According to a recent announcement by Volkswagen, the automaker’s Foshan Plant ‘mega-factory’ in China is being expanded in order to increase its capacity to produce electric vehicles (EVs). The move will enable Volkswagen to notably speed up its EV efforts as Chinese market has been expanding much faster compared to other automobile markets in terms of EV acceptance.

The Foshan Plant is a massive factory which manufactures nearly 300,000 vehicles for the FAW-Volkswagen joint venture.

As a result of the Foshan Plant’s forthcoming second phase extension announced by Volkswagen, its production capacity will increase by two times. Some of the increased capacity will likely be used for new SUV production, because SUVs are becoming quite popular in China.

Highlighting the fact that with the vehicles presently produced on the MQB platform soon be electrified, Volkswagen said that Foshan Plant will play an important role in its “Roadmap E.” The automaker elaborated that Foshan will include the MEB architecture scheduled for introduction to the production line by 2020, alongside the production of MEB battery systems.

With regard to the expansion of Foshan Plant, Prof. Dr. Jochem Heizmann -- Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft’s Management Board member, and Volkswagen Group China’s President and CEO -- said that “Through this mega-factory at the South China base of FAW-Volkswagen, we are fulfilling our promise to electrify China,” and described Foshan as “an important milestone on the way to becoming a people-centric provider of sustainable mobility.”