China's Great Wall Motor Co Ltd plans to sell vehicles to the United States for the first time next year and expand its presence in Europe after shipping 500 sports utility vehicles (SUV) to Italy earlier in the year, its general manager said on Saturday.
Great Wall, among a small club of ambitious Chinese auto makers hoping to make a name globally, sold its first batch of Hover SUVs to Italy in September. "The market reception was pretty good, and we got more orders. We will ship 700 more vehicles to Italy and expand to other European countries such as Greece, Spain and Portugal in 2007," Wang Fengying told Reuters in an interview in Beijing. "We also target to sell our SUVs, pickups and cars to the United States later, before the end of next year."
She said several US dealerships had contacted the company about selling the cars. But the autos would have to meet strict auto emissions levels and other regulatory and safety standards before sales could go ahead.
Great Wall, located in the northern province of Hebei, already exports vehicles to more than 50 countries, mostly developing markets in Africa, the Middle East, South America and Russia. Sales are expected to grow between 20-30 percent to roughly 80,000 units this year, with 30,000 shipped overseas, another senior company executive said.
Exports could account for half of its overall sales by 2008 as the company breaks into more markets in both developing and developed countries. Great Wall's SUV, which is priced between 110,000 yuan ($13,970) and 140,000 yuan in China, sells for less than 20,000 euros in Italy, some 2,000-3,000 euros less than rivals' brands, Wang said.
To help push sales in Europe, where diesel engines are popular, Great Wall is developing diesel-powered vehicles to attract more buyers, Wenlin Xing, general manager of the company's international trade division, told Reuters.
Great Wall joins fellow Chinese car makers Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd and Chery Automotive Co to push aggressively for overseas sales, hoping to follow the success of Japanese and Korean makers, such as Toyota Motor Corp and Hyundai Motor Co, onto the global scene.
Nanjing Automobile Group had announced plans to set up China's first auto manufacturing facility in the US, and Geely is also considering buying existing assets in America. But Wang ruled out such a plan, preferring to ship whole vehicles to developed markets for the time being. She did not discuss the sales target for the US next year, saying volume was not her top concern initially. "I am not worried about volume. What's important for us is a foothold in the United States."