Going gangbusters? Global EV sales surge, BUT who are the winners & losers?

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1:10Hello and welcome to another episode of the Everything Electric podcast. This week, it's kind of self-explanatory, there's been a report out very recently that the July sales figures, global sales figures for electric vehicles, and July is normally a quiet month, you know, where sales are down. People buy cars in the spring and the autumn, apparently. I don't know why. Don't ask me. I'm not a specialist in this area. But that's apparently what happens. And what happened this July is that the world bought 1.85 million vehicles. It's a kind of, you know, it's not a record because there's been over 2 million vehicles sold in other months, but in the months where it's expected, this is a bit of an exceptional blip.

2:00And I thought this was really interesting. And I thought what I need to be able to do is talk to someone who knows and studies the global electric vehicle market, not just in the UK, not just in Europe, but the global one. And for that, I went to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence and I spoke to George Whitcomb, who is their EV sales specialist. and he's a charming young man, I'll have you know. And he's very, very bright and he knows what's going on. He's very, very well-informed and he knows about these things. And it was just fascinating to talk to him. So I'm not going to do any more waffle about it because it's a very, very data-dense episode and I really hope you enjoy it.

2:40But I will say just now, please do like, like and subscribe. I don't know how you like. I'm sure you can like. please like please do tell your friends about it i think it's important because that that's a really good way of spreading the the news about what we're talking about here uh do subscribe if you haven't already and you know that's it really so please welcome uh onto the everything electric podcast from benchmark mineral intelligence their ev specialist george whitcomb

3:16so george this is a thrill uh we managed to arrange this uh for all our listeners and viewers in record time just like can we talk about the fact that there's a lot of people buying electric cars yes when wednesday brilliant there's often like 400 emails to a range of podcasts so this has been a great relief to do this so i'm very grateful george thank you very much for doing can you introduce yourself a bit just to give people an idea of your background and why you're why you're in the role you are in now yeah no thank you very much and thanks for having me on and i'm yeah very grateful it fell into place very quickly um so yeah i'm george and i work in the ev and battery team uh here at benchmark million mineral intelligence we sort of cover the complete mine to grid um battery value chain all the way through from the mining so extracting extracting and lithium, nickel, cobalt, et cetera, through to the cathode, anode production, cell production, and then through to end-use demand, which is the team that I sit on, looking primarily at EV and, consequentially, the battery demand from EVs.

4:23But we also look at all end-use demands for batteries, whether that's stationary storage, portables, two - and three-wheelers. Right. Because, I mean, my experience of Benchmark, which has always been incredibly interesting and fascinating, is sort of literally the mining and the processing of materials and where they're from and where they're going and how much they cost and what's going on with them. And I've talked to many of your colleagues and gone, are we going to run out of lithium? Ask all the really top-level questions. Yeah, exactly. That's sort of where Benchmark started. And then I worked previously for a company called Roadmotion.

5:02and now now we do the whole mine to grid supply chain through through to the battery demand as well and as well as recycling so closing the full loop right so that i mean oh let's go it will do that in a minute but let's just explain what brought us together today because it is the sort of the the figure's sound because i've been doing this a long time i don't want to do any age stuff but i can tell you're quite a young man and uh 16 years ago i don't want to know what you were doing 16 years ago but you know then it seemed like the most unlikely thing to happen i'd seen electric cars in california i knew something was going on i couldn't tell what it was but and also the idea that you could sell more than five with you know because those are the sort of so yeah we managed to sell five vehicles last month you know is and we're talking 1.85 million new electric cars sold in one month is bonkers, you know, from the world that I'm still trying to catch up with what's happening now.

6:03I'm lagging. But I mean, is that a record figure? That's one of the things I wanted to ask. I mean, does that set a new record for monthly sales, global monthly sales? No, don't worry, I won't let you know what I was doing 16 years ago. I'll keep that to me. But in terms of the July EV sales, 1.85 is not a record of all time. The EV market is a highly seasonal market with some months being higher than other months due to sort of various seasonality factors in predominantly within China and Europe in terms of when consumers and automakers choose to sell vehicles. But it's certainly heading in the right direction.

6:47we have seen months surpass 2 million units. These typically tend to be towards the end of the year. But for July and for a summer EV sales month, 1.85 is very good. So that would normally not, July would normally not be an exceptional month. It would normally be one of the quieter months. Yeah, exactly. Particularly within Europe, consumers tend not to buy vehicles. buy vehicles well they do still buy vehicles but not in the same volumes as they do in other months in the summer months uh so yeah july and august tend to be slightly slightly suppressed because of that um but yeah 1.85 is is certainly a july record yeah so i mean certainly i mean going on my very shallow sort of tabloid headline analysis of that is it is it's what are the factors behind that?

7:38I mean, I'm assuming quite a lot of it is the Iran, you know, whatever you want to call that, who owns the straights of all means, I don't want to talk about it. But you know, that has definitely had an impact on global oil, the global oil market, the price of the price of crude oil, all those things presumably have had, I mean, is that it is do you see that as a major factor behind these these increased sales? Yeah, certainly, it certainly is a factor. And we have, we have definitely seen, you know, increased interest as a result of that conflict. In parts of the world, particularly within Europe and some of the rest of world countries, it pretty much changed the economics of driving a BV overnight in terms of the daily running cost in fuel and fuel versus electricity.

8:25And so we did see real peaked interest in those countries, in Europe and rest of the world. But then there are also other factors. Europe is having an absolute stormer of a year, so to speak. It really has been sort of the main engine of unit sales growth, EV unit sales growth so far in 2026. And there are a few factors behind that. It's got a really strong legislative, regulatory and subsidy environment, particularly when compared to the other major regions in China and North America. So that's that's its real strength this year and this year has sort of seen the the return of a number of subsidy schemes across major automotive markets in europe which has really helped growth there but yeah the the elevated fuel prices has certainly played a role in some in some regions more than others but but it's you know it's definitely a factor this year yeah and i mean that's one of the interesting things that you know that we're constantly dealing with and trying to work out how to represent or how to tell that story is the sort of arrival, if you like, of Chinese vehicles, which is not that recent.

9:36I mean, they've been arriving for quite some time, but it feels like they're arriving with bigger ships and more of them now. And, I mean, are the sales in Europe in particular, and here, but Europe in particular, are those from mostly indigenous manufacturers or has the influx of Chinese cars had a measurable impact on sales? Yeah, you're definitely right. Every month from China seems to be a record export month. One after the other is continually going up and increasing and that's certainly in the interest of Chinese automakers. They're having a slightly tougher time domestically this year in terms of EV sales and so they're increasingly turning to overseas markets and Europe really is a major target for those automakers.

10:31There's a few reasons for that. The Chinese market is very price sensitive and cost competitive and vehicle prices are typically lower. So they can use Europe and other countries outside of China as ways to charge slightly larger premiums on those vehicles and improve their own balance sheet and profitability that way. And so we are certainly seeing an expansion of Chinese automakers within Europe. So for instance, now this year, well, 2025, I think BYD had a market share in Europe of about 7%, whereas four or five years ago, they were not a brand that consumers in Europe were aware of. And we're certainly seeing more and more of those vehicles on the road and they're sponsoring major sporting events.

11:21Yes. And so visibility is just going up and up for those guys in Europe. Yeah. No, it's remarkable that, you know, I know that because I saw some BYD cars a long time ago at the Geneva Motor Show, and that's the first time I registered the notion of BYD stands for Build Your Dreams. It's a Chinese company. They used to make batteries, now they make cars. And I saw these cars and I wasn't overly impressed. and they were surrounded by exquisite Audis and BMWs and Mercedes and the Volkswagen stand was the size of, you know, a small town. And there was this little stand in the corner with three BYD cars that looked a bit shonky.

11:59And then you go, no one outside the automotive industry would have heard of them at that time. And now my neighbours who aren't interested in cars have no idea about anything. They said, should we buy in BYD? You know, so you go, my God, it's gone completely that way. So the premium thing is very interesting because we're in a weird position where we kind of get these three price indicators. So we have Elliot Richards, who's a correspondent that films for us in China, who's an amazing man. So he'll see a Chinese car that he knows his car. He'll review cars that aren't coming here, but he also reviews ones that we know are coming to Europe and the UK.

12:42And he'll say, this car is a small hatchback. It's got this, it's got to fit this range, and it costs, and it's roughly, say,£8 ,000 if that's what it costs in China. And then I'm married to an Australian, so we spend time in Australia. I see the same car in Australia, and it's£14 ,000 in Australia. And you go, oh, my God, the equivalent. And then you see it launched here, and it's£23 ,000. And you go, well, is that all tariffs and import duty and transportation? I mean, obviously, that's going to have a dent in it. But clearly, they – so what you're saying is the manufacturers go, we can get seven grand for it in China, but we can get probably 12 or 13 for it in the UK or even more.

13:27Yeah, that certainly – That would be the way that's going. Yeah, that certainly is. Yeah, the opportunity to make a greater margin on those vehicles is definitely what Chinese OEMs are looking at when they're fighting at home on the cost front continually. uh but yeah tariffs and increasingly tariffs in in different parts of the world for chinese evs do do play a factor in increased price in those those countries and so yeah yeah naturally that's going to push prices up but yeah it's still an opportunity to really really take take a margin on those vehicles right so that does that helps me because that explains a bit and so it's less i'm less yes because it is it was just there was a time i can't remember it was last year when i saw a car i think it was a byd at 03 or something my sister-in-law had bought it and it was so much cheaper in australia than it is here i mean really noticeably it was tens of thousands of dollars less you know it was it was noticeable the i mean the one of the things i wanted to really clarify was the 1.85 million is that bevs is that battery electric vehicle sales it's not including plug-in hybrids or anything is or is it yeah so the 1.85 million is including plug-in hybrids so it's just that number of battery electric vehicles and um plug-in hybrids we're we're sort of rooted in in tracking ev sales and understanding the ev market from a from a battery demand standpoint so right tracking tracking the plug-in hybrid sales is is it is important uh for that although obviously naturally battery electric vehicles are are dominant in terms of creating battery demand but plug-in hybrids do play a role.

15:05But in terms of, so I'm really interested in, this has become a sort of topic for me recently, and I'm about to drive on a very long journey, a plug-in hybrid for the first time. So I will buy petrol for the first time in a few weeks' time. First time in, I think it's 14 years. I haven't ever bought a drip of petrol, so I'm going to have to. But I'm intrigued by the very recent reports, which is not, I know this is not really what we're discussing now, but about the, it's really come to light since the first tranche of least plug-in hybrids have been put on the open market and people are looking at them going, oh, it's in really good condition, it's only done this many miles.

15:46Then they open the back and there is an unopened charge cable. It's never been used. Not even, they didn't even take out the plastic wrapping. And it's the most recent report I've said, the estimate's about 60 % of the plug-in hybrids. probably either very rarely or never been charged. And one of the excuses someone gave us, oh, that's because home chargers always have a cable. I have never seen a home charger with a cable. Home chargers are a socket on the wall. They're not a tethered cable anyway. But in percentage terms, what are the hybrid? Do you know roughly what the plug-in hybrids are out of that figure?

16:27What percentage are plug-in hybrids? yeah so in uh the sorry the 1.85 million you know this year we're sort of seeing it's sort of there's a good way of thinking about it is roughly sort of a third two-thirds splits it sort of fluctuates month for month but roughly two-thirds of sales are bvs and then um a third of sales are plug-in hybrids and that was certainly been true last year and while we're swinging slightly to more to more increasingly swinging more towards battery electric vehicles this year and that's something we'd expect to continue moving forward. Yeah. That's currently the split.

17:03Yeah. And I mean, do you think, does the industry, because this is where the level of information I can get out of the automotive industry is fairly minimal. It's definitely on the PR end of their communications. But are they seeing and planning for hybrids as a stepping stone, as an intermediary solution that convinces some people that are nervous about me. I can't help laughing a bit. Making the leap, like it's a leap. It's a tiny step, but anyway. Yeah, jumping off a cliff to a full electric. Jumping off a massive cliff into the utter unknown to drive something that's got a plug on it, you know, for goodness sake.

17:44But, I mean, is that... Do you expect to see the sales of those eventually decline? I mean, do you think... is the battery electric vehicle winning in that battle i suppose yeah over time um battery electric vehicles will will sort of the expectation is is they will prevail but there are certainly you know for a number of years uh plug-in hybrids and and hybrids are their sales are going to increase um year on year right and there's sort of a few facts of that and it's also it's quite regional in terms of what we'd expect to see so some somewhere like europe uh europe europe's got quite strong emission standards clear targets in terms of where we're headed uh heading on that front in in terms of reducing tailpipe emissions so over time battery electric vehicles are going to increase and continue to increase their market share um but then when we look at other automotive markets when we look at sort of south korea japan uh progress in terms of bv sales has not been as stronger um and has not been as advanced and as quick and the hybrid so not even the plug-in hybrid but a full hybrid vehicle is um increasingly being used by automakers as sort of a tool in in in making steps towards electrification without sort of going the full way and putting a plug on the vehicle it's it's a way of introducing a consumer to yeah the direction rather than the end result because i'm very aware of the japanese market i mean it is it is intriguing well that's one of the questions i wanted to ask but i mean if you the the countries where the countries that would be at i was surprised to discover had started adopting the electric vehicles ethiopia being a very good example and then you it only takes a moment you kind of i looked at ethiopia My wife worked there many years ago, so she knows the country.

19:41She knew the country for a while. But I didn't have any notion of what their power generation was. I just didn't know anything. And it's basically they're pretty much 100 % renewably powered, hydro and wind and solar. So then you go, oh, they make their own fuel. That seems to be a big difference. They don't have to import coal, burn the coal, generate the electricity, put the electricity in a car. They've already got that. They don't import anything else. Once they've got, you know, I'm presuming if you're an Ethiopian and you can afford to buy a car, it makes a lot of sense. Absolutely. And that Ethiopia policy, it stands out as being unique at this stage.

20:25Right. In terms of... That is a government policy. Is there some government encouragement in Ethiopia for that? So there's, yeah, there's pretty much, the policy is in theory that ICE vehicles can't be imported or sold. It's got to be electric only. And that has worked. Ethiopia is quite a small, new total vehicle market. But it has had an impact in terms of we have seen a pretty significant increase in EV imports into Ethiopia. But as you say, they've got their own power generation. And that policy, rather than sort of being environmentally rooted, it was largely sort of an economic policy, really.

21:09Importing fuel was expensive. You've got to buy the foreign currency to buy the fuel. And it was quite a drain on their foreign currency reserves. So it was rather an economic route rather than an environmental route. But as you say, once you notice a few countries like that in terms of unexpected countries doing well in the EV market, the list is pretty much, you know, keeps growing and growing this year. The rest of world regions, so outside of the major North America, Europe, China is sort of really having its moment on the EV market this year. We're seeing pretty significant growth rates from a number of unexpected countries.

21:47There's Mexico, Brazil in sort of Central and South America, really, really growing last year very well and continuing that this year. We're seeing growth in Uruguay as well. That's another country that's doing well. Much of Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand are also having a very strong year. So it really is rest of world year this year in terms of sales growth. Right. And I mean, that's interesting with Brazil in particular, because that was always, you know, many years ago was the sort of the beacon of biofuels you know that they would they would just like mash down a low wall rainforest and plant crops that produce biofuel and i think even i just think that that the the the waning of that was was not economic was not uh environmental or caring about the planet or keeping the the protecting it was money you know again it was a financial thing and i mean because i have by i mean i know byd are doing exceptionally well in in brazil but have they built factory i mean they seem to be building factories everywhere i know they have in mexico uh they so they have they have one in brazil the mexico uh the byd factory of mexico was something that was much talked about for for a long time but has yet to it's not actually actually materialized but brazil is where they've sort of set up their hub in in sort of central and south america at the moment it it sort of started production it's at the minute it's producing what's called knockdown kits so it's essentially flat pack furnitures flat pack churn of vehicles from china but it's it's transitioning to to full vehicle production but it started production in july 2025 and it took about a year to produce 100 000 evs so it's already going going at quite quite a rate yeah which is which is really remarkable and it's sort of it's there to serve initially primarily brazil but it's got orders from mexico and argentina as well pretty sizable orders to fulfill for those countries too so it's it's really a hub and that seems to be byd's global expansion strategy in terms of uh it seems like it's picking a number of countries around the world and setting up facilities of various sizes based on where they are, of course, but really using local production and increasingly using local production to enter those markets and move away from shipments.

24:09I mean, it is a thing that's hard to ignore in this area is the kind of impact that China has made. I think even it feels like in the last five years, I sort of knew about it 10 years ago. I knew that it was happening there. I knew Elliot, who was in China, and he was talking about electric cars there but it really feels like in the last five years it's ramped up so much and i was there last year and it is you know you you can't i can't over exaggerate i was only in shanghai really and hangzhou so i didn't see the whole country by any means but i saw large amounts of a very very big city and i saw i'm guessing about 80 percent of the road transport was electric i is extraordinary, particularly in the centre.

24:55It is 100%. Yeah, it's certainly remarkable. The clue for me was I was walking down the street with Elliot and we could hear birdsong. I could smell cigarette smoke, which is all the people on scooters smoking cigarettes. And I heard, and I picked it out. It's tragic. It's an old man thing. I heard a Ferrari engine and I knew that's what it was. But the thing is, I couldn't see it. I turned around thinking it was miles away because there was no other noise. all that noise and then it did go past us one red ferrari in is surrounded by tens of thousands of electric vehicles it is the most it was a very iconic moment in a way it is truly remarkable in terms of they've sort of you know set their stall out to be global leaders in it and and create a technology which they can now export and they've they've done it domestically and now they're now they're looking overseas yes i mean it must be so difficult with it's a very really difficult one because i recently drove something can't even remember what a small chinese car nice and then i and i parked it in a car park next to a renault 5 and i went oh you know i don't know what it is about the renault 5 but it clearly has hooked people it's clearly got them you see them i mean they're i've got a feeling that renault will still be around in 20 years time and volkswagen i'm hoping those two will make it yeah hopefully hopefully they do but it seems to be uh getting increasingly tough for those those players in europe and struggling with you know filling facilities and keeping production high enough to to keep their cars competitive and also they you know where are they getting their batteries from they're getting them from china you know i mean it doesn't matter what the make of the car is it's going to have i mean that could is that history is that a topic that when you discuss this with big companies and when you're doing reports do you sort of go back and say we kind of need to understand the history that china you know 20 years ago said we need we need to make sure we've got access to the materials we need to make a trillion batteries you know i mean it was on a scale that's so hard to comprehend now it's sort of it's landing now in the in the west isn't it that what they what they have done.

27:11It's not too late by a couple of months, it's too late by 15 to 20 years. It is certainly landing on, you know, and has been landing for probably a few years now in Europe and North America about how tight of a grip and how much control China has over certain portions of the battery supply chain and certain key portions of the battery supply chain. And there is now increasingly both in Europe and North America, legislation and targets in terms of increasing um is sort of starting at cell production in terms of increasing domestic cell production and local cell production and sort of trying to work its way back down the battery value chain from from that cell production so in europe there is a number of cell facilities producing cells going into going into evs right and that's something that's increasing uh and is going to increase over the next few years traditionally european um ev cell production has been supported and done by south korean players who have set up production facilities in in europe and those have been supplying the large automakers vw group have been supplied by these these facilities in europe right and there's a few facilities that are looking to open and are currently being built that are uh chinese owned and using chinese facility there's now a catl battery factory in in germany and that's something that's going to so increase uh increase over time but there are also a number of european um established companies that are uh sort of trying to start cell production by themselves and and sort of make it european based and start from the ground up but that's proved and and proving uh increasingly difficult particularly as they open these battery facilities and and getting them to sufficient production levels for those those facilities to be economically viable is is really the the pinch point at the moment in the european supply chain it must be so tough because i did an interview with the ceo of it was at north vault in sweden up in northern sweden and it was so optimistic and so positive and so amazing and it made so much sense that the location of it and the you know all the advantages they had of uh you know being in a cool place and then i don't i mean i i've got a horrible feeling they're no they're no longer with us it's so hard because if you're a south korean or or a chinese cell production company you've you've done it before you've built a factory you've scaled that factory you you you know where you're gonna the pitfalls in doing that so to speak and you know what you need when you need it whereas it's so much difficult going so much more difficult going from zero to 100 without that prior knowledge and that that's really what's come to light over the last sort of 18 months with the likes of asphalt

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30:44I mean, it does feel like the likelihood of large manufacturing in the greater European area it's going to be quite a lot of Chinese companies that build the factories and start that process rather than, you know, which is, you know, it's not the end of the world. It'll employ lots of people. And it means that we, you know, that we don't have to transport batteries from China across the sea here. You know, we can put them on a train or something. You know, it's a lot more economic in that sense. Yeah, certainly shorten supply chains in terms of getting that end product to Europe or to North America.

31:26But yeah, the scaling up is proving hard. Yeah. So I wouldn't mind turning to the United States just because it is fascinating. I had the privilege of working there a lot in the early noughties, which is where I first became aware of the notion of putting lithium-ion batteries that we used in computers and phones, put them in a car. And it was such a weird, it felt, it did not feel glamorous or interesting. It felt like a nerdy science experiment that some nerdy boys in Silicon Valley tried out. And they put, you know, laptop batteries in a box with wires coming out of it that went into a motor and it made a car.

32:03You know, it was like, yeah, I was anything but convinced. I'm talking, this is about 2002. but the what is fascinating is that that whole technological drive and that development and that the the kind of first stages of development of viable economically plausible electric cars came out of California particularly obviously Tesla and I mean I can't tell because it's so difficult to to see through the sludge of awful news what is actually happening in America but I I do know that Rivian are doing, well, I think they're doing all right. Lucid, who I've kind of had some dealings with, seem to be still making cars.

32:48The ones I'm hoping that will work is Aptera. I don't know if you've come across them, but they are. It's an amazing machine. I can't see it being a big seller. I'd love one. I would love one. I mean, for listeners and viewers who haven't seen the Aptera, Google it, but it's basically a dolphin with some wheels stuck on the outside. It's super, super aerodynamic with solar panels everywhere, like a hyper-efficient two-seater electric car. I've sat in one. I mean, it's just incredible machine. I've not driven one, but I think very few people have. They do look amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, but that innovation is so exciting.

33:27And I kind of, I'm sort of holding my breath. My one ambition is to outlive a certain gentleman in the White House, you know, just so that I can, then I can pop my clogs. I'm not bothered. But I just want to last longer than him. That would be just a great achievement. But also to see what happens there afterwards, which we don't have to discuss now. But is the market very depressed, the EV market in the United States very depressed? Or is it sort of bubbling along at just a slightly lower level? Yeah, so what the context to the US market is that it was previously pretty well supported with this Inflation Reduction Act tax credit, which gave consumers up to$7 ,500 off the purchase price of EV, which is pretty massive.

34:18And it still is deemed a very generous or was a very generous EV subsidy scheme. So that was very supportive for the domestic North American market. It was attached to certain criteria that focused on, as we touched on earlier, about localizing the battery supply chain and localizing vehicle production but there are not there are there were a number of eligible vehicles and a number of very popular eligible vehicles on on that uh that eligible list and then at the end of september 2025 that got removed and was no longer available for consumers um and so what we saw in the third quarter of last year was we saw pretty massive ramp up in terms of consumers going out to buy these vehicles while they still could receive receive federal support so we saw a huge ramp up and then the market uh consequently did suffer just just really suffered after in in q4 and then what we've seen uh getting onto your question what we've seen in q1 and q2 this year is q1 really you know we we did continue to see real real struggle struggle for the the us market in in q1 it was it was down i think about 33 percent at the end of q1 but q2 was was much more positive it came out of q2 24 percent down year to date so there was some there are signs of signs of recovery and still signs of life so to speak in the us ev market and the the the automakers that have done particularly well out of that are the uh as we spoke about earlier the the sort of the tesla and rivian who are ev to their core um and sort of don't produce any other alternatives it's if you want to buy a tesla or rivian it's it's ev or nothing yeah so so those are two players that have done particularly particularly well i think rivian's up about 17 year to date so even without that support it's done well but it that was also a model that wasn't eligible for tax credit support it wouldn't have got the credit yes it's a bit more insulated from that but what What we're going to see now over the next sort of three months is we are going to see a worsening picture again out of the US just because of that huge ramp up in Q3 last year.

36:32Right. I mean, basically, everyone's still driving the cars, but they had then. They're not that old yet. Exactly. They're not that old. And we saw in the wake of the removal of the tax credits and the US's emission standards were also basically pretty much made void at the same time. So there was no push to an automaker and no pull for a consumer in terms of turning to an EV. But what we, as a result of the, oh, I've lost my train of thought now. Sorry. That's all right. But it was to do, I mean, presumably to do with the drop in, I'm trying to help you now. She's not going to be easy. A drop in the market in America.

37:18So I don't know. Is it the way you're following it? Or are we seeing? Yes. No, I don't know. Damn. Don't worry. We can snipping out. I think I've got it. I think I've got it. Ah, good. We lost the push. Okay. Yeah.

37:35Yeah, I've got it. Sorry. So in the US market, at the wake of losing the tax credit support and then also emission standards were pretty much made void at the same time. We saw that there was no longer a push for an automaker to sell an EV or a pull from a consumer to get one in the form of that tax credit. We saw the sort of large, very, you know, American, you know, the GM, Fords and the like, multi-billion dollar write downs in terms of pivoting away from EVs. They canceled plans, they canceled upcoming vehicles, they canceled development, and they really pivoted away hard from the all electric model back towards, you know, ICE vehicles and sort of familiar territory, partly because they can make more money on these vehicles because they know they're no longer going to sell the BEVs.

38:24and that really has brought a sort of a shift in the tide in north america and what we're seeing now a little bit is rather than all electric vehicle development we're seeing the development of of a range extended ev which is kind of like a plug-in hybrid it's sort of a halfway between a plug-in hybrid and a battery electric vehicle and that's sort of something the u.s market at the minute is turning towards as an opportunity for some degree of electrification while while it operates in a different regulatory landscape than it did 12 months ago yes yeah i mean certainly if you're going to put a combustion engine in anything in this is in my very strict list of criteria uh you know a range extender is a but you know like the london taxi that's effectively a range extender the bmwi3 the you know the original one with a little motorbike engine in the back but what the amount of people i met who bought that with the very the distinct you know fear that they would run out but if they've got that that makes them feel better and most of them have had had problems with the engine because they never used it and that was a real that was a real eye-opener for i think for bmw as well it was like oh they didn't actually they weren't running that engine all the time and they can't you were in your manual your i bmw i3 manual it said run the engine because it otherwise it gets all clogged up and the petrol goes off and all that stuff anyway that's exactly the i3 was sort of the first one and then after that we've not we've not well the london taxi is one but range extenders have largely been confined to the chinese market since then and american i mean the number of cabbies i've spoken to you and i said do you ever do you plug your car and he went of course i do all the time and i said all right So, you know, the amount of them have said that, they say, oh, I hate it when the engine comes on.