The cost of building a Mexican plant could be around $600 million, similar to what BYD paid for its Brazilian EV plant, Bloomberg said, citing a person familiar with the matter.
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BYD (HKG: 1211, OTCMKTS: BYDDY) sent a delegation to the Mexican state of Jalisco to consider building an electric vehicle (EV) plant there, Bloomberg said in a March 9 report.
BYD executives from China met with state officials last week, as well as Chinese suppliers already in Jalisco, such as Haitian, which makes machines for auto parts, said Roberto Arechederra, Jalisco's economic development secretary., according to the report.
BYD did a very in-depth analysis of how many education centers there are and the size of the population near where the plant could be placed, Arechederra said.
Building a Mexican plant could cost about $600 million, which is similar to what BYD paid for its Brazilian EV plant, Bloomberg said, citing a person familiar with the matter.
On February 14, Nikkei reported that BYD is considering setting up an EV plant in Mexico as the automaker seeks to establish an export hub to the United States.
Nikkei cited Zou Zhou, manager of BYD Mexico, as saying that Mexico is an important market with great potential.
BYD's rival Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) plans to build a Gigafactory in Nuevo Leon state for the production of next-generation vehicles.
BYD Americas CEO Stella Li told Reuters on February 28 that the company is looking for a location in Mexico to build a plant and expects to select a site for the plant by the end of the year. The plant will have a capacity of 150,000 vehicles per year, according to Li.
Li said BYD's ambitions in Mexico were for local sales only. "Our plan is to build the facility for the Mexican market, not for the export market," she said, according to Reuters.
BYD is looking for factory locations in the central and southern regions, rather than in northern Mexico near the United States -- where transportation costs to reach consumers would be expensive, she said.
Earlier this month, BYD launched the Dolphin Mini, a micro EV, in Brazil and Mexico, bringing its least expensive model to South America.
The Dolphin Mini is known as the Seagull in China, and the Dolphin is BYD's other slightly more expensive model.
BYD has previously introduced the Dolphin, Han, Tang and Yuan Plus to the Mexican market.
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