Two days of test driving in Andalusia to launch the B03X, its B-segment SUV, and a growth curve steep enough to make you blink. Francesco Giacalone, global head of product, marketing and communications at Leapmotor International, set out the Chinese brand’s strategy in front of the European press, and he did not dodge what the test drivers had to say.
A range that runs from an A-segment city car to a large SUV, five global models in two years, a launch every three months. Leapmotor is keeping to the cadence announced in May 2024, when Stellantis and the Chinese manufacturer set up their joint venture to sell its cars outside China. The B03X, unveiled in Andalusia, is the latest arrival, and it takes on a B-segment worth 20% of the European market.
From 1,037 cars to a million
The figures Giacalone runs through show the scale of the climb. Leapmotor delivered 1,037 cars in 2019, 8,050 in 2020, 43,748 in 2021, 111,168 in 2022, 144,155 in 2023, 293,724 in 2024 and 596,555 in 2025. Over the first eight months of 2026 the counter stands at 560,883 units against 329,027 a year earlier, growth of 70%, with 101,267 cars in July and 103,129 in August. Cumulative deliveries now top 1.75 million, and the one-million target for 2026 alone, announced by the group’s president, will be met in his view.
Markets outside China now account for around 17% of those volumes, across five continents, more than 50 markets and over 1,100 sales and service points. The pace of expansion is hard to keep up with, even for the man in charge of it. Eighteen months ago the brand covered no more than nine or ten European countries.
Neither low cost nor budget
Positioning is the question that comes up at every round table, and Giacalone’s answer never varies. The starting idea was to bring the best Chinese electric technology to a mainstream audience, at a price that suits buyers who have no wish to spend a fortune moving from petrol to electric. Where many Chinese manufacturers talk up extreme technology, Leapmotor says it has gone for accessibility, for technology that is easy to use and, outside China, for straightforward servicing through the Stellantis network.
A budget brand strips technology out of the car in order to advertise a price, he argues, whereas Leapmotor keeps the equipment complete from entry level and squeezes its margins and its processes instead. “We don’t want to be the cheapest brand, we want to be the value-for-money brand,” he sums up.
The range, model by model
Five global models make up the line-up today. The T03 is the A-segment city car. The C10 is the D-segment SUV, offered as a battery electric vehicle and as a range-extender hybrid. The B10, a C-segment SUV, is presented as the first car designed and industrialised by a Chinese team with help from Stellantis development staff, and it too comes with both powertrains. The B05 is the five-door compact, and the B03X, the newest arrival, covers the B-segment. Outside Europe there is also the C16, sold in Brazil and the Middle East, and the D19, a large SUV developed for China and intended for the Middle East. Whether it reaches Europe depends on volumes, although Switzerland has already made clear that it wants the car.
Zaragoza, the industrial turning point
European production starts in October at Figueruelas, near Zaragoza, beginning with the B10 in both left-hand and right-hand drive. The brand is currently running quality checks and building up line speed. With the B platform now installed in the Spanish factory, other models can be slotted in later, and a second plant, in Madrid, could be bought from Stellantis if the financial conditions stack up.
The calculation is partly opportunistic, Giacalone concedes. Localising more than 40% of the value of certain models avoids penalties and opens access to purchase incentives in some markets. As an importer, the brand pays 30.7% in duties, and sea freight from China has risen from roughly 100 to 150 dollars per cubic metre. Leapmotor has also built up a network of European tier-one suppliers able to work to Chinese specifications. Building in Europe costs more than building in China, but “we would not launch production if we were projecting a loss”. The same regional logic applies to Malaysia, where production has started, and to Brazil, where it is due to follow.
The B03X plays the space card
The newcomer is the first Leapmotor with front-wheel drive, which frees up room at the back. The boot holds 510 litres, a benchmark in the class, and 1,605 litres with the seats folded, with 947mm of rear legroom. A 10-metre turning circle keeps the car easy to place in town.
Homologated range is 382km on the combined cycle, based on 15.7kWh/100km, while the consumption figures recorded by the press on the Andalusian route sat between 12 and 14kWh. It is a gap the executive is happy to own, explaining that the brand is systematically too cautious in its homologation cycles. With this level of standard equipment and this price, he says, he would like to see more cars like it on the market.
Battery, steering, traction, the reservations
The test drives threw up three reservations, and Giacalone took them one at a time. The decision to fit a modest battery, when several rivals go beyond 400km, was argued out internally. Three or four kilowatt-hours more, at around 80 dollars per kilowatt-hour, would have pushed the B03X up to the B05’s price level, so the brand chose to protect the model’s positioning instead. The very flat charging curve, he says, puts more energy back in less time than some competitors manage. A deliberate compromise, much like the decision to offer neither options nor small print.
On the steering, which several drivers found too soft and short on precision, the answer is candid. “We perceived it too and I am not ashamed to say it, we saw it in testing and we are going to fix it,” he admits, and he already knows the remedy. “It’s software.” The set-up signed off on the B05, developed through many loops with Stellantis, will be carried over to the B03X. “The B05 is at another level in terms of stability, feel and steering precision,” he says, before defending the hardware work. “On the chassis and the suspension tuning, we did a good job compared with the Chinese version.” The new design centre in Munich is there in part to feed European expectations back to the Chinese teams.
The front axle, which spun up under acceleration on several cars, falls into the same category. “We can also review the acceleration parameters. We are at 8.7 seconds, we could be at 9.5 and release less power at once,” Giacalone suggests. Here too the route is the same. “If it comes down to the traction control, it is software again, our engineers can reset the parameters in a matter of weeks. So it is not a question of structural change.” He closed in front of the journalists by saying the point was taken, and that the brand would check it and work on it.
The B05 as pathfinder
The five-door compact, now reaching our roads in turn, marks a turning point for the brand, a Chinese car that is not an SUV, in a segment the established manufacturers defend hard. It has taken five stars from Euro NCAP and is a candidate for Car of the Year 2027, with jury testing starting on 19 September. In July and August it gathered more than 7,000 orders, putting it second in the range for order intake. Leapmotor reads that reception as encouraging, and as a useful precedent for the B03X.
The Stellantis question
That leaves the awkward subject, whether Leapmotor is cannibalising the group’s brands, given that the Stellantis network distributes its cars. With around 150,000 sales outside China, the brand says it can now replace guesswork with figures. Nine customers out of ten would not have bought any group brand and would have gone to another Chinese manufacturer, while one in ten genuinely hesitated over a Stellantis model. Leapmotor therefore presents itself as a net contributor of volume, and as a way of keeping customers inside the group who would otherwise have slipped away. The next instalment comes at the Paris Motor Show, where the D19 will be on display.
