General Motors has indicated that the company and local partners are boosting production capacity for GM-brand vehicles in China to 5 million units. This is all part of a USD 12 billion investment program through 2017.
Matt Tsien, president of GM China, said that includes three factories due to open this year and two more next year. He said “I think the addition of the several new plants currently under construction will help us reach the capacity of 5 million units by the end of 2015.”
GM and Germany’s Volkswagen AG are level pegging to be China’s most popular vehicle brand. GM said earlier that its 2013 sales rose 11.4 percent to 3.1 million vehicles.
Forecasters expect the overall market in China to expand by 8 to 10 percent. That could raise GM sales to 3.4 million.
The company plans to increase production capacity in China by 65 percent by 2020, Tsien said.
In China, GM manufactures sedans, minivans and pickup trucks in joint ventures with state-owned SAIC (Shanghai Automotive Industries Co.) and Liuzhou Wuling Motors Co. The three companies also launched a separate low-cost brand, Baojun, the company that Warren Buffet also bought into.
