Business
BYD: Chinese EV giant sees UK sales soar by 880%
Chinese car making giant BYD says the UK has become its biggest market outside China, after its sales there surged by 880% in September compared to a year earlier.
The company says it sold 11,271 cars in the UK last month, with the plug-in hybrid version of its Seal U sports utility vehicle (SUV) accounting for the majority of those sales.
It comes after figures from the car industry body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) showed that sales of electric vehicles (EVs) jumped to a record high in September.
The UK is particularly attractive to firms like BYD as the country has not imposed tariffs on Chinese EVs, unlike other major markets such as the European Union and the US.
BYD, which offers cheaper models than many of its Western rivals, said its share of the UK market jumped to 3.6% in September.
The company will launch more new hybrid and electric cars in the months ahead, said the BYD’s UK manager Bono Ge. He added that the brand’s future in Britain looks “hugely exciting”, having just opened its 100th retail outlet.
UK EV sales hit a record high last month, with sales of pure battery electric vehicles rising to almost 73,000, according to the SMMT.
Sales of plug-in hybrid cars grew even faster, it said.
The Kia Sportage, Ford Puma and Nissan Qashqai were the best-selling cars in September. Chinese models – the Jaecoo 7 and BYD Seal U – were also in the top 10.
But despite the surge in overall EV sales in the UK, petrol and diesel vehicles still made up more than half of new car sales last month, according to the SMMT.
In October last year, the EU announced it would hit imports of Chinese EVs with levies of up to 45%.
The measure is aimed to protect European car makers from being undermined by what the EU believes are unfair Chinese-state subsidies.
Chinese car makers like BYD have been effectively shut out of the US by high tariffs, which were backed by both President Donald Trump and his predecessor Joe Biden.
A man experiencing homelessness said he hoped the government would focus on increasing accessibility to housing in its upcoming Budget.
Josh, 26, who is currently a resident at the night shelter Jimmy’s in Cambridge, said the availability of council housing and “move-on housing” – shared accommodation where people can receive support – was important.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves will deliver Labour’s second budget on 26 November.
Cambridge City Council received 1,139 homelessness applications between April 2024 and March 2025, which was a 13% rise on the previous year.
Josh said his focus was to get back into work after he completed his electrician qualifications, which he said were “just as hard as a degree in my opinion”.
He would like to see the Budget include more opportunities for continuing apprenticeships and more financial support for necessities such as course books.
Josh said he recently received a government grant to pay for essential job hunting equipment, such as a mobile phone, boots and suitable clothing.
He added that he would support a rise in taxes if they were spent on investing in public services, “especially the train lines into London”.
Andrew works in the security sector and lives in Peterborough in a home owned by the charity Hope Into Action.
The charity, which was set up in the city 15 years ago, owns 130 houses across the UK.
Andrew has beea living in one of the charity’s properties for two years, after experiencing homelessness for about “three or four months”.
“The charity saved my life,” he said.
He said renting in the private sector “can be expensive” but that people themselves have “got to budget as much as possible”.
Applications for housing to Peterborough City Council are also rising.
In 2024, it was contacted by 3,654 households facing homelessness, which was an 11% jump on the previous year.
And since 7 April this year, there have already been 2,333 approaches – an average of 70 a week.
The authority received nearly £1m last month to help tackle rough sleeping in the city.
Andrew said he recognised that public services needed to be paid for and that if tax rises needed to happen to pay for them then “you’ve got to make good” yourself.
HM Treasury was contacted for comment.
A sign with the company logo sits outside of the headquarters of Eli Lilly in Indianapolis, Indiana, on March 17, 2024.
Scott Olson | Getty Images
Eli Lilly reached a $1 trillion market capitalization on Friday, the first health-care company in the world to join the exclusive club dominated by tech firms.
Eli Lilly briefly hit the $1 trillion mark in morning trading before retreating. It was last trading around $1,048 a share. Eli Lilly is the second nontechnology company to reach the coveted $1 trillion mark in the U.S. after Warren Buffett‘s Berkshire Hathaway.
The drugmaker’s stock has climbed more than 36% this year as investors applaud the gains it has made over chief rival Novo Nordisk in the GLP-1 drug space. The Indianapolis-based company’s stock has been riding the skyrocketing popularity of its weight loss injection Zepbound and diabetes treatment Mounjaro.
Eli Lilly’s stock has soared on the back of the success of its drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound.Demand is only expected to grow as approvals for the treatments’ uses and insurance coverage expand.
The two drugs have driven eye-popping sales growth for Eli Lilly. Last month, the company said Mounjaro drew in $6.52 billion in revenue in the third quarter, a 109% increase from the previous year. Meanwhile, Zepbound posted $3.59 billion in sales during the period, a 184% spike from the prior-year period.
Demand for the treatments will only grow as approvals for their use and insurance coverage expand. In addition, Eli Lilly expects an oral version of its popular drugs to hit the market next year, which could give patients a more convenient option than a shot that is easier for the company to produce.
Eli Lilly will likely remain a dominant player in the weight loss drug market, which some analysts believe could be worth more than $150 billion by the early 2030s.
But despite its recent struggles and leadership shake-ups, Novo Nordisk remains a formidable rival for Eli Lilly in the space. Pfizer also made a push forward in the market, as well, when it won a $10 billion bidding war with Novo Nordisk for obesity drugmaker Metsera earlier this month.
The runaway success of Zepbound, Mounjaro
Eli Lilly, a pharmaceutical chemist and Union veteran of the U.S. Civil War, founded his namesake company in 1876. It has long been at the forefront of the diabetes treatment space, introducing the world’s first commercial insulin in 1923.
Eli Lilly became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange by 1952, and for decades relied on a slate of widely successful products to drive much of its profits and revenue. That included insulins, the antidepressant pill Prozac and the earliest polio vaccine.
An Eli Lilly & Co. Zepbound injection pen, March 28, 2024.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Eli Lilly hit the jackpot with the May 2022 approval of tirzepatide for diabetes, which is sold as Mounjaro. It started to compete with Novo Nordisk’s diabetes injection Ozempic, which had entered the market a few years earlier.
But Eli Lilly brought a new way to treat diabetes and eventually, obesity. Tirzepatide works by imitating two hormones produced in the gut called GLP-1 and GIP. GLP-1 helps reduce food intake and appetite. GIP, which also suppresses appetite, may also improve how the body breaks down sugar and fat.
Meanwhile, Novo Nordisk’s semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and its weight loss drug Wegovy, only targets GLP-1.
Mounjaro achieved “blockbuster” status — meaning it generated more than $1 billion in annual sales — during its first full year on the market. Eli Lilly then won approval in late 2023 for tirzepatide as a treatment for obesity, which is sold as Zepbound and now competes with Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy.
By 2024, Mounjaro pulled in $11.54 billion in sales, while Zepbound posted $4.93 billion in revenue.
Miles DavisDevon political reporter
BBCA gin producer and drinks maker is concerned the chancellor might increase tax on spirits again in the Budget.
The previous Conservative government increased excise duty by more than 10% in August 2023 and Labour increased the tax by another 3.65% in 2024.
Mick Skerratt from Exeter Gin said another increase in duty would be a tough blow to take at a time when all other production costs are increasing.
HM Treasury said the majority of UK spirits were exported and so not liable for UK alcohol duty.
Mr Skerratt said: “It would put a massive pressure on us as a business and also to our customers.
“There’s only so far that a margin can stretch and profitability will be affected.”
The gin producer said the spirits industry was being “used as a bit of a cash cow for the government”.
He said: “We’re in a cost of living crisis and there’s a tipping point to what people are prepared and able to pay and it doesn’t help anybody – it doesn’t help the consumer and it doesn’t help us as a small business.”
The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on UK Spirits, which was set up to support the industry, said the number of distilleries in the UK had tripled in the past seven years, from 350 to 1,050, which it described as “a modern British success story”.
The group said excise duty accounted for about 70% of the price of an average bottle of spirits sold in the UK.
The group’s chairwoman, Labour MP Carolyn Harris, called for a complete freeze on excise duty in Wednesday’s Budget and for the remainder of this Parliament.
She said: “By not freezing duty we’re putting all distillers in a position whereby they’re going to have their business threatened or they’re going to create unemployment which would be no good for the economy.
“It makes sense to me to freeze the duty so at least the industry can move on from where they are now and start to thrive and survive.”
Duty on beer has been frozen or reduced at every Budget for the last 12 years and the APPG said the discrepancy in changes to taxation on beer and spirits was unfair.
Brewery boss Alan Collyer said any changes to duty on beer had little impact compared to the wider problems facing small businesses.
Mr Collyer, owner of Exeter Brewery, said: “These pennies here and there really don’t make a significant enough difference to drive people back to pubs.
“You’ve got the contrast between very cheap alcohol in the supermarkets compared to increasing costs of a pint of beer in a pub and it would need substantive change to make people think it was worth going back to the pub again.”
A spokesperson for HM Treasury said “our distilleries are vital to Britain’s economy”.
“We’re making it easier for them to thrive: no export duty, lower licensing fees, reduced tariffs, and a cap on corporation tax,” they said.
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