The Chinese government has given, as expected, the green light to the Volkswagen Group for the building of two new automotive plants in the cities of Foshan and Yizheng. The final approval for the project was signed today, June 28, in Berlin during a meeting between Chairman of VW’s board, Prof. Dr. Martin Winterkorn, and the Presidents of the Chinese partner companies.
The plant in Yizheng will be developed in partnership with Shangai Volkswagen, while the other in Foshan, in southern China, in collaboration with the FAW-VW joint venture. Each factory will have an annual capacity of 300,000 vehicles and production will start in 2013.
“China is already the world’s largest sales market for automobiles and further substantial growth is expected in the future,” said Winterkorn.
VW plans to get a large share of this growth by investing € 10.6 billion in China between now and 2015, not just for the new plants but also for increasing the capacity of its existing factories, in Nanjing and Chengdu, to 300-350,000 vehicles per year.
