VW contracts to build 12th Chinese assembly plant
Shanghai Volkswagen Automotive Co. has signed an agreement with the government of east China's Zhejiang province to build an assembly plant in the province's port city of Ningbo.
The Ningbo plant will be Shanghai VW's sixth assembly plant and parent company Volkswagen's 12th assembly plant in China.
The 11.8 billion yuan ($1.9 billion) plant will be in Ningbo's Hangzhou Bay district, and will produce as many as 300,000 vehicles a year. It will launch production in late 2013, the Zhejiang provincial government said in a statement.
Shanghai VW, a 50-50 joint venture between VW and Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp., also has received approval from the central Chinese government to build VW's 13th plant in northwest China's Xinjiang region, according to Xinjiang's government.
VW has nine assembly plants operating in China. Five are owned by Shanghai VW and four are owned by FAW Volkswagen Automobile Co., a joint venture between VW and China FAW Group Corp.
Two more plants are under construction. FAW Volkswagen is building an assembly plant in Foshan in south China's Guangdong province, and Shanghai VW is constructing one in Yizheng in east China's Jiangsu province.
Sales of Volkswagen brand vehicles in China and Hong Kong rose 13.8 percent to more than 1.7 million units in 2011, according to VW.
