“Build Your Dreams” is an apt name for BYD Auto Co., the Shenzhen, China-based company that made headlines last year when Warren Buffet was permitted to buy a 10-percent stake. It plans to start selling its E6 electric crossover and the F3DM hybrid in the States by year’s end, which would seem unrealistic had Toyota’s market-leading hybrid, the Prius, not fallen from grace. Wang has designs on growing it into the world’s largest car company by 2025. He already beat the Japanese once with cheaper batteries; a new agreement with Daimler AG portends that for BYD, the sky’s the limit.

Published in the spring Transportation special of Monocle magazine.