Will the Denza D9 GT radically reshape the luxury auto market?

Like an instant tent at a festival, Chinese brand Denza has popped into place in the European market, seemingly arriving fully formed with all mod cons. The arrival of Denza follows on from the successful introduction of parent company BYD Group, which already sells a number of affordable EVs and hybrids with a marine mammal theme (Dolphin, Seal and Sealion).

Denza is pitched a tier or two above BYD’s budget offerings, and the trio of cars shown at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed point to the potential rivals in quite a transparent way. Goodness, doesn’t the Z9 GT look a lot like Porsche’s Panamera and Taycan models? And gosh, doesn’t the B5 resembles the latest Toyota Land Cruiser? Even the D9 MPV has clear antecedents in the shape of the Lexus LM.

Last year’s Festival of Speed saw the debut of yet another BYD sub-brand, Yangwang, although it looks like Denza will be first to the European market. As is commonplace with big Chinese conglomerates, the BYD Group also has fingers into the mass transit, semiconductor, and battery industries, amongst others, together with yet another EV brand, the China-only Fangchengbao. The company boasts a total of over 120,000 engineers alone – to put that into perspective, the total number of direct employees in the UK’s entire automotive sector is around 200,000.

A lot of this instant know-how comes from the origin story of BYD’s automotive ventures, which began with a joint partnership with Mercedes-Benz. The German giant’s holding has since been diluted into oblivion as the original strategy – to make premium cars for China with German branding and design know-how – became superfluous due to the rapid shifts in China’s market maturity and industry abilities.

True to the country’s one-step-ahead stance that is rapidly skewing the global industry balance, Denza will arrive in showrooms with both EV and ‘super hybrid’ options, the latter tapping into the desire for flexibility without any whiff of range anxiety. What’s in a name? Just as BYD stands for ‘Build Your Dreams’, we’re told that Denza (styled as DENZA by company) represents Diverse, Elegance, Novel, Zenith and Aspirational.

Alphabet spaghetti aside, the flagship Z9 GT will arrive first. On paper, it’s a very compelling package. Huge amounts of power (substantially more than the Turbo S E-Hybrid variant of the Panamera) are mated to Denza’s unique and flexible e3 platform. Amongst the car’s array of party tricks are the ability to do a ‘compass u-turn’ on the spot, and ‘crab walk’ into a parking space. These will help, because the Z9 GT is a big car – 5.18m long and just under 2m wide. Rear space looks to be capacious and there are screens everywhere.

Next up will be the rugged B5 SUV and D9 MPV, both of which cloak their slight genericism with plenty of onboard accessories and technology. Any implication that Chinese manufacturers can’t hit established industry quality standards is now laughably outdated. The only barrier to entry is Europe’s longstanding loyalty to legacy brands and the occasional misalignment of matters of taste and aesthetics. Depending on the pricing, Denza be a major disruptor in the premium sector.

Denza.com, @Denza.Europe