007 with a licence to accelerate: Dongfeng’s Tajima-tuned EV sets its sights on Tesla

© A. Krivonosov

China’s Dongfeng is entering Japan not with yet another city EV, but with the Monster Sport 007 — an all-wheel-drive electric sedan pitched from day one around speed and motorsport. The interesting part isn’t only the hardware: Tajima Motor Corporation and Nobuhiro Tajima himself, the Pikes Peak legend, stand behind the project, so the car is being groomed not just for sales but for a possible racing career.

The Monster Sport 007 is tied to the Dongfeng eπ 007 and is seen as a close relative of the Nissan N7 sold in China. But where the N7 is a front-wheel-drive sedan, the Japanese version bets on all-wheel drive. Peak output reaches 400 kW — about 544 hp — and the 0-100 km/h sprint takes 3.9 seconds. A battery of roughly 73 kWh delivers around 540 km of range. For everyday use that is no longer a “showroom” number, but a genuinely usable figure for highway and city alike, without constant range anxiety.

In size the Monster Sport 007 is bigger than the Tesla Model 3: 4880 mm long and 1895 mm wide. The comparison with Tesla is unavoidable. The Model 3 Premium hits 100 km/h in 4.4 seconds and the Performance in 3.1 seconds, and some versions offer more range. Dongfeng’s bet is different: a larger body, a muscular all-wheel-drive setup and a sporting slant courtesy of Monster Sport.

Chinese EVs are outgrowing the budget-alternative label and pushing into the fast-sedan niche. For now the Monster Sport 007 is a Japan-market story; where it would reach buyers only through parallel import, the familiar hurdles apply — landed cost, warranty, charging infrastructure, resale value and access to body panels.

Where it arrives outside official channels, a car like this is bought not instead of a mass-market Geely or Haval, but instead of a Tesla, a Zeekr or another quick EV on the grey market.