DIGIVESTASI - Chinese electric car manufacturer BYD has beaten Tesla in global electric car sales. This news apparently dealt a severe blow to the CEO of Tesla, Inc. Elon Musk who once mocked BYD. That's right, in an interview with Bloomberg TV in 2011, Elon once mocked BYD. At that time, BYD had just received new funding from Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway, which bought 225 million BYD shares for $232 million. 

When asked if BYD was a serious competitor to Tesla, Elon laughed and in a mocking tone, Elon wondered if BYD electric cars would be seen on the road? Elon also thinks BYD will not be a serious competitor to Tesla because its products do not have good technology.

"Did you see their car?" "Elon Musk said with a smile. "I don't think they have good (EV) products. I think the product is not attractive, the technology is not good," Elon continued. But after more than 10 years, it seems to be BYD's turn to mock Tesla.

The thing is, BYD's sales are currently much higher than Tesla. BYD reports selling three million electric cars worldwide by 2023. This number is far behind Tesla, which in its year-end report said it had sold 1.8 million electric cars. This is the second time in a row that Tesla has lost to BYD in global sales figures. For your information, Tesla's sales figures above only include pure BEV (Battery Electric Vehicle) cars. The American company only produces and sells full electric cars.

Meanwhile, BYD's sales figures also include BEV and hybrid vehicles.  BYD is said to have sold 1.6 million pure BEV vehicles, while 1.4 million were hybrid vehicles. Despite reaching 3 million electric vehicles, BYD did not achieve the sales target of 3.05 million vehicles as planned. The number of cars sold was "only" 3.02 million units. 

Meanwhile, Elon Musk also corrected his smile towards BYD. In May 2023, Elon Musk through his personal account X posted a comment on his BYD parody video. In the commentary, Elon basically began to see that BYD's electric car products would become competitive products in the market.  "This happened years ago," wrote Elon Musk. Their cars are very competitive today."