SAIC General Motors Corp. plans to spend 26.5 billion yuan ($3.9 billion) to develop a new generation of electrified vehicles over the next seven years.

GM's joint venture with SAIC Motor Corp., in a statement last week, said it will offer a range of electric vehicles, conventional hybrids, plug-in hybrids and conventional vehicles equipped with stop-start systems.

The partnership hopes to boost annual sales of the vehicles to 150,000 units by 2020, and 500,000 by 2025. The company did not disclose current sales of the vehicles.

SAIC-GM, established in 1997 in Shanghai, delivered 1.89 million Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac vehicles last year, up 7.7 percent from 2015.

The partnership has nine assembly plants, four powertrain factories and more than 1,500 franchised dealerships in China.

The announcement comes as China is considering tough quotas that would force automakers to quickly ramp up EV sales in 2018.

Volkswagen Group, for example, has announced plans to deliver 400,000 EVs annually in China by 2020, and 1.5 million of the vehicles a year by 2025.