Vietnam S Vinfast To Build 2 Bln Electric Vehicle Factory In U.S.

Vinggroup, Vietnam’s largest heterogeneous group (VIC.HM), has said it plans to invest a total of $ 4 billion in its first US plant complex. Construction should begin this year as soon as the company receives the necessary permits and is expected to be completed by July 2024. The initial capacity of the plant will be 150,000 units per year, Vinfast said. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com Register “With a manufacturing unit right in the US market, VinFast can stabilize prices and shorten product delivery times, making our EVs more accessible to customers,” said Nguyen Thi Thu Thuy, Vinggroup Vice President and CEO of VinFast Global. VinFast has started receiving pre-orders worldwide for two electric SUVs with the aim of starting their delivery in the fourth quarter. US President Joe Biden said VinFast’s investment, which will create more than 7,000 jobs, is “the latest example of my financial strategy at work”. “It’s based on recent announcements by companies like GM, Ford and Siemens to reinvest in America and create jobs,” said Biden, who set an ambitious goal of half of new car sales being electric by 2030. . This will be the first car plant in North Carolina and is the largest announcement of economic growth in the history of the state, the governor’s office said in a statement. VinFast said prices for the VF8 sports SUV started at $ 41,000 in the United States. By comparison, a Tesla SUV sells for about $ 63,000. VinFast aims to sell 42,000 electric vehicles worldwide this year. PRODUCTION IS DIFFICULT VinFast is betting heavily on the US market, where it hopes to compete with traditional automakers and startups with economical electric SUVs and a battery-leasing model. Other start-up electric vehicle companies, such as Rivian and Lucid, cut their production targets this year due to supply chain disruptions caused by the coronavirus, which hit their share prices. read more Tesla CEO Elon Musk said last year: “It is insanely difficult to achieve mass production at an affordable unit cost.” VinFast, which became Vietnam’s first fully developed domestic carmaker in 2019, plans to start producing pure electric vehicles by the end of 2022. Outside of North America, the company is looking for a plant in Germany, it said in January. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com Register Report by Phuong Nguyen in Vietnam and Hyunjoo Jin in San Francisco. Edited by Chizu Nomiyama and David Gregorio Our role models: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.