Chery's new Lepas brand sees a wide-open lane for its Australian debut

Lepas, the newest marque under Chery, will enter Australia with a spread of small, mid and large SUVs plus a compact hatchback, spearheaded by the L6 electric mid-size SUV in October — the group's first mid-size EV for the local market. Chery Motor Australia chief operating officer Lucas Harris argues nothing on local showroom floors genuinely competes with it, and pictures incoming buyers ditching dull, grey-toned mainstream cars.

Rather than chasing a premium badge, the brand is aimed at what the company calls "vibrant expressionists" — city-dwelling, style-conscious buyers aged 25 to 59 with a 55 per cent female skew. The name itself is a blend of leopard and passion, and feline-inspired cues run through the range, from the L6's sculpted rear haunches to shared LED daytime running lights. Bright paintwork will stay in the catalogue even if it sells slowly, because it defines the brand.

Overlap within the wider group is nonetheless inevitable: the L6's plug-in hybrid twin goes up against the Chery Tiggo 7 and Jaecoo J7, the compact L4 EV meets the Chery E5 and Jaecoo J5, and the bigger L8 squares off with the Tiggo 8. Harris brushed aside cannibalisation fears, calling strong demand across the group a desirable problem.

Volume expectations are deliberately vague — the target audience is narrower than the core Chery brand's, and Harris declined to nominate a sales ranking. Three more group marques, iCaur, Jetour and Freelander, follow in 2027 with distinctly different styling.