Chinese truck maker rides electric boom

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FAW Jiefang Automotive Co Ltd, an established Chinese truck manufacturer, has opened its first production base for electric trucks.

The base in the coastal city of Qingdao in east China's Shandong Province is expected to produce 50,000 full electric trucks each year, according to the company, a subsidiary of China's leading automaker First Auto Works (FAW) Group.

The company has developed light, medium and heavy-duty new energy trucks, said Hu Hanjie, general manager of FAW Jiefang.

New energy vehicles, including all-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, have seen explosive growth in China.

Statistics from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology showed that 517,000 new energy vehicles, including fully electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, were manufactured and 490,000 were sold between January and October, both up more than 45 percent year on year.

Since the first Jiefang truck rolled down the assembly line in FAW in Changchun, northeastern Jilin Province in 1956, the brand has sold more than 6.6 million trucks and exported to 80 countries and regions. Jiefang was the first truck manufactured in China.

In 2016, the company sold 202,000 trucks, 185,000 of which were medium and heavy-duty vehicles, holding the biggest market share in China at 19.25 percent. Its output this year has exceeded 300,000, the company announced Thursday.

In addition to the electric push, Jiefang will also focus on research for self-driving trucks in coming years.

Source(s): Xinhua News Agency