As Chinese automakers continue to expand their overseas footprint, their sales channels are also rapidly expanding. Looking at the overall picture, the overseas sales networks of China’s major automotive groups have entered the stage of a thousand-plus-outlet scale, and cover more than 80 countries and regions worldwide. As of the end of 2025, Geely’s overseas sales and service network had exceeded 1,000 outlets, covering more than 80 countries; BYD had entered 30 country markets in Europe, and continued to expand toward a scale of more than 1,000 retail and service outlets. Beyond the expansion of overseas sales scale, different Chinese manufacturers have also formed clear differences in market operating entities, channel-building approaches, and choice of partners.
Local General Distributor Leads: Completing Market Entry with the Help of Mature Partners
The local general distributor is a relatively common way for Chinese automakers to enter overseas markets. Manufacturers usually authorize a local importer or large automotive dealership group to be responsible for the business in a country or region, with the partner bearing vehicle importation, certification, inventory, channel building, market promotion, sales, and after-sales service, while the manufacturer is mainly responsible for product supply, brand authorization, and operational support. The direct advantage of this model is that it reduces the upfront investment a Chinese automaker needs to establish an organization and channels in a new market, and uses the partner’s existing automotive retail and service resources to quickly form market coverage.
Geely adopted this approach in Vietnam, with the local automotive group Tasco Auto serving as the official dealer. Just 4 months after the brand entered Vietnam, Tasco had already established 24 authorized dealerships, and simultaneously laid out 50 charging stations, while introducing 3 vehicle models. When Geely entered the New Zealand market, it chose the large local automotive dealership group Giltrap as its official dealer.
For Chinese automakers that need to enter multiple scattered markets at the same time, the local general distributor can significantly reduce the complexity of establishing a sales company country by country. Correspondingly, vehicle inventory, terminal sales, and consumer touchpoints are held more in the hands of the partner, and the manufacturer’s direct control over the local pricing system, channel operations, and user data is relatively limited.
Manufacturer’s Local Company Leads, Authorized Dealers Sell: Channel Assets Invested by the Partner, Market Operation Held by the Manufacturer
As the importance of a market and the scale of business increase, some Chinese automakers no longer hand an entire country over to a general distributor to operate, but instead establish a sales company locally, taking responsibility themselves for model planning, pricing, marketing, channel layout, and dealer management, and then having authorized dealers bear the store investment, sales, delivery, and after-sales service.
BYD currently uses this model extensively in Europe. The manufacturer is responsible for local market operation, and continuously brings in mature automotive retail groups to expand the terminal network. Taking Germany as an example, BYD had only 26 dealer outlets at the beginning of 2025, and by the end of the year had signed 150 sales and service outlets, with a plan to further expand to 350 by the end of 2026. At the overall European level, BYD set out to enter 29 countries and form a network of more than 1,000 retail stores by the end of 2025.
The characteristic of this model is that it splits apart the investment in channel assets and the market-operation function: dealers bear a large amount of store, personnel, and local sales investment, while the automaker retains management rights over products, brand, pricing, and the channel system. Compared with the general distributor model, the manufacturer can manage the local market more directly; compared with fully direct sales, it can also make use of dealership groups to increase the speed of outlet construction.
Manufacturer Direct Sales: Directly Grasping Transactions and Consumer Touchpoints
Under the direct-sales model, the automaker completes vehicle sales directly facing consumers, building its own official website, directly operated outlets, and delivery and service systems, and does not rely on independent automotive dealers to complete transactions. Tesla is the most typical representative of this; consumers can place orders directly through the official website or Tesla stores, and the sales channel is operated by the manufacturer itself.
When NIO first entered Europe, it also mainly followed the direct-sales system, establishing its own sales and service networks in key markets such as Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. Direct sales enables the manufacturer to directly grasp the brand experience, pricing, and user relationships, but every time it enters a new country, it needs to simultaneously build sales personnel, stores, delivery, and after-sales capabilities, and the fixed investment and organizational complexity are also relatively higher. This constraint has already been reflected in NIO’s subsequent expansion. In 2025, NIO announced its entry into 7 European markets — Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Luxembourg, Poland, and Romania — but the newly added markets were mainly entered through local partners such as Hedin Mobility Group and AutoWallis, while continuing to retain the direct-sales network in its existing key markets.
Therefore, direct sales has not disappeared, but its scope of application has begun to concentrate more on markets with a certain sales base or strategic importance, while when expanding country coverage, some Chinese manufacturers have reintroduced the local dealership system.
Global Strategic Platform Cooperation: Acquiring Cross-Market Sales Capability Through a Mature Automotive Group
Unlike seeking a general distributor country by country, some Chinese manufacturers choose to establish strategic cooperation with enterprises that possess global automotive channels, entering multiple countries at the same time through a single cooperation platform.
Leapmotor and Stellantis establishing Leapmotor International is currently the most typical case. This company is 51%-held by Stellantis and 49%-held by Leapmotor, and is responsible for Leapmotor’s sales business in markets outside Greater China, directly making use of the sales and after-sales network that Stellantis has built over the long term. The most obvious effect of this model is reflected in the speed of channel building. Leapmotor International began its European business in September 2024, and by the end of 2024 had already formed about 250 sales outlets; as of June 2025, its European sales and service outlets had increased to 600, with a plan to further exceed 700 that year. Completing the construction of several hundred channel touchpoints in less than a year is closely related to its directly accessing Stellantis’s existing network. At the same time, Leapmotor continues to use Stellantis’s original importers and large dealership groups in specific markets such as Ireland and Central and Eastern Europe. As a result, the enterprise does not need to build national sales companies, dealer relationships, and after-sales systems completely from scratch, and can form cross-national market coverage relatively quickly. Correspondingly, the overseas sales organization, channel resources, and operating profits also need to be allocated between the two cooperating parties.
The Overseas Sales System Is Forming a Landscape Where Stratification, Cooperation, and Deep Manufacturer Participation Coexist
The overseas practices of different Chinese manufacturers show that sales models will not ultimately converge into a single form, but are increasingly configured according to market scale, development stage, and the enterprise’s own resources.
First, the same automaker adopting different sales models in different countries is becoming the norm. Key markets have greater sales potential and can support a local company or even a direct-sales system; newly entered or smaller-scale markets make more use of general distributors and dealers to reduce entry costs. NIO retaining a direct-sales network in its existing European markets while entering 7 newly added countries through partners is a relatively typical case.
Second, mature dealership groups are becoming an important resource for Chinese automakers to improve the efficiency of their overseas coverage. Geely, with the help of Tasco, completed the layout of 24 dealer outlets in Vietnam within 4 months; BYD expanded from 26 outlets to 150 signed sales and service points in Germany within one year; Leapmotor, using the Stellantis system, formed 600 European sales and service touchpoints in less than a year. Although the different cooperation approaches vary, they all reflect that making use of existing channel resources can significantly shorten the outlet-construction cycle.
Third, as market scale increases, Chinese automakers’ degree of participation in local operations increases overall. The general distributor model is still applicable for rapidly entering new markets, but in key markets, more and more manufacturers are beginning to establish local sales companies, directly managing products, pricing, marketing, and channels. BYD using a local company to manage the dealership system, and NIO retaining a direct-sales organization in key European markets, both reflect manufacturers’ strengthening of the operating functions of core markets.
Therefore, the change in overseas sales strategy is not a simple “direct sales replacing dealers” or “dealers once again replacing direct sales,” but rather Chinese automakers beginning to configure different sales-organization approaches to different markets. The focus of future overseas channel competition will also no longer be merely the number of sales outlets, but how to form a more effective combination among market-entry speed, channel investment, and operational control.
[Disclaimer]: The above content reflects analysis of publicly available information, expert insights, and BCC research. It does not constitute investment advice. BCC is not responsible for any losses resulting from reliance on the views expressed herein. Investors should exercise caution.