Volkswagen plans to build an electric sports utility vehicle (SUV) for the China market, which will go on sale in 2021, taking on the Chinese market leader Tesla’s Model X as the German car manufacturer ramps up production of zero emissions vehicles, said Reuters.
The new SUV is the latest move in Volkswagen’s growth strategy in China, where electric cars are given preferential treatment by authorities.
VW said its SUV, which it presented in Shanghai on Sunday, will have three rows of seats and an operating range of up to 450 km on a single charge.
“We plan to produce more than 22 million electric cars in the next 10 years,” VW Chief Executive Herbert Diess said, adding that around half of VW’s engineers were working on products destined for China.