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Chinese automaker opens 1st plant in US
Aggregated Source: Shanghai Daily: Business

THE first Chinese-owned vehicle manufacturer in the United States has unveiled ambitious plans to eventually build as many as 1,000 plug-in electric buses a year at a refurbished RV manufacturing plant in a wind-swept, sage-dotted corner of the Mojave Desert.

In a news conference on a patio outside BYD's new energy-efficient production facility on Wednesday, the company's Senior Vice President Stella Li said the first of 10 zero-pollution vehicles, already on order from the city of Long Beach, should roll off the assembly line next year.

Within two years, Li said, BYD Motors expects to be producing 50 buses a year, and it will continue to ramp up production, hoping to reach the plant's capacity of 1,000 buses a year within a decade or two.

All the buses will be powered by the company's own iron-phosphate batteries, which will be made at another plant near the bus factory in Lancaster, 100 kilometers east of Los Angeles. BYD is the world's largest maker of rechargeable batteries.

"Today is a very special day for us," Li said. "Today marks the first time a Chinese vehicle company opens a vehicle manufacturing plant in the United States."

She said after the news conference that BYD has invested more than US$10 million in the two plants, declining to give a more specific figure. When the vehicle plant reaches full production, she said, it could employ as many as 1,000 people.

BYD's North American headquarters in Los Angeles now employs about 40 people but will also grow as bus production does, Li said.


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