BYD plans fourth new energy vehicle factory in China

BYD is massively expanding their electric car production capacity in China. The manufacturer has now struck an agreement with the Changzhou city government to build a fourth car factory, which will have a capacity of 400,000 electric cars per year. Existing sites will ramp up as well.

The investment costs are expected to amount to around 1.5 billion dollars. Nothing is yet known regarding the construction timetable. BYD is also moving to expand the other existing plants in the region: the production capacity of the factory in Xi’an is to be increased from 100,000 to 400,000 and the Changsha plant will be upgraded from 100,000 to 300,000 electric cars per year.

A battery factory in the Chinese city of Chongqing is also under construction and will have an annual capacity of 20 GWh. The factory will focus on the production of cells and battery systems. The ground-breaking ceremony took place at the end of February and the first construction phase is to be completed and commissioned within one year. At the end of August BYD announced, they would also provide development services for third parties in the factory.

According to media reports from 2018, BYD aims to increase battery production to 48 GWh in the current year and 60 GWh in 2020. BYD is also flirting with the idea of constructing battery factories in Europe and the USA. In Europe, the company is examining possible locations in Great Britain and Germany. Additionally, the Chinese EV manufacturer is considering setting up a separate listing of its battery business on the stock exchange.

BYD did not disclose their total production capacity for electric cars, but according to Nikkei, it sold around 250,000 units last year. This means that the group controls around one fifth of the Chinese electric vehicle market. China’s government aims to boost annual sales of electric and other new energy vehicles to two million by 2020, up 60% from 2018.

asia.nikkei.com (Paywall)