Dongfeng Peugeot Citroën Automobile opens new plant in Chengdu, China

As part of the implementation of the ‘Push to Pass’ plan and to support the China and Southeast Asia region's goal of selling one million vehicles in 2018, Dongfeng Peugeot Citroën Automobile (DPCA) today inaugurated its fourth assembly plant in Chengdu, China.

The ceremony was attended by Carlos Tavares, chairman of the Managing Board of the PSA Group; Zhu Yanfeng, chairman of the Board of Directors of Dongfeng Motor Corporation; Denis Martin, the PSA Group's executive vice-president, China and ASEAN; Liu Weidong, chief operating officer of Dongfeng Motor Corporation; Su Weibin, general manager of DPCA; Jean Christophe Marchal, Executive Vice-President of DPCA and representatives of Sichuan province and the municipality of Chengdu.

The fourth DPCA plant will manufacture vehicles for the Dongfeng Peugeot, Dongfeng Citroën and Dongfeng Fengshen brands on the PSA Group's EMP2 platform, primarily in the SUV segment.

Production will begin with the new Peugeot 4008 SUV, which is scheduled for launch in November 2016. Following a gain of 53% in 2015, the SUV segment continued to expand rapidly in first-half 2016, with 44% growth. It currently accounts for 38.8% of the Chinese market. As a whole, the Chinese auto market offers great potential. Car ownership stands at 75 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants, and the country recently overtook the United States to become home to the world's largest middle class, which represented 110 million people at end-2015. This figure is forecast to double to 220 million by 2022.

Leveraging the best practices of PSA and Dongfeng Motor (DFM), DPCA built the plant in two years according to the highest industry standards. The world-class facility uses a flexible manufacturing system that enables close cooperation with suppliers, while adhering to the most stringent environmental principles.

In addition to the CAPSA plant in Shenzen, which manufactures DS models, DPCA's production base now comprises four assembly plants: three in Wuhan, in Hubei province, and one in Chengdu, in Sichuan province. With this new facility and DPCA's latest 5A+ medium-term plan unveiled on 11 May, the PSA Group and DFM have demonstrated their commitment to strengthening their strategic partnership in order to satisfy the needs of the Chinese market. The two partners are pursuing three clear-cut objectives for improving the joint venture's financial performance:

- Significantly increasing customer satisfaction with products and services to become one of the top three in the industry by 2018 and No. 1 by 2020

- Generating revenue in excess of RMB 100 billion by 2020

- Achieving profitable, sustainable growth underpinned by productivity gains of 30% by 2020

During the ceremony, Carlos Tavares said: "This new plant will help us to expand our vehicle range in the fast-growing SUV segment and meet the needs of our Chinese customers. It represents an important step in implementing our Push to Pass plan and achieving our objective to launch 20 new models in China by 2021 and sell over one million vehicles in the region by 2018."