BYD launches low-cost 'Dolphin Surf' electric car in Europe
The car will sell at three price points, from 22,990 euros ($26,100.55) for a 322-kilometre range, to 24,990 euros for a 507-kilometre range.
Until the end of June, the three versions will be available at a discounted price of 19,990-24,990 euros, sales chief Patrick Schulz announced on Wednesday.
The car piles pressure on Europe's carmakers to offer more affordable electric alternatives, with cost still a major barrier to wider adoption of electric cars.
While only a handful of models, such as the Dacia Spring or Leapmotor's T03, exist in Europe for under 20,000 euros, 11 new models priced under 25,000 euros will go on sale on the continent this year including Volkswagen's ID.2, the Renault R5, the Fiat Grand Panda, and the Hyundai Inster.
Live Events
"The compact segment is the next frontier for electrification in Europe," Maria Grazia Davino, regional managing director for markets including Germany, said in Berlin. "We think this market has huge potential."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Hindustan Times
2 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
Amazon Great Freedom Festival goes live in 4 hours for everyone! Up to 75% off on tablets, smartwatches, laptops & more
Ramp, a startup leveraging AI to automate corporate finance tasks, raised $500 million in a Series E-2 funding round, valuing it at $22.5 billion. The funds will enhance hiring and development of AI agents for finance teams. With over 40,000 clients, Ramp aims to streamline expense management and budgeting amid growing competition in the fintech space.
Time of India
3 hours ago
- Time of India
Virtual labs with AI scientists produce promising result in Stanford study
Virtual scientists in a virtual lab at Stanford University are coming up with unorthodox ways to address clinical challenges, researchers reported on Tuesday in Nature. The virtual lab is modeled after a well-established Stanford School of Medicine research group, complete with a principal investigator and seasoned scientists, the report says. As in human-run research labs, the virtual lab has regular meetings during which agents generate ideas and engage in a conversational back-and-forth. They also have one-on-one meetings, allowing the virtual lab members to meet with the virtual principal investigator individually to discuss ideas. Unlike human meetings, the virtual gatherings take a few seconds or minutes. When humans tasked the virtual team with devising a better vaccine for the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, they equipped the virtual scientists with tools and software to stimulate creative "thinking" skills. The virtual scientists even created their own wish list. "They would ask for access to certain tools, and we'd build it into the model to let them use it," study leader James Zou said in a statement. Instead of opting for the usual vaccine design using an antibody, the AI team came up with using a nanobody, an antibody fragment that's smaller and simpler. "From the beginning of their meetings, the AI scientists decided that nanobodies would be a more promising strategy," Zou said. "They said nanobodies are typically much smaller than antibodies, so that makes the machine learning scientist's job much easier," Zou said, "because when you computationally model proteins, working with smaller molecules means you can have more confidence in modeling and designing them." When humans created the AI researchers' nanobody in a real-world lab, they found it was stable and could attach itself to one of the COVID virus variants more tightly than existing antibodies - a key factor in determining vaccine effectiveness. Aside from the initial prompt, the main guideline consistently given to the AI lab members was budget-related. Zou estimates that he or his lab members intervene about 1% of the time. "I don't want to tell the AI scientists exactly how they should do their work. That really limits their creativity," Zou said. "I want them to come up with new solutions and ideas that are beyond what I would think about." SCIENTISTS FIND GENES THAT CAUSE STUTTERING A new study found a clear genetic basis for stuttering, the speech disorder that affects more than 400 million people worldwide. Overall, as reported in Nature Genetics, the researchers identified 57 distinct regions on 48 genes associated with stuttering. Some of the same genetic variants involved in stuttering can also contribute to autism, depression and musicality, they found. Stuttering, characterized by syllable and word repetitions, sound prolongations, and breaks between words, is the most common fluency disorder, the researchers said. "There have been hundreds of years of misconceptions about what causes stuttering, from ideas about left-handedness to childhood trauma to overbearing mothers," study leader Jennifer (Piper) Below of Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville said in a statement. "Rather than being caused by personal or familial failings or intelligence, our study shows that stuttering is influenced by our genes." Young people who stutter report increased bullying, decreased classroom participation, and a more negative educational experience, her team noted. Stuttering can also negatively impact employment opportunities and perceived job performance, as well as mental and social well-being. Dillon Pruett, a postdoctoral fellow at Vanderbilt and a co-author of the study, stutters. "As someone personally affected, I wanted to contribute to this body of research," he said. "Our study found that there are many genes that ultimately contribute to stuttering risk, and we hope to use this knowledge to dispel stigma related to stuttering and also to hopefully develop new therapeutic approaches in the future." AT THE SIGHT OF A SICK PERSON, THE BRAIN GOES ON ALERT At the mere sight of a possibly contagious person, the human brain launches its germ-fighting preparations, researchers say. In virtual reality experiments using Google's Oculus Rift headsets, 248 healthy young adults were approached by human-like avatars, some of which showed visible signs of infection, such as rashes or coughing. Other avatars appeared neutral or fearful. As the infectious avatars moved closer, noninvasive monitoring showed changes in brain regions involved in integrating awareness of the body's position, movement, and relationship to the surrounding environment, which was not seen in response to the approaching neutral or fearful faces, the researchers reported in Nature Neuroscience. Participants were more reactive to touch when the sick-looking avatars were nearby, the researchers also found. Blood samples showed that exposure to the infectious-appearing avatars triggered an increase in volunteers' innate lymphoid cell activity, a key component of the immune system, which is typically seen during responses to real infections or vaccines. The results illustrate the power of the brain "to predict what is going on (and) to select the proper response," study co-author Andrea Serino of University Hospital of Lausanne, Switzerland said in an accompanying news article in the journal.
Mint
4 hours ago
- Mint
Porsche, Aston Martin hike US prices as hopes for tariff sweeteners fade
Porsche, Aston Martin flag U.S. price hikes US-EU trade deal imposes 15% tariffs, averts larger trade war Mercedes, Porsche cool hopes of auto specific trade deals By Rachel More, Alessandro Parodi and Shashwat Awasthi BERLIN, - European luxury carmakers including Porsche and Aston Martin have surged ahead with U.S. price hikes, which could point the way for bigger brands to follow in their wake as companies pass on the cost of tariffs. The United States and Europe reached a trade deal that will see EU-made cars hit with a 15% tariff from August, lower than once threatened but far higher than the 2.5% rate before U.S. President Donald Trump launched his trade offensive this year. On Wednesday, Volkswagen's luxury brand Porsche said it had raised U.S. prices by between 2.3% and 3.6% in July, with no plans for now to establish a U.S. production presence - a move that would let it avoid the levies. "This is not a storm that will pass," Porsche CEO Oliver Blume said after the company cut its full-year profit target and flagged a $462 million hit from tariffs in the first half. "We continue to face significant challenges around the world." U.S. tariffs have pummelled global automakers, forcing companies such as GM, Volkswagen, Hyundai and Mercedes-Benz to book billions of dollars of losses, issue profit warnings, slash forecasts and raise prices. Ford Motor, which boasts domestic production for around 80% of the vehicles it sells in the U.S., said on Wednesday that second-quarter results took an $800 million hit from tariffs and higher U.S. levies would likely cost more than expected for the year. Japanese carmaker Nissan reported a $535 million quarterly loss on Wednesday, impacted by U.S. tariffs, restructuring and lower sales volumes. British sports-car maker Aston Martin said it had made incremental price increases in the United States since last month, issuing a profit warning based on the U.S. tariffs impact and prolonged suppressed Asian demand. ADDITIONAL COSTS While bigger carmakers have so far held off, other sectors have seen price hikes as companies have looked to pass on the additional cost of tariffs. Analysts said larger carmakers could take similar steps in the second half of the year. "Into H2, we are looking to gain additional visibility with regards to the ability of Mercedes-Benz and the rest of the premium OEMs to increase prices in the U.S. in order to offset the impact of tariffs," J.P. Morgan said in a note. European carmakers are also getting less optimistic that they could seal extra sector-specific tariff reductions, resigned to dealing with the 15% rate. Mercedes CEO Ola Kaellenius told analysts on Wednesday that the group was assuming tariffs would remain at 15%, throwing cold water on hopes companies may be able to negotiate individual deals. "For all intents and purposes, that global deal for now is it," said Kaellenius, also president of Europe's car lobby ACEA. Any side deals were "very uncertain". Volkswagen had said last week it was hoping investment commitments could help it negotiate lower U.S. tariffs. But Porsche CEO Blume, also head of VW, suggested there would not be a separate U.S. deal for the automotive sector. "I agree with Ola Kaellenius' assessment that there will not be a separate automotive deal," Blume said. This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
