FULLY IMPORTED CKD IS THE NEW CHALLENGE FOR SOUTH AFRICA’ S DOMESTIC AUTOMOTIVE SUPPLIERS.
CKD, SKD and now WICKD?
Companies operating in South Africa’ s automotive supply chain are deeply familiar with different types of vehicle assembly. To unlock the most incentives from the government’ s APDP programme, OEMs have traditionally invested in completely knocked-down( CKD) manufacturing rather than semi-knockdown( SKD) kits.
CKD involves on-site stamping tools, paint shops, and even engine block machining. With the government targeting 60 % component localisation by 2035, prime and aftermarket automotive suppliers have the highest likelihood of securing contracts by aligning with one of South Africa’ s established OEMs through their legacy CKD programmes. But a new form of CKD is threatening South African manufacturers and their component suppliers.
Local CKD demand is waning
Market dynamics don’ t care for industrial development acronyms and South Africa is experiencing a dramatic change in the sourcing of its vehicles. Of the 10 best-selling brands now operating in South Africa, only four have invested in local manufacturing.
The simple truth is that more South Africans are now buying imported cars than ever before, which is decaying CKD manufacturing and its downstream supplier businesses.
How bad is South Africa’ s CKD trend decline? In the last two decades, measured from South Africa’ s record new-vehicle market year in 2006( 714 315), the momentum of investment in deep-value local manufacturing capacity has produced poor outcomes. CKD assembly regressed from 56 % of the total new-vehicle market to 33 %.
The trend is alarming, especially for those smaller suppliers and aftermarket businesses that have made long-term investment and capex decisions, predicated on projected CKD growth rates from the early 2010s. Perhaps more alarming is the emergence of a new automotive assembly acronym, which could be devastating for South Africa’ s automotive industry and the government’ s autosector employment ambitions.
The‘ alternative’ CKD
A new phenomenon is automakers targeting relatively small South African sales volumes with‘ wholly imported, completely knockeddown’( WICKD) vehicles.
The reality is that emerging Asian automakers have immense vertical integration and access to the world’ s best-developed supply chains at scale. It allows them to import all components required to assemble a vehicle in South Africa, creating the WICKD model.
Although these WICKD vehicles are completely locally assembled, from a more basic form than SKDs, they are effectively phantom CKDs. Why? Because the WICKD method has absolutely no localisation integration with South African components. All components, large and small, are imported.
It might sound like a burdensome supply chain, logistics, and shipment operation to sustain, but the import tariff avoidance with WICKD has created a business case that some brands are exploiting.
WORDS IN ACTION 30 APRIL 2026