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Brand Finance self-effacingly describes itself as "the world's leading independent branded business valuation and strategy consultancy". And adds that it regularly picks apart the current and future value of more than 3500 brands across multiple market sectors around the world.
These London-based boffins reckon Delta trumps American Airlines, Real Madrid has knocked off Manchester United, and Haval is a more powerful SUV brand than Land Rover or Jeep. So, no surprise Haval promotes the research on its Australian website.
Just to split hairs, Land Rover leaps to the top of the rankings when it comes to overall value, but in terms of an upward trajectory and potential for future growth, Brand Finance says Haval is the one.
The irony is you probably wouldn't know a Haval if it ran into you, which obviously isn't good in any sense, but a factor of the Chinese Great Wall subsidiary's relatively brief time, and so far, limited sales in the Australian market.
One of three models released in late 2015 to launch the Haval brand locally, the H2 is a small, five-seat SUV competing against a hot bed of more than 20 established players including the segment-leading Mitsubishi ASX, ever-popular Mazda CX-3, and recently arrived Hyundai Kona.
So, is Haval's potential reflected in its current product offering? We spent a week living with the sharply priced H2 City to find out.
If there is one word that should be at the very top of the GWM Haval Jolion Hybrid’s brochure, it is value, value, value.
Well, that's three words. But you get the idea.
This is the just-updated flagship version, and it gets tons of premium-style goodies, and it’s less than $40k drive-away. The cheapest one is under $33k on the road.
And with Japanese hybrid prices only heading one way — up — that makes this Chinese SUV something of a bargain.
The question is, does it have more to offer than just kindness on your bank account? Or to put it another way, is it both cheap and cheerful, or too much of one and not enough of the other?
There’s only one way to find out. So stick around as we take a closer look at the GWM Haval Jolion HEV Ultra.
How you define value will determine whether the Haval H2 City is the right small SUV for you. In terms of metal for money it delivers heaps of space, a reasonable standard features list and adequate safety. But it's let down by mediocre performance, sub-par dynamics and a surprising thirst for (premium) unleaded. Brand Finance may rank Haval high on the power index, but the product needs to climb a few rungs higher before that potential's realised.
Perhaps not the most engaging drive on offer in Australia, this GWM Haval Jolion HEV Ultra feels like a marked improvement over the last petrol-powered Jolion I drove, with a smooth and lag-free power delivery and more polished road manners. The value and practicality offerings are on point, too.
Inoffensive but uninspiring is a blunt yet fair summation of the Haval H2 City's exterior design, especially when you think about rivals like the dramatic Toyota C-HR, edgy Hyundai Kona, or funky Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross.
The nose is dominated by a huge, slatted and chromed grille with bright metal mesh behind it, and vaguely Audi-of-10-years-ago shaped headlights either side.
The lighting treatment is elaborate with projector halogen main beams and reflector halogen high-beam units surrounded by a dotted-line string of LEDs looking uncomfortably like aftermarket inserts available via your online auction site of choice.
Standard fog-lights are recessed into a blacked-out area under the bumper, with another line of LEDs, functioning as DRLs, below that. And just to complicate matters, the upper LEDs only illuminate with the headlights, while the lower units come to life when the headlights are off.
A sharp character line runs along the H2's flanks from the trailing edge of the headlights to the tail, with an equally distinct swage line running from front to back, narrowing the car's mid-section and accentuating the bulge of its wheelarches, filled adequately by standard 18-inch multi-spoke alloy rims.
The rear is similarly reserved, the only hint of flash confined to a roof-top spoiler, cool typeface chosen for the prominent Haval badging across the hatch door, and a diffuser with chrome exhaust tips poking through either side.
Inside, the look and feel is early noughties plain, The dashtop is a nice soft-touch material, but there are lots of buttons and old-school analogue instruments combined with a media and ventilation interface that might have been acceptable on a mainstream model 20 years ago.
Don't even think about Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. The tiny LCD screen (sitting below a CD slot) wins the smallest, most basic graphics award. A miniscule scale reflecting the manual air-con's temperature setting is a particular low-light.
A small 3.5-inch screen between the tacho and speedometer displays fuel economy and distance information, but frustratingly no digital speed read-out. Standard cloth trim has a distinctly synthetic but tough feel, while the polyurethane plastic steering wheel is another throwback.
Sure, we're at the budget end of the market here, but be prepared for low-tech design combined with cheap and cheerful execution.
The best-looking Haval to date? I reckon so. While still not what you might describe as subtle in places, I see a bit of Germany in its exterior design – even a bit of Mercedes-Benz AMG Line, perhaps?
Part of that is down to the blacked-out design treatment on our car, with the mirrors, door handles and grille surrounds all black, which pair nicely with the more swept-back body styling. But it’s also down to the fact that it doesn’t feel like it's trying too hard, which makes a refreshing change from some Chinese automotive design philosophies.
There are some quirks, though. The first being that the huge spoilers and swollen arches make it look far sportier than it is from behind the wheel, but I also think it’s weird that the body seems so much bigger than the platform itself, so the wheels kind of vanish behind the body work – and from some angles they disappear altogether.
Inside it’s a familiar GWM Haval cabin experience, but the material choices for the seats and dash are nice, especially given the price point.
The screens are all big and clear, the wireless charging and the rotary gear selector are present and accounted for, but again there are some drawbacks.
For one, the wheel somehow feels too big for the cabin. Maybe it’s just in my head, but it feels like you’re driving a bus. And I’ve never been a fan of under-centre-console storage as a location for the USB-A ports, which require some Cirque de Soleil antics to access.
At 4.3m long, 1.8m wide, and just under 1.7m high the Haval H2 is a big small SUV, and there's plenty of room inside.
Up front, storage runs to a bin (with sliding top) between the seats, two large cupholders in the centre console and a lidded oddments tray in front of the gearshift, as well as a sunglass holder, average-sized glove box and door bins with room for bottles. You'll notice the pennies saved with non-illumination of the sunvisor vanity mirrors.
Rear seat passengers pick up generous head, leg, and importantly, shoulder room. Three large adults across the back will be tight but do-able for short trips. Kids and young teenagers, no problem.
A centre fold-down armrest houses neatly integrated dual-cupholders, there are bins with space for bottles in each door and map pockets on the front seat backs. No adjustable air vents for backseaters, though.
Connectivity and power runs to two 12-volt outlets, a USB-A port and an 'aux-in' jack, all in the front.
Although a strong seller in the small SUV segment, the Mazda3's Achilles heel is its modest 264-litre boot, and while the H2 exceeds that number, it's not by much.
The Haval's 300-litre capacity is way less than the Honda HR-V (437 litres), Toyota C-HR (377 litres) and Hyundai Kona (361 litres). But it's enough to swallow the bulky CarsGuide pram or three-piece hard suitcase set (35, 68 and 105 litres), and (as with all contenders in the segment) a 60/40 split-fold rear seat increases flexibility and volume.
If you're into towing, the H2's limited to 750kg for an un-braked trailer and 1200kg braked, and the spare tyre is a full-size (18-inch) steel rim shod with narrower space-saving (155/85) rubber.
This GWM Haval Jolion HEV is a spacious place to spend the hours on a long road trip, even in the backseat, where, sitting behind my own 175cm driving position, I had more than enough head and legroom to be comfortable.
And because there’s no bulky transmission tunnel, there’s even room for three adults to sit semi-comfortably. Backseat riders also get USB-A ports and air vents, but no temperature controls.
There's a pull-down seat divider that deploys from the middle seat, and which is home to two cupholders, and there are bottle holders in all four doors.
So comfortable, yes, but somehow not as lavish-feeling as the two front seats, with the back pew of the Jolion feeling a little sparse, but plenty spacious.
The GWM Haval Jolion Hybrid’s boot is deep, but shallow. Mostly because the three-depth layout has a tyre repair kit directly below the boot floor, and then below that, there's a whole bunch of hybrid tech that eats into the usable cargo room.
Haval says you’ll get 255 litres with the rear seats in place, and 916 litres with them folded flat, while towing capacity is a braked 1300kg.
At the time of publication, the Haval H2 City was carrying a drive-away price tag - $19,990 for the six-speed manual version and $20,990 for the six-speed auto (as tested here).
So, you're getting a lot of metal and interior space for your money, but what about the standard features taken for granted in the H2's main competitors?
Included in that drive-away price are the 18-inch alloys, keyless entry and start, reverse parking sensors, (manual) air-conditioning, cruise control, front and rear fog lights, LED daytime running lights, ambient interior lighting, heated front seats, rear privacy glass, and cloth trim.
But the headlights are halogen, the audio is four-speaker (with Bluetooth and single CD player), the safety tech (covered in the Safety section below) is relatively basic, and 'our' car's 'Pewter' (silver metallic) paint is a $495 option.
Equivalent entry-level competitors from Honda, Hyundai, Mazda, Mitsubishi and Toyota will set you back between five and $10k more than this H2. And if you're happy to live without features like a media touchscreen, digital radio, leather accented wheel and gearshift, rear air vents, reversing camera, etc, etc, etc, you're onto a winner.
The GWM Haval Jolion HEV, or Hybrid Electric Vehicle, can be had in three grades – the Premium, the Lux and our flagship Ultra – with drive-away pricing stepping from $32,990 to $35,990, and topping out at $38,990.
They’re all pretty well equipped, to be fair, but the Ultra gets the best stuff, building on the Lux grade’s 18-inch alloys, digital dash, 12.3-inch central screen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, and LED lighting by adding a big panoramic sunroof, wireless charging and ambient interior lighting.
Be warned though, some of the functionality is less than intuitive. I rang the company to figure out how to activate the heated seats, for example, which required a right-side swipe of the multimedia screen. And the driver's seat is allegedly ventilated, too, but I couldn't figure out where that functionality was hiding.
Still, once you know how to do it it's all easy enough.
The Haval H2 City (as tested) is powered by a 1.5-litre direct-injection, turbo-petrol, four-cylinder engine driving the front wheels through a six-speed automatic transmission.
Peak power (110kW) arrives at 5600rpm, with maximum torque (210Nm) delivered at 2200rpm.
The GWM Haval Jolion HEV pairs a 1.5-litre petrol engine with a 70kW electric motor for a total 140kW and 375Nm.
It pairs with what Haval calls a hybrid transmission, a CVT, and sends its power to the front wheels.
Claimed fuel economy for the combined (ADR 81/02 - urban, extra-urban) cycle is 9.0L/100km, the 1.5-litre turbo four emitting 208g/km of CO2 in the process.
Not exactly outstanding, and over roughly 250km of city, suburban and freeway running we recorded 10.8L/100km (at the bowser).
Another rude surprise is the fact the H2 requires 95 RON premium unleaded fuel, of which you'll need 55 litres to fill the tank.
It’s efficient, too, GWM reckons its 55-litre tank will deliver a total 1000kms in driving range, with the brand claiming 5.1L/100km on the combined cycle. That said, we've been getting more like 7.0L on average in the city.
Still, sticking with the claimed fuel use figure, and combining it with the big 55L fuel tank, means an impressive theoretical driving range of over 1000km on a single tank of fuel.
That's Sydney to Brisbane or Melbourne to Sydney without having to stop to fill up.
Cold weather and internal-combustion engines are usually firm friends. Lower ambient temperature means denser air entering the cylinder (even under the extra pressure of a turbo), and as long as more fuel arrives at the same time, you'll have a bigger bang and more power.
But the H2 City's 1.5-litre four must have missed the memo, because cool morning start-ups result in a distinct reluctance to proceed at normal pace.
Sure, there's forward motion, but pinning the right-hand pedal to the floor won't shift the speedo needle much above a brisk walking pace. Unsettling.
Even after a few minutes, when things settle into a more predictable pattern, this Haval hovers at the sluggish end of the performance spectrum.
Not that any of the compact SUVs it competes with are rocketships, but you can generally expect a turbo-petrol engine to serve up a decent dose of low-down grunt.
However, with a maximum output of 210Nm delivered at a relatively high 2200rpm the 1.5-tonne H2 won't be threatening the land speed record anytime soon.
Suspension is strut front, multi-link rear, with the H2 City riding on (235/55x18) Kumho Solus KL21 rubber, and on typically pock-marked and bumpy urban roads ride quality could be better.
The steering displays some nervousness on centre, which combines with a lack of road feel and a mildly disconcerting top-heavy sensation in cornering. It's not that the car lurches or suffers from too much body roll; more that something isn't quite right in the front-end geometry.
On the upside, although firm, the front seats are comfortable, the exterior mirrors are nice and big, overall noise levels are moderate, and the brakes (vented disc front / solid disc rear) are reassuringly progressive.
On the downside, the media system (such as it is) is woeful. Plug your mobile device (mine's an iPhone 7) into the car's single USB port and you'll be met by a 'Loading-USB error' message, the heating and ventilation read-outs on the letterbox slot screen are a joke, and to top it all, select reverse and the audio cuts out altogether.
The addition of an electric motor seems to have only improved the Jolion drive experience. I spent three months behind the wheel of a petrol-powered Jolion, back in 2022, and there were plenty of hard-to-live with kinks that are effectively ironed out in the hybrid.
The laggy, surging acceleration is gone, replaced by a constant flow of power, presumably because any power holes on take-off are being filled by electric grunt. Gone, too, is the fidgety gearbox, replaced by an (occasionally pretty droning) CVT that smooths out your progress.
The result of all that is a car that feels far more resolved and confident than the petrol-powered Jolion I lived with, and it means a much happier drive experience in the Jolion HEV.
It's also plenty powerful enough for everyday life, too. I know the numbers don't sound life-altering on paper, but getting to city speeds is no issue, and even travelling well beyond them – overtaking at 80km/h to 90km/h for example – is easy, with the Jolion HEV never feeling underpowered no matter where I took it.
There are still some downsides. The steering wheel feels too big in your hands, and a little doughy and vague, and the front tyres are still only too happy to break traction should you get too aggressive with the accelerator with any turning lock on.
And this might sound weird, but I really struggled at times to judge the where the edges of the vehicle are, I think because the driver's seating position meets the high vehicle edges to block the view, but I also think it might be because the body work expands out over the wheels, screwing with your judgement. Or maybe I was just having a bad day.
Still, you get used to the oddities quickly enough, and while not the most engaging drive experience, this Jolion is comfortable, easy to live with, and – though sometimes noisy in the cabin through that gearbox and tyre noise on the wrong road surface – a big step in the right direction.
In terms of active safety the H2 City ticks the 'cost-of-entry' boxes, including ABS, BA, EBD, ESP, rear parking senors, tyre-pressure monitoring and emergency brake hazard lighting.
But forget about more recent systems like AEB, lane keeping assistance, blind spot monitoring, cross traffic alerts or adaptive cruise. And you don't get a reversing camera.
If a crash is unavoidable the airbag count runs to six (dual front, dual front side, and dual curtain). And there are three child restraint/baby capsule top tether points across the back seat, with ISOFIX anchors on the outer two positions.
The Haval H2 scored a maximum five-star ANCAP rating in late 2017, a rank it would not replicate when assessed against 2019's more challenging criteria.
All Jolion Hybrids get mostly the same safety kit, including adaptive cruise control, lane departure warning with active lane keep assist, rear cross-traffic alert, traffic sign recognition and rear parking sensors. The Lux then adds a 360-degree camera, while our Ultra adds front parking sensors.
And I'm happy to note I didn't find any of the above overly intrusive. But the same can't be said of the driver-monitoring system, which not only bongs incessantly when you take your eyes off the road, but even asks you to accept a little message that pops up on the centre screen, like you have to acknowledge your mistake and promise it won't happen again. And then, even after you do accept, it still bongs for several long seconds.
It's time we got rid of driver-monitoring systems like this one.
Haval covers all new cars it sells in Australia with a seven year/unlimited km warranty with 24-hour roadside assistance provided for five years/100,000km.
That's a strong statement from the brand, and well ahead of the major players in the mainstream market.
Service is recommended every 12 months/10,000km, and no capped-price servicing program is currently in place.
The GWM Haval Jolion hybrid is covered by a seven-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with five years of roadside assist and an eight-year battery warranty.
There is capped-price servicing on board, too, which limits the first five years of ownership to $1650.