Given recent concerns over fully electronic door handles, it’s worth noting those of the 7X slide out from a flush position. To get them to do so, you first have to locate and push an adjacent round button. I found the seats comfortable for my particular build, though the interior was more conventional and “German,” with largely black trim — versus the new Model Y’s stripped-down, almost Scandinavian approach. More than any other vehicle on the lot, the Zeekr 7X was the one reporters and Geely execs viewed as a possible US entry. The key issue would be price. In China it sells for $32,000; the price in Mexico is roughly 97,000 pesos, or about $55,000. Context from Europe Giovanni Lanfranchi, CEO of Zeekr Technology Europe, is based in Gothenburg, Sweden, where Volvo has been based for almost 100 years. Until a restructuring last year, Volvo owned 30 percent shares of both Zeekr and Lynk & Co. Major changes followed the September 2024 Taizhou Declaration from Geely founder and chairman Li Shufu. The single-page document demanded that all Geely R&D activities focus on developing every new vehicle from shared components, not just vehicle platforms but also software architectures and application layers. More than any other vehicle on the lot, the Zeekr 7X was the one reporters and Geely execs viewed as a possible US entry. Lanfranchi said since then, he has been “shocked” at the speed of what became “profound, radical change” in Geely’s R&D groups in Gothenburg and Frankfurt, which work side by side with their counterparts in China. Just 16 months after the declaration, each brand already has a new vehicle on an entirely common architecture. The Geely M9, Lynk & Co 900, and Zeekr 9X shown at CES are all built on the SEA-S 900V long-range plug-in hybrid platform announced in July. They share 90 percent of their components and software, Lanfranchi said — whereas earlier Zeekr models used platforms developed by its own R&D group just for its own models. Geely now plans to launch new vehicles in China and Europe simultaneously, rather than delaying up to a year while a Chinese-designed vehicle is adapted to conditions in other markets. Trump’s invitation to China Earlier this year, Trump dropped a bombshell. He’d be entirely fine with Chinese automakers selling in the US, he told the Detroit Economic Club — as long as they open plants to build them in this country. Geely can probably do so more easily and faster than any other Chinese maker. The plant in Ridgeville, South Carolina, presently only builds Volvo and Polestar vehicles. But with common platforms and identical underlying software architectures, and Volvo and Polestar migrating onto them, Lanfranchi sees “no reason not to” build group vehicles in the Volvo factory. He stressed that such a move was not his to make, and no decision had been announced. But in the end, he mused, “I think it may happen.” Michael Dunne, CEO of Dunne Insights and an expert on China’s auto industry, called Geely’s US entry “absolutely possible, likely, and probable.” The company has long felt, he said, that the US would be “its destiny.” Dunne noted that Chinese EVs in the UK, led by BYD and MG, are roughly 15 percent cheaper than Japanese and Korean models. “The Chinese don’t have to be scary cheap,” he said. “They just need to be priced low enough to make you pause — then take a closer look.” That’s exactly how German, Japanese, and then Korean makers built their businesses, along with features domestic cars didn’t offer, from smaller cars to bulletproof reliability to long warranties. Those countries, of course, are allies of the US — China is not. Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates. John Voelcker