• Ferrari's first electric car, the Luce, is off to a bad start.
• The $640,000 EV was torn apart by the internet, sparking a share price drop for Ferrari.
• Ferrari execs say the Luce aims to win over EV owners. Nowhere has more of those than China.

Ferrari's new electric car is off to a bad start in the court of public opinion. The Italian automaker might be more concerned about a market where electric vehicles reign supreme — China.

Earlier this week, the internet — and Ferrari's ex-chair — wasted no time in roasting the Luce, a $640,000 five-seat EV designed by legendary former Apple designer Jony Ive.

"It risks destroying a legend, and I'm deeply sorry. I hope they at least remove the prancing horse from that car," Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, the revered former Ferrari chairman, who ran the company for nearly 25 years, told Italian media on Tuesday.

Social media users compared Ferrari's first-ever electric car to the Nissan Leaf. The meme machine was in full swing. And Ferrari's stock price fell 6%.

Ferrari is going electric at a time when global EV sales have flatlined, and other automakers — including Ferrari's luxury rivals Lamborghini and Porsche — have overhauled their electrification strategies in the face of stuttering demand.

In China, though, EVs now make up over half of all new car sales, and the market dynamics may favor a car that many see as unfavorable.

In an investor Q&A in October, Ferrari CEO Benedetto Vigna namechecked China as a critical market for the company's first EV, which was then known as the Elettrica.

"China can be a good opportunity for Elettrica. Because the clients are already used to electric cars, and because there is an appetite for our Ferrari," he said.

Ferrari turns east

In China, local brands like BYD and Xiaomi have crushed Western carmakers with their affordable, high-tech electric vehicles.

Those companies are now looking to do the same with the luxury car market.

BYD has launched luxury models such as the Yangwang U8, a $150,000 hybrid SUV that can float on water, and the $233,000 U9 supercar, a modified version of which claimed the title of world's fastest production car last year.

Smartphone giant Xiaomi, meanwhile, poached top designers from Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Porsche to build its SU7 EV. Last March, the company began selling the $76,000 SU7 Ultra, which can accelerate from 0-62 miles per hour in under 2 seconds — quicker than the Luce.

Ferrari would enter an ultra-competitive Chinese EV market. Even affordable models come packed with high-tech features like voice controls and AI assistants, and luxury consumers are increasingly shunning Western carmakers in favor of tech-savvy local brands.

Luxury stalwarts like BMW, Mercedes, and Porsche have all seen their Chinese sales plunge in recent years. Meanwhile, the Maextro S800, a luxury sedan built by Chinese smartphone maker Huawei, became China's top-selling car priced over $100,000 in December.

Ferrari's business relies on scarcity and exclusivity, not mass-market appeal. But the company's sales in mainland China have declined by more than half since 2023, and accounted for just over 5% of Ferrari's global shipments in the first quarter.

Ferrari executives have said that the Luce is designed to be polarizing and is aimed at attracting EV owners to the brand, rather than Ferrari's usual strategy of selling to people who already own one of its cars.

"To my petrolheads that I meet, I always tell them, please don't buy [the Luce]. The key driver the carmaker is targeting is someone who already owns an electric car," Enrico Galliera, Ferrari's chief marketing and commercial officer, told the Financial Times at the Luce's launch.

Nowhere has more EV owners than China. If Chinese buyers are won over by the Luce's distinct design and high-tech interior, the internet mockery will be worth it.

One person doesn't seem convinced: Montezemolo.

"This is definitely a car that the Chinese won't copy," the former Ferrari chairman told media on Tuesday.