Shanghai, April 22 (Gasgoo.com) Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Corp (BAIC) said today that it is setting up a plant to make vehicles using technology acquired from GM's Saab unit, Reuters reported, citing the carmaker's top executive.
The new plant will have annual capacity of 300,000 vehicles, said Beijing Auto President Wang Dazong at an industry forum ahead of the Beijing auto show, China's largest. Production of Saab-based cars is expected to start at this plant as soon as 2011.
In late 2009, BAIC bought the design rights to several older Saab models for about $200 million ($29.3 million). The fifth-largest Chinese automaker agreed to buy the platforms of Saab 9-3 and 9-5 models and other tooling and powertrain technologies from GM.
After the deal was signed in December, BAIC said it would immediately start integrating the technology into its own vehicles to develop self-branded models. It plans to invest 33 billion yuan in its own-brand vehicle R&D projects over three years.
"We basically agree with the view that the purchase of Saab's intellectual property can help cut short the development time for Beijing Auto's own-brand passenger vehicles by 4-5 years," BAIC Chairman Xu Heyi said earlier.
Beijing Auto, a partner of Hyundai Motor and Daimler AG, sold more than 360,000 vehicles in the first three months, up 43.9% year on year, and aims to sell 100,000 self-developed passenger cars in 2011.
