Great Wall opens European factory

Chinese car maker Great Wall has opened its first European manufacturing plant in Bulgaria.

The first Chinese car maker to establish a production base in Europe will assemble the Great Wall Motors Voleex C10 for sale in Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey. Production will intially run at a conservative rate of just 8000 cars per year but is planned to rise to a maximum of 70,000 annually by 2015.

In the second phase of its plan to further infiltrate the European car market (including Norway, Sweden and England), company marketing director, Wang Shihui said: “We want to go into these markets, the faster, the better.”

Along with the Voleex C10, Great Wall Motors is also planning to assemble the Hover H5 SUV and Steed at its new European plant.