Brilliance Auto to add 150,000-unit capacity

Shanghai. September 12 (Gasgoo.com) Brilliance Auto, the Chinese partner of BMW, will add a new production base near to its existing plant, Jinghua newspaper said, citing an unnamed company official.

The new site would be able to make 150,000 own brand cars annually after the expansion is completed. The automaker currently rolls out cars under the rate of 400,000 units a year at its existing plant, which is running three shifts a day without pausing.

The official said Brilliance originally planned to share some capacities at its joint venture's second plant, but has dropped the idea to avoid further capacity constraint.

Brilliance and BMW announced recently to build a second car plant with a capacity of 40,000 units as of October. Completion date of the plant is expected to be the end of 2009 and BMW 5 Series is reported to be built at the new plant.

Brilliance Auto's products include Zhonghua passenger car, Jinbei Haise minibus, and A class sedans. It also sells BMW 3 series and 5 series sedans in Chin. Last year the automaker sold 300,369 completely built-up vehicles, up 42.72 percent from one year earlier.