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China built its automotive expertise on enforced partnerships with foreign brands. The reward for global car makers was market access and billions in profits. But it came at a long-term price: those once humble manufacturing partners have become some of their toughest competitors globally.

Now global car makers are seeking help from the same Chinese partners as they scrabble to reduce costs and lift technology to the new Chinese standard. There’s one key difference, though: today’s partnerships have a lighter touch than the old industrial tie-ups mandated all those years ago in China.

“If you have a partnership with China and a good connection to Chinese suppliers, I think that is really one of the key things which will make you stronger,” Volvo CEO Håkan Samuelsson told the recent Financial Times Future of the Car conference.

Car makers operating at the volume end of the European market are suffering a doom spiral. A higher cost base in Europe is being pushed even higher as they lose manufacturing scale for one key reason: the Chinese are eating their market share.

“We're competing with OEMs from China, but they have a very clear advantage around massive scale, as they export product into Europe,” Ford of Europe boss Jim Baumbick told the Financial Times conference. “We have to find our own way in Europe to generate competitive scale. We believe doing that through partnerships is a way to compete.”

Ford is reportedly talking to Geely about building cars at its underutilised Kuga plant in Valencia, Spain, as it looks to lower its industrial costs.

Ford hasn't confirmed this report but has ramped up speculation that it will leverage Geely electrified platforms with the announcement that it will launch two new ‘multi-energy’ crossovers in Europe by 2029.

“We talk to tons of different companies all the time,” Baumbick told Autocar in response to our question.

A possible future Geely link-up would increase the number of partnerships Ford has on car development in Europe to three, after leveraging the Volkswagen Group's MEB platform for the Explorer and Capri and now Renault for two small electric cars on the Renault 5 platform, due in 2028.

This kind of cherry-picking approach to partnerships is very different from the massive tie-ups of old, such as the Renault-Nissan Alliance or DaimlerChrysler. “We look for opportunities where we can both win and share,” Baumbick said.

Chats with potential partners can give a useful insight into where your company sits in terms of tech and cost, said Baumbick: “We can test [our] own internal hypothesis around the competitiveness of choices we're making internally versus maybe leveraging partner technologies or assets for scale."

There was some surprise in the industry when Ford went with Renault to develop and build its small EVs, rather than develop its existing relationship with Volkswagen. Baumbick’s boss, CEO Jim Farley, said we shouldn’t have been: among other benefits, Renault’s solution was cheaper.

One of the furthest down the road in terms of incorporating knowhow from a Chinese partner is Stellantis, which has quickly leveraged its investment in EV specialist Leapmotor not just to fill its underutilised European factories but also use its tech for new models, starting with a new Vauxhall/Opel SUV, due in 2028.

Stellantis has also signed a similar deal with its long-time joint-venture partner Dongfeng, setting up a Stellantis-controlled European arm to import the Chinese company's upmarket Voyah EVs and tap into its engineering expertise.

Stellantis has moved fast to seek Chinese help in filling its European plants, estimated by the bank Jefferies to be suffering from spare capacity totalling around a million units a year.

Leapmotor will build its B10 and C10 EVs at the Stellantis facility in Zaragoza, Spain, starting this year, while the Dongfeng deal creates “potential” for production of Dongfeng EVs in Rennes, France.

A rash of similar reports linking Chinese production in existing European plants – including Chery and Dongfeng at Nissan’s Sunderland plant - has yet to translate to solid contracts, bar Leapmotor's Zaragoza deal.

“With the exception of Chery's early deal with Nissan in Spain, Chinese OEMs seem reluctant to rely on older, less efficient and unionised facilities,” Philippe Houchois, automotive analyst at Jefferies, wrote in a note to investors.

For Leapmotor, however, the broader link-up with Stellantis is a money-saver as it fights to grow share in Europe. “This, in my opinion, is another kind of profitability,” CFO Tengfei Li said on a recent earnings call. “Without this kind of partnership, we may have to invest 10 times higher than we have and may not reach the same results.”

For some established manufacturers, Europe has become so difficult that they can no longer develop models specifically for the region, and China is the preferred source for the electrified platforms and technology needed to keep pace with the tech and cost upheavals of the past five years or so.

Nissan is one example: CEO Ivan Espinosa has said the Japanese company will drop its long-term policy of creating products in Europe for Europe. Instead it will lean on models developed for its three core markets of China, the US and Japan.

“The competition is getting more and more severe with Chinese players,” Espinosa told the Financial Times conference. “Traditionally we were investing a lot on specific products for Europe. With the scale that we have, it has proven not sustainable.”

Asked by Autocar whether its Chinese partnerships might provide the next platform for its European models, Espinosa said Nissan “could consider doing something with what we're creating in China”.

Another possibility is leaning further on its Alliance partner Renault, which is developing a new EV platform with range-extender options due to land in 2028 and already builds the Nissan Micra on the Renault 5 platform. 

“It's a very good win-win case, because Nissan doesn't have to invest on its own on creating a product. With a fraction of the investment, we can get access to a competitive product,” 

Honda is another Japanese company turning to Chinese partners to develop models, rather than just manufacturing them.

Global car makers operating in China are already increasingly using electrified platforms and associated technology from their Chinese partners, among them Audi, Mazda, Nissan, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo.

“Special products for China would be almost impossible for us to develop by ourselves,” Volvo’s Samuelsson said.

Geely, Volvo's Chinese parent company, supplies the platform for the new XC70 long-range plug-in hybrid SUV, which is capable of travelling on 125 miles on electric power alone.

Partnerships are often difficult, former Nissan executive Andy Palmer told Autocar: “It's hard to get to big corporate cultures to work together when you don't have financial interests [in each other], where it's purely a commercial contract. You try and name a collaboration that has really worked very well and it's really hard to think of one.”

The key is to be humble going in, believes Samuelsson: “You first need to identify what you can learn from others, and then you need to be open and curious. I think the Chinese culture has always been a learning culture, and that is something we should really pick up.”

There are undoubtedly culture clashes, however. The speed at which the Chinese make decisions is both refreshing and frustrating for Westerners. New information can result in 180deg tacks on projects that aren’t properly communicated. The Chinese are also willing to bend rules, for example ignoring local employment regulation to carry on working the insane hours they do at home.

But the penalty for ignoring the Chinese way of working is even worse: death by unsustainable discounts.

When BMC launched the original Mini in 1959, it was both highly innovative in its packaging and widely affordable, being priced from just £496 - and of course it was wildly successful.

Come the early 1990s, its new custodian, Rover, began exploring a replacement - but when BMW bought the British company in January 1994, it was clear that they had very different ideas about what a new Mini should look like.

Development quickly became a tug of war. Rover proposals favoured a compact, innovatively packaged successor, while BMW proposals leaned towards a retro-styled sporting car. Fifteen different designers from across Europe and the US were tasked with designing the new car in just six months, ultimately presenting various competing visions - creating real tension.

BMW eventually settled on a strategy of repositioning the Mini from a budget car into a premium car, choosing a design proposal by its own Frank Stephenson.

It would target two distinct demographics: affluent young "thrusters" between the ages of 20 and 34 and those aged 35-50 who had fond memories of the original Mini. And it would be 20 times more expensive: the One ultimately started at £10,000 and the sporty Cooper at £11,600.

Our first glimpse of this direction came at the Frankfurt motor show in 1997, three years before the car's release, as BMW wanted to gauge public reaction. There were risks in exposing the design so early, but chairman Bernd Pischetsrieder dismissed those worries, insisting that "nobody will copy the Mini; it will be a unique car".

Reaction was anything but unified. One Autocar reader complained: "As a long-standing Mini owner and admirer, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that BMW planned to give the world a sneak preview. Until I saw it. This is not a Mini; everything that the Mini stands for has been bastardised into a pointless marketing gimmick." Another snapped back: "New Mini? Honey, I shrunk the Citroën DS."

Even Alex Moulton, the engineer responsible for the original Mini's suspension, expressed disapproval, telling Autocar: "I don't know what it is. It's got the word Mini on it, and details such as the grille and lights are right, but the car is too large. It looks like it has lost its proportions. I don't think it's a real Mini."

Accusations of BMW ruining the Mini's classic look also rolled in, with one reader writing: "Those lights, that grille - especially if spun round the other way. Yes, old frog eyes is back! One of the ugliest faces to deface a car (last seen in the Ford Scorpio) makes a return." Another struggled to believe that the prototype unveiled at Frankfurt was a new Mini in spirit and not "a cynical attempt to market what appears to be just another small hatch by trading on the name, reputation and styling cues of the greatest car of all time".

Not all responses were hostile, though, as this letter demonstrates: "I'm smitten. The new Mini has shot to the top of my new car shopping list. It combines the need for extra space and safety, with just the right mix of retro styling cues and modern layout."

When the new Mini finally went on sale in 2001, our road testers found it "great to look at and sit in" but felt that wasn't enough to offset such a "mediocre engine and disappointing package". Like the earlier public reaction, this was a verdict of contrasts: eager and engaging to drive yet lumbered with an engine that felt coarse and gruff.

To buy such a car also meant stepping into a BMW dealership, which one reader described as an "intimidating experience". This highlighted a deeper tension: Mini was no longer accessible and classless but a carefully curated premium product, and not everyone was comfortable with that shift.

Enjoy full access to the complete Autocar archive at the magazineshop.com

In reinventing the Mini, BMW had taken a risk by trading simplicity for sophistication and affordability for aspiration. Predictably, not everyone liked this idea, but plenty more bought into it: 800,000 examples of the Mk1 were sold globally, and today Stephenson's design is widely regarded as a modern classic.

Furthermore, the Mini grew into a thriving brand with a broad model range - in stark contrast to Rover, which died in 2005. 

Alice Pewter

For Jethro Harris, his Aston Martin Vantage V8 coupé is a dream come true, albeit one tinged with sadness.

"I've always loved the model," he says, "but unfortunately mine was an inheritance purchase. My dad had always wanted to buy one but never quite managed to, so when the opportunity to own one eventually fell to me, I thought: 'Okay, let's do it."

Jethro bought his Vantage, a regular V8 registered in 2015, 12 months ago from an independent dealer. "I'd been looking for six months and had clear requirements," he says. "It needed to be the coupé and it needed to be a manual. I wasn't too fussed whether it was the regular V8 or the V8 S, since in normal driving I don't believe there's sufficient difference between them.

"It also needed to be a 2015 model with the improved suspension but before the 2016 update, when the dashboard was upgraded. I prefer the older dash. The car I eventually bought ticks all those boxes."

All those boxes bar one: it had had what, at first, Jethro thought was an unsettling number of previous owners. "It's had six previous keepers but my uncle, who used to be a car dealer, assured me that cars like the Vantage are just toys that are owned for a couple of years before being sold when the owner fancies a change.

"As long as the service history is up to date, he said, I should have nothing to worry about. Fortunately, it was. Also, the car didn't have a stupidly low mileage: 33,000 suggested it had been used, rather than parked up for long periods," he says.

Jethro will say only that he paid "the mid-forties" (that's thousands) for his car but he seems happy with that. He says: "Looking at the current prices for similar examples, the value of mine appears to be holding up." With his dream of Aston Martin ownership realised, Jethro has the pleasure of admiring his V8 each time he opens his front door. "It's a 'pinch me' moment every time I look at it," he says. "The design is 20 years old but has aged really well."

He may be the happy owner of an Aston but Jethro still watches the pennies. "I had the car serviced last month, not by a main dealer but by an excellent independent workshop in Egham called Aston Keeper," he says. "They're not a tick-box garage but instead do only what is required. For example, they improved the gearchange reverse to first had been a bit baulky with fresh oil and fixed the seized rear handbrake caliper pins that I suspect a previous workshop hadn't spotted.

"The mechanic worked for ages trying to free them and eventually fitted a set of secondhand parts from stock. They also know which alternative parts to use, such as Jaguar ones, that are the same but cheaper."

Jethro says that, on a limited-mileage policy, the Vantage is cheaper to insure than his 2018 Alfa Romeo Giulia 2.0 Veloce. "That was a relief," he says.

"I park it outside too, so I should be worried about it being stolen except that I'm banking on a Vantage being harder to dispose of than cars such as Mercedes." Let's hope he's right. 

Autocar's testers have revealed the top 50 new cars you can buy in every category - and you'd do very well to bookmark the link below if you're on the hunt for a new motor: it could save you hours of teeth-grinding test driving and forum trawling. 

Revealed: Autocar names UK's 50 best cars – in all categories 

But which are the best of the best? The absolute cream of the crop? 

To find out, us testers have each selected a car from our Top 50 nominations, one that is an exemplar of its category, and brought them all to our favourite Oxfordshire stomping ground. We'll try some cars, dodge some potholes and finally gather at the excellent Five Bells pub to find out who has made the best choice - and who is having second thoughts.

Illya Verpraet James, why did you bring a Hyundai i10? Why is it the best fun small car?

James Disdale Because it's brilliant. It just does everything you want. I drove it here saying to myself: 'I don't think I need anything else.' It's refined, it goes fast enough and it comes with all the toys I need.

Richard Lane How much does it weigh?

JD It's under a tonne.

RL Fair play.

Matt Prior Is there an argument that it's the best car on sale? Because what are they, £18,000?

JD You wish. That one comes with chrome door handles! More like £21,000.

RL You can have a Dacia Jogger for that money.

IV Would you not like a bit more power? And better seats for that matter?

JD That's what happens, isn't it? You keep saying you want a little bit more, and then the car gets bigger and bigger and bigger.

RL How about the new Renault Twingo?

JD At the moment, I don't think it would suit my needs as well, considering it has a claimed range of only 163 miles.

IV The thing about petrol-engined city cars is that while they may not be your first choice for a 300-mile journey, they can do it without too much fuss - which isn't the case yet with their electric equivalents.

JD This could just be my age, but I still marvel at the fact that a car so small and with quite a prosaic use case can be so well engineered, that it can be as refined as it is, that it can handle the way it does and can ride the way it does. The manual gearshift quality is up there with the best, and they don't all cost £21,000, they start at about £18,000, like Prior said. You could just about make a case for that as a single car.

IV It's a situation where the car industry perfected that kind of car 10 years ago and they just try to keep making it for as long as they can.

RL And try not to be legislated out of existence in the meantime. It's the petrol-engined supermini at its absolute apotheosis.

IV I think that sums up the i10 nicely. Richard, what about the Volvo ES90? Why is it your favourite electric executive saloon?

RL Ah, Volvo

Matt Saunders Is it very good at selecting reverse?

RL I've realised I like the idea of it probably a bit more than I like the reality, because there's a dearth of genuinely appealing full-size electric saloons: the BMW i5 has an annoying interior and looks crap; the Mercedes-Benz EQE is quite poorly packaged, I find; and the Audi A6 E-tron is a bit anonymous character-wise. Volvo had an open goal: just make it look fabulous and ride like a Swedish Bentley understudy. In truth it has a lot of appeal: great cabin ambience, fantastic seats. It doesn't need to have any sporting pretensions whatsoever, because they've got Polestar for that. And it's got a cutting-edge 800V architecture with all the right figures for range and charging.

MS What does it actually do range-wise?

RL Just over 400 miles WLTP, which is to say enough. But the main problem is its ride quality. I thought that with the new SPA2 platform, Volvo would have cured its cars' usual issue of a great primary ride but a jittery secondary ride. On the ES90 it's better but still not where it needs to be, given that Volvo has an entire sister brand in Polestar to manage the sporty stuff. In fairness, this is a Plus-spec car on the passive dampers, and paying the extra £2k to add air springs might well help with the problem, though I doubt they would cure it entirely because air rarely does. It's close to being a very, very good car. The powertrain calibration is slick, it steers nicely and it is - and this is the critical bit if you're Volvo - undemanding, digital quirks aside.

JD Hmm, 'close to being good' isn't really selling it to me, if I'm honest.

RL Look, the point is that I wanted it to be a baby Bentley. It could still be that car, with a bit of fine-tuning. Maybe.

JD Well, it's nice that you're here and that you've made the effort.

IV Moving swiftly on to the actual Bentley...

MS The Flying Spur is clearly the best Oscars-night grand tourer. A car such as this needs to bring with it the extra dimension of delivering the luxury experience to those who are sitting in the back, not behind the steering wheel. I just think a Spur is now the definitive Bentley. I used to think it was a bit too big and just existed to tick a box, but that was the first- generation ones that looked a bit rubbish and weren't quite up to the task. I went on a Bentley event last year and drove the GT and Spur back to back, and I was surprised that the Spur was objectively better- riding and just as good dynamically. And it's inherently more convincing as a luxury car, because you can use it for more things.

RL Do you think the fact that this latest iteration of the Continental GT coupé has become a bit softer and a bit less of a driver's car has played in favour of the Flying Spur?

IV You've got the only plug-in hybrid here. Does being a hybrid actually help it?

MS This car carries it well. The early plug-in ones with the V6 engine didn't really feel like they were the full ticket. But now that it has the more potent V8 and a slightly bigger boot, it wears its electrification better than the supposedly sportier coupé does. This rides as well as anything, too.

JD I didn't think the ride was perfect. The secondary ride is just a bit jiggly.

IV Are you just saying that because you hit a massive pothole when you went out in it earlier?

JD Well, there was that.

RL Really, it's better than most of the cars of its type. The current Mercedes-AMG S63 has quite a nice handling balance, but it's undone as a luxury solution. Most cars have to choose one or the other: luxury or sportiness.

IV Which is why I've chosen sportiness and brought a Mazda MX-5, the definitive analogue sports car. It's more expensive than it used to be, but it's still some of the most fun you can have on four wheels for any money.

RL How much does it cost?

IV High £30,000s.

MP Wow. The world really has gone mad.

IV This one is the top trim level with the bigger engine and the nice seats. You can have a 1.5-litre one for less than £30,000, but there are no other true driver's cars left under £50,000.

RL Apart from a Caterham Seven.

IV Well, yes, but many people would be happy to use an MX-5 every day; most people would not be happy using a Caterham every day. And the Mazda just has everything we love in sports cars: it's rear-wheel drive, it's light, it's small, it has a delightful manual gearbox and it handles like a dream. It does everything well. And if you want, you can even modify it.

RL Would you modify it?

IV I might go to BBR GTi and have them put some nicer suspension on it.

RL Their Super 220 remains in my top three cars of all time.

MP As standard, MX-5s are just a bit too soft.

JD But that's part of the philosophy - so it feels like it's faster than it really is.

RL I know, but I can't help but feel, rather patronisingly, that it is geared towards the more casual driver.

IV The genius is that the potential is there to be unlocked. The casual driver has a great time and the hardcore driver can go to BBR. Catering to that wide audience is key to making a car like this uphold a viable business case in 2026.

JD It's an incredible piece of engineering, really. Look at any car that has evolved over the years and the MX-5 is one of the few where the current generation is barely if any bigger or heavier than it was when it started. And yet this one has got air conditioning, airbags and crash structures, and it still complies with all the overbearing modern regulations.

IV From one Japanese manual-gearboxed analogue sports car to another: Prior, why have you brought a farmer's-spec Toyota Hilux?

MP The category was 'Best ready-for-anything off-roader'. If you might conceivably have the need to carry a dead sheep in the cabin with you at some point, a plush SUV is suboptimal. It doesn't have to be a dead sheep: it can be a hay bale or wet gear or a Border collie or whatever. You have to have a pick-up, because they will go everywhere that the best SUVs do and they're just more practical and versatile. If you're going to have a pick-up, then you have to have the best one, which is the Hilux. It's the narrowest, so it fits through the most gates, and it's the most reliable, because it's built by Toyota. It's not the most amazing thing to drive on the road, but that's okay.

RL Would you take it to the opera

MP I would. You would get a little bit looked at in Glyndebourne, particularly with a dead sheep in the back, but it's fine.

MS If your old Land Rover Defender died tomorrow, could you replace it with a Hilux and would you be happy to?

MP Oh, easily. It would be vastly better, because it would be more efficient and because the Land Rover is mouldy inside because the horse food lives inside it.

RL Wouldn't you want an Ineos Grenadier Quartermaster instead?

MP Oh, I would, but they cost about £80,000 and the turning circle is a disaster.

JD It's authentic. Don't the Gen Zers love the word 'authentic'?

MP Is that a thing? I'd say it was very fit for purpose. Hiluxes have probably gone farther than any other vehicle. You would trust one to, anyway.

IV On that very Autocar note, I think we just need to decide what we'd take home, assuming we can't pick the car we've brought.

MP Well, I'm taking the i10, because it's all the car I'd need. I really like small cars anyway, and I'm amazed they can fit so much engineering into such a small package for such a low price.

JD I'll take the MX-5, please. It's the best small affordable sports car. Also the only one. You can spend four times as much and still won't have a better time driving.

IV Ooh, I'm going back and forth between the extremes. It's either the i10 or the Bentley for me.

JD Just put the i10 in the Bentley's boot.

IV An i10 and a Flying Spur is the brilliant two-car garage that nobody is asking for. In the end, I'll go i10, because I'm a manual gearbox purist and I love how small and light the car is.

RL The MX-5: you just can't argue with it. It will do the European holiday for two people and its sporting credentials are obviously epic. I love the Bentley as well, but is it really the last car you will ever drive? Actually, no, I'm going to say the Hilux. There's something about its invincibility and the fact that the cabin is actually pretty hospitable. It remains a charming device by dint of its toughness.

MS I'll take the MX-5, because I've never owned one - but I got close so many times. With the i10, there are other, similar cars that I like a bit more, but with the MX-5 there's nothing that has quite the same perfect positioning and execution. Although that does mean we have a tie.

MP Why don't we let the photographer have the deciding vote?

Jack Harrison The i10 is a very fit-for-purpose car, but for the money the Suzuki Swift does everything better. Whereas the MX-5 is the archetype of a sports car. It's a car I'd actually own. In fact, I used to have a second-gen MX-5.

Now for the alternatives we can afford

Mazda MX-5 (NC)

Mazda revived the affordable roadster concept with this lightweight, rear- driven marvel, and today they're as fun as they are accessible. The analogue, fleet-footed Mk1 (the NA) is a peach, but you need at least £8000-£10,000 for a tidy, well-maintained one. Rust is every MX-5's nemesis, but the Mk2 (NB) suffers the most.

Skip these generations, then, and focus on the Mk3. That's no bad thing, because the NC, while also a victim of corrosion, is refined, practical and affordable. Leggy cars can be found for less than £1000, but you can snag a cleaner, low-mileage one for £4000-£5000. The 125bhp 1.8-litre is fun, but the 158bhp 2.0-litre is the one to have, for its limited-slip diff and variable valve timing. Aim for Sport Tech trim with the long-legged six-speed manual 'box. Both engines are bulletproof - provided the oil level is maintained. 

Volvo S90

The S90 is a prime example of Scandinavian minimalism, bringing lounge-like comfort and refinement to a class that has long been dominated by German alternatives. The 187bhp 2.0-litre diesel D4 should serve you well: it's a bit staid but economical and widely available. Petrols are rare, so we'd stick with the diesel or the T8 358bhp plug-in hybrid. It can travel up to 35 miles on electric power alone, but be mindful of turbocharger and supercharger failures and software glitches that affect the battery.

Momentum trim is well equipped, but stretch to an Inscription model if you can because they get nappa leather and 18in wheels. We saw an immaculate D4 Inscription with 70,000 miles on the clock for a hair under £14,000.

Hyundai i10

Hyundai's diminutive city car has been a mainstay of the A-segment for almost 20 years, and it is now an affordable, likeable and generally robust dinky hatchback. The second-generation model is particularly good value, especially if you aim for a later, post-facelift example (from 2017 onwards). The 65bhp 1.0-litre triple is ideal for scooting around town, but we'd opt for the 86bhp 1.2-litre four-pot, which has more pep for motorways and is just as frugal.

Be wary of clutch judder from standstill and crunching gears. You can snap up a clean, low-mileage example for around £8000. Premium SE is the trim to go for: it has heated seats, a heated steering wheel and a 7.0in infotainment screen that includes Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

Toyota Hilux

No other model showcases the global prominence of the Toyota brand quite like the Hilux pick-up. Older models are actually becoming quite rare and sought- after, so it's the hard-wearing seventh generation we're recommending here.

Prices range from £8000- £20,000 and there's plenty of choice, from utilitarian single-cabs to plush, post-facelift double-cabs with more modern touches. The torquier 3.0-litre diesel is best for towing, but watch for a tapping noise at idle and smoke on start- up, which could mean a problem with the injectors. The 2.5-litre diesel is robust and enduring and the best choice for those using a Hilux as a workhorse. Check for dents on the body and corrosion on the chassis and sills. If the Hilux you're interested in looks like it has been used off-road, cast an eye over the suspension and any rubber components, which might need to be replaced.

Bentley Flying Spur

The Spur is a sublime luxo-barge - if you can stomach its vast running costs. You'll do well to get more than 15mpg from the 553bhp 6.0-litre twin-turbocharged W12 and maintenance and repairs are very expensive. Prices for high-milers start from under £12,000, but these forgo any maintenance records. For a car like this, a watertight dealer or specialist history is a must, so stretch the budget to around £15,000. Watch for misfires (often caused by faulty coil packs) and test the air suspension: leaking struts are common and cost up to £1500 to replace. Similar issues afflict the more regal Mk2. You can have a V8 or W12 with a full history for the same price as a Jaecoo 7, but beware electrical gremlins in its complex dual-battery system.