The Chinese electric car manufacturer Xpeng has announced the construction of another plant. It is to be built in Wuhan and will have an annual capacity of 100,000 cars. A timetable for the start of construction has not yet been given.
The planned area covers over 733,000 square metres and also includes research and development facilities. This would be Xpeng’s third production facility in China following the existing plant in Zhaoqing and a new plant in Guangzhou, where construction started in September 2020.
The Guangzhou plant is scheduled to go into operation at the end of 2022. If the factories are of similar size and are built at a comparable pace, the first Xpeng could be built in Wuhan during 2023, possibly in the second half of the year.
So far, Xpeng has not mentioned production capacity for the Guangzhou plant, but Wuhan – like the existing Zhaoqing factory – is expected to be able to build 100,000 vehicles each year.
CEO He Xiaopeng justified the decision for Wuhan by saying that the city is strategically located and, “as a hub for car manufacturing and distribution”, will “further enhance” the company’s supply chain management, sales and distribution network in the future.
Xpeng’s announcement comes after NIO – another Chinese carmaker and a pioneer in the global premium electric vehicle market – last week reached another milestone in its corporate history by producing its 100,000th electric vehicle.
Wuhan, home to the headquarters of state-owned carmaker Dongfeng, is a city of 11 million people – the most populous city in central China. It is connected to the high-speed rail network, has several highway links, and is also considered a transport hub for inland waterways.
At the beginning of 2021, Xpeng president Brian Gu stated that the production of electric vehicles in Europe is also conceivable in future. A decision on this is expected to be made in the first half of this year.