Automotive Business Magazine – Q3 2026 – Digital edition - Flipbook - Page 6
New kids
on the block
Milly Standing finds out
what upstart OEMs could
mean for the market
A
utomotive has long
been a key sector
for the UK, with
manufacturing
coming to the
fore in the 1950s,
when the UK
provided more
than half of the
world’s exported vehicles. In
the past few years, however,
fleet managers, dealers,
OEMs, and consumers have all
been dealing with the same
trend: new entrant automotive
brands. Their arrival has been
grabbing headlines and dividing
6
AUTOMOTIVE BUSINESS
Q3 2026
longstanding loyalties, but it
begs the question: where does
this leave legacy brands?
Taking the market by storm
The rapid advancement of
technology is allowing new
entrant OEMs to complete
research and development
processes at a faster pace.
Consumers are no longer
equating price with experience,
when new entrants are
increasingly proving that they
can bring high-quality, low-price
models to the market. Inevitably,
consumer expectations are
changing. May’s Startline Used
Car Tracker showed that almost
seven out of 10 car buyers are
open to the idea of buying a
Chinese car, while 69% would be
happy to buy a car from a brand
they did not know, as long as the
price and quality were right.
However, Chinese cars cannot
come directly to the UK without
any forethought on how both
the vehicle and the business will
compete in the UK climate.
Russell Borrie, CEO at
Arnold Clark, says: “Strong
value positioning, combined
with high specifications as
