Chery Australia and New Zealand’s Chief Operating Officer has said that “nothing’s off the table” when it comes to expanding into other segments in the Australian car market. 

The Chinese manufacturer currently offers a range of compact, medium and large SUVs in Australia across the Chery, Omoda and Jaecoo brands. 

Internationally – particularly in left-hand-drive markets – vehicles of other body styles are offered by Chery which are not currently available in Australia. 

Models from Chery’s Arrizo series of sedans are sold domestically in China, as well as in other left-hand drive markets including but not limited to Russia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Brazil and Egypt. 

Vehicles from Chery’s QQ range of city cars are also sold in some international markets under a variety of badges. 

Talks of Chery bringing additional body styles to Australia to complement their SUV range have emerged before. 

In September 2024, Chery Australia and New Zealand's Chief Operating Officer, Lucas Harris expressed his desire to bring the Chery Arrizo 8 mid-size sedan to the local market. 

The Arrizo 8 – should it come to Australia – would likely rival the likes of the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord. 

This week, when asked by CarSauce about the prospect of expanding the Chery brand into other segments in Australia, Harris expressed Chery’s openness to possibilities. 

“So I think when it comes to other segments, nothing's off the table. I think there's a general interest, certainly from our local team, to look at basically anything and find an opportunity to home something” Said Harris. 

“The real challenge is having a good justification for the global business to produce those left-hand drive cars as right-hand drive”

“Franky speaking, given the size of the Australian market in the global perspective is quite small and so we would need to then work with other right-hand drive markets to look at what the potential is there to warrant any potential product coming and what it might be so certainly we would not sustain the volume ourselves you know for something like a medium-large sedan for example.” 

“So if as a collective those right hand drive markets could deliver a suitable volume, then that would then be potentially enough business case for global R&D to spend the money to develop a right hand drive car.” 

Chery has previously sold models of other body styles in Australia. The J1 city car and J3 hatchback were previously sold locally prior to Chery’s withdrawal from the local market in 2015. 

However, any plans to sell vehicles from Chery’s international non-SUV line-up are yet to be confirmed.