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The resurrection of a car plant in Brazil’s poor northeast stands as a symbol of China’s global advance—and the West’s retreat.

BYD, the Shenzhen-based conglomerate, has taken over an old Ford factory in Camaçari, which was abandoned by the American automaker nearly a century after Henry Ford first set up operations in Brazil.

When Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Brazil’s president, visited China last year, he met BYD’s billionaire founder and chair, Wang Chuanfu. After that meeting, BYD picked the country for its first carmaking hub outside of Asia.