Volkswagen's luxury car subsidiary, Audi is planning to double its production capacity in the Chinese automobile market within the next four years. The German automobile manufacturer has decided to increase its production capacity, due to raging demand for high-end passenger cars in the world's largest automobile market.
The current production capacity of Audi in China is around 3, 00,000 units per annum however, the plans would increase the production to 700,000 vehicles per annum by 2015. Moreover, with an improvement in the production capacity, at the existing plant in Changchun China, the company has also intended to establish another production plant in the country. President at Audi's China Division, Dietmar Voggenreiter has confirmed the news, however, declined to specify the details regarding the amount of investment to be made for the new production plant.
Regarding the demand of cars in China, Voggenreiter stated in an interview, “You see a lot of young customers and young families now buying premium cars. Nowadays, the upper middle-management customers are growing and this is our main customer focus.”
Another reason that led to the conclusion could be the company's goal to overtake BMW in the international luxury car market by 2015. Currently, Audi has dominated one-third of the luxury car segment in the Chinese automobile market, ahead of automobile giants, BMW and Mercedes-Benz.
Moreover, Audi also has plans to launch new cars for the Chinese market in the coming time, wherein Voggenreiter has hinted that the company may introduce an electric car in China. Currently, Audi, in partnership with China FAW Group Corp., has successfully created a strong market for itself with products like Audi A4L, A6L sedan and Audi Q5 sport utility vehicle being introduced in China.
2011 has been favourable in terms of sales for the German based automobile company. Within the first nine months of 2011, the company has already sold around 2, 23,631 cars in China that is 29% higher from 2010. Furthermore, the company is targeting car sales to reach up to 3, 60,000 next year.
