GAC Motor Co., the passenger vehicle unit of Guangzhou Automobile Group Co., started building light vehicles on a second production line at a plant in Guangzhou.

 

The new line can produce up to 150,000 vehicles a year. It will boost the company's annual production capacity to 350,000 vehicles.

 

The first two vehicles to be assembled on the line are the Trumpchi-badged, seven-seat GS8 SUV and the compact plug-in hybrid GA3S sedan, GAC Motor said. 

 

In the first half of the year, GAC Motor sold approximately 15,900 Trumpchi vehicles, surging 170 percent from the same period last year. 

 

To ease a production bottleneck, GAC Motor has converted its joint venture with private domestic automaker Gonow Automobile Co. into a wholly owned subsidiary. The subsidiary, in the east China city of Taizhou, can build as many as 60,000 Trumpchi cars a year.

 

In June, the company unveiled plans to construct a plant that can assemble 50,000 vehicles a year in the northwest China region of Xinjiang. The proposal has not been approved by the Chinese government. 

 

GAC Motor, established in 2008, also hopes to launch sales in the United States in the next few years. It plans to exhibit at the Detroit auto show in 2017 after a one-year hiatus.

 

Its parent company, GAC, operates joint ventures with Toyota, Honda, Mitsubishi and Fiat Chrysler, and has also said it hopes to launch U.S. sales in the next few years.