A lot of attention is paid on the Tesla factories, those already built, and those under construction, but this time we will take a look at the Geely and Volvo‘s “Luqiao Super Factory” in Luqiao – a district of Taizhou in Zhejiang Province, China.
It’s an interesting plant, as it produces CMA-based models (electric and conventional) for three brands – Lynk & Co 01, Volvo XC40 and Polestar 2 – on the same production line.
The site is jointly operated by Volvo and Geely: “Here, a bridging of two different, unique cultures has created a versatile team capable of creating the next generation of vehicles.”
Polestar 2 is of course the first all-electric model for the plant and for the CMA platform:
So far, the Polestar 2 is considered to be very well built, so it might mean that all the models are produced at a high-standard.
And here is a drone fly-through tour of the Luqiao Super Factory, which shows the moving machinery:
Volvo is already 10 years under Geely and the company expanded significantly since 2009, increasing sales to new record levels (over 700,000 annually), co-developed new platforms, progresses towards electrification including a broad lineup of plug-in hybrids (and soon also all-electric models).
Also, Geely acquired the Polestar performance brand and re-launched it as a stand-alone manufacturer with its own models. That’s quite an achievement.
And here is a very interesting presentation of the Compact Modular Architecture (CMA) – ‘Super Matrix’, developed for 5 years for the small/medium size models of all types (ICE, HEV, PHEV, BEV):
