1. BYD drops Australia's cheapest plug-in hybrid
BYD's price offensive rolls on. The Atto 2 DM-i plug-in hybrid compact SUV starts at $24,990 (before on-road costs) for the Essential grade and $29,990 for the fully-loaded Premium — making it Australia's cheapest plug-in hybrid, a full $9,000 less than the bigger BYD Sealion 5.
The tech: combined output of 122kW (Essential) or 156kW (Premium), both with 300Nm of torque, and three drive modes — EV Pure Electric, HEV Series (petrol engine acts as generator), and HEV Parallel (both drive the wheels together). The catches are honest ones: peak AC charging is just 3.3kW, there's no DC fast-charging at all, and vehicle-to-load (V2L) is exclusive to the Premium.
This lands just nine days after the Atto 1 EV became Australia's cheapest new car at $19,990 drive-away — the first time an EV has held that distinction.
2. NSW pledges $16.5M for kerbside EV chargers
If you can't charge at home, you don't buy an EV — that's the real bottleneck. The NSW Government has pledged $16.5 million for new kerbside EV chargers, aimed squarely at drivers without off-street parking. It's exactly the kind of infrastructure spend that decides whether the EV transition reaches apartments and terrace houses, or just stays a garage-owners club.
Source: Drive.com.au
3. Uber + Wayve launch the UK's first autonomous rides
Uber and British startup Wayve have launched supervised autonomous rides in London — the first time autonomous trips have been available on Uber in the UK. Riders requesting an UberX, Uber Electric or Uber Comfort may be matched with a Wayve ride at no extra cost, in an all-electric Ford Mustang Mach-E running the Wayve AI Driver with surround sensors.
It's supervised for now: a trained, TfL-licensed private hire driver rides along to oversee the trip, and the service excludes airports. Riders can accept or switch to a non-AV ride before the car arrives, and the in-vehicle screens show the car's planned path. Small start, but the direction of travel is obvious.
Source: Uber (investor press release, 3 Sep 2026)
4. Zeekr 9X flagship ships overseas — Australia next
Zeekr's flagship 9X has begun its first large-scale overseas shipment from Fuzhou Port to the UAE. It's the world's first vehicle equipped with Zeekr's SEA-Super Electric Hybrid (SEP) technology, and it's already the most expensive Chinese vehicle sold overseas — priced above RMB 800,000 in the UAE.
Worth watching locally: Zeekr is the 21st best-selling new-car brand in Australia this year with 10,070 deliveries in the first eight months of 2026, and the 9X is expected to arrive here in the first three months of 2027, after the 7GT wagon lands early next year.
Sources: GlobeNewswire, Drive.com.au