Who owns Mercedes-Benz Group AG? The ownership chain, BAIC Group's stake and the 2019 deal
Facts checked
Mercedes-Benz Group AG appears here because the ownership graph records a holding in it by a Chinese entity. The chain below is the whole of what this site claims.
BAIC Group, the Beijing municipal state-owned carmaker and Mercedes-Benz's Chinese joint-venture partner, first disclosed a 5% holding in July 2019 and has held 9.98% of the voting rights since. It is the largest single shareholder of Mercedes-Benz Group. Together with Li Shufu's 9.69% the two Chinese holdings come to 19.67%.
The short answer
| Controlled by | BAIC Group |
|---|---|
| Stake | 9.98% |
| Since | July 2019 |
| Kind | company |
| Recorded holdings | 2 |
| Origin | DE |
| Top of the chain | Beijing Municipal State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission |
The chain, step by step
Beijing Municipal State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission owns BAIC Group at 100%.
BAIC Group is a municipal state-owned enterprise held by the Beijing city government rather than by the central SASAC. The date the present holding structure took its current form was not verified for this entry.
BAIC Group holds a stake in Mercedes-Benz Group AG at 9.98% since July 2019.
BAIC Group, the Beijing municipal state-owned carmaker and Mercedes-Benz's Chinese joint-venture partner, first disclosed a 5% holding in July 2019 and has held 9.98% of the voting rights since. It is the largest single shareholder of Mercedes-Benz Group. Together with Li Shufu's 9.69% the two Chinese holdings come to 19.67%.
| Holder | Holds | Kind | Stake | Since |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Beijing Municipal State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission | BAIC Group | owns | 100% | not published |
| BAIC Group | Mercedes-Benz Group AG | holds a stake in | 9.98% | July 2019 |
Other recorded holdings in Mercedes-Benz Group AG
Holdings that are not control, kept out of the chain above so that nothing on this page reads as ownership when it is not. A joint venture is a company two parents built together: its percentage is a share of the venture, not a holding in the partner. The same pair can appear twice with different kinds, and both rows are real.
| Holder | What it is | Share | Since | What the source says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BAIC Group | runs a joint venture with | 51% of the joint venture | 8 August 2005 | Joint venture Beijing Benz Automotive Co., Ltd.: BAIC Motor 51%, Mercedes-Benz Group 38.665%, Mercedes-Benz China 10.335%. The business descends from Beijing Jeep Corporation, established in January 1984 and renamed Beijing Benz-DaimlerChrysler in 2004. The stake field records BAIC's share of the joint venture, not a holding in Mercedes-Benz Group AG. |
| Li Shufu | holds a stake in | 9.69% | February 2018 | Li Shufu, the founder of Geely Holding, bought 9.69% of what was then Daimler AG in February 2018 through Tenaciou3 Prospect Investment Limited. The holding is personal to Li Shufu rather than held by Geely Holding or the listed Geely Automobile Holdings, although it is widely reported as 'Geely's stake'. It makes him the second-largest single shareholder of Mercedes-Benz Group behind BAIC. |
What Mercedes-Benz Group AG holds
Every current holding recorded from Mercedes-Benz Group AG downward: outright ownership, minority stakes, joint ventures and licences, each with the stake as the source states it and the date it began. A joint venture's percentage is a share of that venture, not of the partner.
| Holding | What it is | Share | Since | What the source says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BAIC Group | holds a stake in | 9.55% | not published | Mercedes-Benz Group holds 9.55% of BAIC Motor Corporation Limited, BAIC Group's Hong Kong listed passenger-car arm, a figure reported as at 31 December 2024. It is a holding in the listed subsidiary, not in BAIC Group itself. Mercedes-Benz Investment China separately holds 2.69% of BAIC BluePark. |
| smart | runs a joint venture with | 50% of the joint venture | 8 January 2020 | Mercedes-Benz AG holds the other half of smart Automobile Co., Ltd.; its RMB 2.7 billion contribution was covered mainly by putting the smart brand itself into the venture. Mercedes-Benz designs the cars, the Geely side engineers and builds them. |
Former holdings
Holdings that ended, kept out of the tables above so nothing current reads as past or the reverse.
| Holding | What it is | Share | Since | What the source says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Denza | formerly held | 50% | 27 May 2010 | Daimler and BYD founded Shenzhen Denza New Energy Automotive as an equal joint venture on 27 May 2010. BYD signed an equity transfer agreement in January 2022 that reduced Daimler's successor, Mercedes-Benz Group, to 10%; the deal closed in mid-2022. |
| Denza | formerly held | 10% | 2022 | Mercedes-Benz kept a 10% residual holding in Denza after the 2022 transfer and disposed of it in 2024; the corporate register showed it off the shareholder list on 14 September 2024 and a Mercedes executive removed from the board. |
Related
Sources for Mercedes-Benz Group AG
- Wikipedia, Beijing Benz. Read .
- Wikipedia, BAIC Group. Read .
- CnEVPost, BYD now holds 100% of Denza as Mercedes exits. Read . Records the September 2024 shareholder change removing Mercedes-Benz from Denza
- smart Newsroom, Mercedes-Benz and Geely Holding formally established global joint venture smart Automobile Co., Ltd. for the smart brand. Read .
- Wikipedia, Mercedes-Benz Group (article). Read . Used only for the shareholder list (Tenaciou3 Prospect Investment 9.7%, BAIC 9.98%), which it attributes to the company's own shareholder-structure page; that page refused automated access on 2026-09-04.
- Beijing Automotive Group Co., Ltd., 集团简介 (Group profile). Read . BAIC describes itself as a state-owned enterprise
- Wikipedia, Mercedes-Benz Group. Read . BAIC 9.98%, initial 5% in July 2019, combined Chinese holding 19.67%.
- China Daily, China's BAIC now Daimler's largest shareholder. Read . Report that BAIC had become the largest shareholder; read via the search index.