BYD plays spot the difference

I had been under the impression that Red Chinese automaker BYD was a Toyota licensee, though in Autocade I stopped short of making this assertion since I had no proof of it. I did think it was odd that BYD has Mitsubishi-derived engines. It turns out there is no connection, but when you see things like the below you have to wonder.
   Two years ago, BYD issued this photograph of its upcoming model, the F1. It since renamed the car the F0, because it claimed it didn’t to get into a legal dispute with the Formula 1 people.

   Look familiar? While BYD might not want legal trouble with F1, it doesn’t seem to mind legal trouble with Toyota. Here’s a publicity photograph for the Toyota Aygo:    BYD’s general manager, Xia Zhibing, has been quoted as saying, ‘The BYD F1 is a model developed by ourselves and we hold the intellectual property right for it.’
   I guess there’s no shame at BYD, and that the ideals of truthfulness in Confucianism haven’t made a return to parts of Red China.
   Come on, Mr Xia, the only contribution BYD has made to the 2007 photo is in Adobe Photoshop! If you are going to lie about it, don’t make it so obvious by using someone else’s publicity pic first! At least use CAD to generate something new!
   Or this could be some form of getting war reparations from Japan, but that Toyota hasn’t been informed.
   And this is the company that Warren Buffett has put money in to. Somehow I think that if any BYD cars ever make it to the US as Mr Buffett intends, Toyota’s going slap a big court order on them, and not a single one will make it on to the market.
   If you look at the F3 and F6, BYD’s larger models, the doors look identical to those of the Toyota Corolla E120 and Toyota Camry XV30, but the front- and rear-end styling has been modified to resemble some of Honda’s work. I understand the dimensions are slightly different but that an expert should be able to prove objective similarity in the shapes of the doors—or enough to stop BYDs from going on sale in many markets.
   The F3 hybrid, the world’s first plug-in car, beating Chevrolet with its Volt, might have an innovative powertrain, but what is the likelihood that has come from somewhere else?
   BYD shows how out of touch parts of Red Chinese commerce is with, well, honesty and decency. I’m happy to deal with mainland Chinese firms, but only those that I am connected to by blood or referred to by family—and governments should not be signing things like free-trade agreements with the Politburo in Beijing till some of these intellectual property issues can be sorted out.
   New Zealand, of course, is a trifle too naïve, with its free-trade agreement.