The car, code-named the BP31, will be sold under SAIC's Roewe brand, Chen Zhixing, head of SAIC's passenger vehicle plant, told reporters last week in Shanghai.

The car will be among the nine new and redesigned models SAIC plans to put on sale from 2011 to 2015.

In July, SAIC's first SUV, the Roewe W5, went on sale on the domestic market with a starting price of 172,000 yuan ($26,875).

By 2015, SAIC plans to invest 45 billion yuan in r&d to expand and upgrade its passenger vehicle line. Chen said 23 billion yuan of that amount already has been spent.

SAIC sells passenger vehicles under its Roewe and MG brands. Aside from the Roewe W5 SUV, its products include the Roewe-badged 750, 550 and 350 cars as well as the MG-branded MG6, MG3 and MG7 cars.

SAIC is majority owned by the Shanghai city government. The company has two passenger vehicle joint ventures with General Motors -- Shanghai General Motors Corp., which builds GM's Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac vehicles, and SAIC-GM-Wuling Automobile Co., which produces Wuling-badged microvans.

In the first seven months, SAIC's passenger vehicle sales dropped 2 percent year-on-year to 90,840 units.