The coronavirus has left a bleak schedule in terms of automotive events. Each appointment that includes the International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers is accompanied by the word “cancelled” or “postponed”, and few are still maintained.

One of the most important is the 2020 Beijing Auto Show, which was postponed in April to the end of September and due to the uncertainty that floods everything. But a seemingly virus-free China is keen to regain its pulse, and it has been confirmed to open its doors on September 27.

The challenge of receiving more than 800,000 visitors in the middle of a pandemic

The 2020 Beijing Motor Show will open its doors to the press on September 26 at the ‘China International Exhibition Center New Venue’ in Tianzhu, and the general public will be able to attend from October 1 to 5.

Since the Geneva Auto Show, the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, and the Paris Auto Show have been held on a virtual platform or cancelled altogether, this will become the only major international auto event to be held this year.

According to the organizing committee, this year’s show will be attended by almost all the national and foreign auto brands known with their latest products and more than 30 international car brands such as Volkswagen, Ford, Lincoln, General Motors, Toyota or Nissan.

It is a biennial event that in 2018 brought together 820,000 visitors from 14 countries and regions around the world, and which exhibited more than 1,000 vehicles, including 105 premieres.

In this complicated scenario, with a virus that has spread to all corners of the world, the organizers try to send a message of tranquillity by ensuring that protection measures will be taken in the more than 200,000 square meters that they will have.

However, it is not clear if the capacity will be limited.

China begins to wake up

The Beijing International Automotive Exhibition is a vitally important event for a country that has seen its economy and auto industry suffer, leading to a historic drop in sales.

In January this year, the Chinese auto market contracted for the first time since 1992 and sales fell by 6% to 22.7 million units against the same backdrop as today: an unresolved trade war and a crash in the stock market, in addition to a pandemic.

The communist country needs a boost like this show, but it is highly unlikely that foreign visitors will be able to enter the country.

According to data from the National Health Commission, China has been eight consecutive days without local infections, with 16 infections registered on Sunday, and all come from foreign people.

Since June, and after registering an outbreak that was quickly controlled (according to their data), life has returned to the epicenter of the pandemic. They have opened cinemas, bookstores and museums across the country, and in Wuhan, they have even dared to hold a massive water festival, with tens of thousands of people together, without masks or social distance.

It seems that the Asian giant, which claims that it has a vaccine, has managed to defeat the coronavirus, but talking about the end of this pandemic is something quite risky.