For all the polyglot talk, the real story behind this week’s Shanghai Auto Show is the domestic one. China’s carmakers are revving up: last month, cheap-and-cheerful Chery Automobile became the first mainland group to top the league table of vehicle sales. Meantime, more Chinese manufacturers are taking their wares overseas, exporting 340,000 vehicles last year.

Chinese carmakers control 29 per cent of the local passenger vehicle market – the second biggest globally – according to JD Power. That represents a threefold increase over five years ago and comes as the market itself continues to expand. In the first two months of the year, unit sales have continued to rise at a rate of 30 per cent year on year. Much of the Chinese groups’ success is down to price. That is especially the case for bigger vehicles, a segment dominated by local manufacturers: for the price of a foreign-made heavy truck, you can have three Chinese ones. Car buyers are pickier but a huge swathe are limited to the $10,000-and-below cars that are the domain of Chinese manufacturers.