After announcing the sale of its South African factories to Chery in January, Nissan has now signed a non-binding agreement with the Chinese carmaker to manufacture the latter’s passenger vehicles for the UK at its four-decade old Sunderland plant, which will continue to be fully owned by Nissan, Reuters reports.
The Japanese carmaker aims to start building Chery’s UK passenger vehicles on Sunderland’s Line One in fiscal 2027, while consolidating its own Leaf, Juke and Qashqai onto Line Two.
Currently the UK’s largest car factory, the Sunderland plant employs some 6,000 people (and these jobs are expected to be retained), but it’s running far below its 600,000-unit capacity – last year, just 273,000 cars were produced (-3% year-on-year), according to The Guardian. This move would begin mass-market Chinese car production in the country for the first time.
Chinese carmakers have been trying to establish European manufacturing operations to dodge import duties and improve supply chains. Chery, Jaecoo (the J7 was the UK’s best-selling car in March), Jetour and Omoda products made up 2% of all new cars sold in Europe between January and April this year.
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