Hyundai enters Chinese commercial vehicle market

Autos.ca (Seoul) - Hyundai will enter the Chinese commercial vehicle market, the world's largest, by producing trucks and buses in China starting in 2013.

The Korea automaker signed an agreement to establish a joint venture company with China's Sichuan Nanjun Automobile Group. The 50-50 joint venture, Sichuan Hyundai, will be established later this year in Ziyang City. It will initially use Nanjun Auto's existing facilities but will aggressively invest in adding to and improving the facilities, and the completion of a new plant will enable Sichuan Hyundai to annually roll out up to 150,000 trucks and 100,000 buses.

Sichuan Hyundai will operate two differentiated brands, improving Nanjun Auto's existing models to cater to value-for-money consumers and nurturing new Hyundai models as a high-end brand.

Hyundai currently sells cars in the Chinese market through its passenger car joint venture Beijing Hyundai Motor Company.

China's commercial vehicle market is expected to expand from 4.3 million units in 2010 to 5.2 million units in 2015. Hyundai aims to sell 73,0000 commercial vehicles in China this year and expand to 160,000 units around 2015, for a market share of three per cent.