SAIC Motor to Invest US$293M in Hybrid and Electric Drive Vehicles
26 November 2008
Reuters. SAIC Motor Corp, China’s biggest automaker, plans to set up a venture with its state-owned parent that will invest 2 billion yuan ($293 million) to develop clean-energy cars.
The SAIC group will hold a 90 percent stake in the venture, which will focus on the development of hybrid and electric vehicles, while its listed unit will hold the remainder.
In January, Shanghai General Motors, SAIC’s venture with GM, introduced the Buick LaCrosse Eco-Hybrid—its first locally produced hybrid car in China. Shanghai GM said it planned to introduce fuel cell-powered vehicles into the market after 2010.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited SAIC in Shanghai on 24 November and was shown a hybrid based on the Roewe 750, expected on the market in 2010, and a plug-in fuel-cell hybrid electric prototype.
Any time I see GM as a partner in new electric cat technology I become skeptical.
GM has a history of buying up promising new technology and preventing it from reducing oil profits.
Posted by: John Taylor | 26 November 2008 at 02:47 AM