Construction of the new vehicle assembly plant in Qingdao, China began in early November 2014. Upon completion in approximately three years the plant will produce 300,000 sedans and SUVs per year and complement the three existing assembly plants in Changchun, Foshan and Chengdu (excluding the production plants operated by Shanghai Volkswagen). However, before a single car will leave the production line in Qingdao, Volkswagen and its joint venture partner FAW will have to invest approximately € 1.5 billion.

The construction of the assembly plant in Qingdao fits into Volkswagen’s bigger plans to overtake Toyota Motor Corp. as the world’s largest automaker. To achieve this goal, Volkswagen will build further plants and increase the production capacity of existing ones. The German carmaker plans to invest as much as € 18.2 billion in China until 2018.

Foreign automakers are adding factories in China to meet the growing demand of cars in a country where the number of licensed driver is estimated to reach 1 billion in the next 10 to 15 years.

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