Asian Tech Press (Oct 30) -- Geely, the Chinese owner of British sports-car brand Lotus, said it will "actively cooperate" with the European Union's anti-subsidy probe.

On October 25th, local time, the European Commission announced that it had selected BYD, SAIC and Geely to initiate an anti-subsidy investigation through sampling.

If the EU finds evidence of subsidies in the sample investigation, it will calculate the corresponding average countervailing duty, which applies to all imports of electric cars from China, not only for local Chinese brands, but also for foreign brands such as Volkswagen, Tesla, BMW, etc., which produce cars in China.

In response, Yang Xueliang, spokesperson for Zhejiang Geely Holding Group (ZGH), said on October 27, "Geely Holding Group will actively cooperate with the EU's anti-subsidy investigation."

Yang said, "Automobile is a global industry, Geely Holding Group has always respected free trade, advocating fair competition, strictly abide by the laws and regulations of the world, and participate in market competition in accordance with the law."

And Stella Li, BYD's executive vice president, said in an interview earlier this month that BYD will continue to push the company to achieve strong growth in Europe despite the EU's launch of an anti-subsidy probe into Chinese electric cars.

"We are a public company that needs to be managed with transparency and openness to share information. Therefore, we have no concerns about any ongoing investigations in Europe," Li Ke added.

Notably, the EU's latest decision comes in response to the significant increase in Chinese EV market share in Europe.

China's exports of new energy vehicles to Europe grew from 19% in 2017 to 36% in 2022 of total vehicle exports, according to a KPMG report released in June.

And data from the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) showed that the proportion further increased to 39.1% in the first half of this year.

Prior to this, the EU on October 4 officially announced the initiation of an anti-subsidy probe on imports of electric vehicles from China.