Volkswagen Group will cooperate more closely with its Chinese joint venture partners SAIC Motor Co. and First Automotive Works (FAW) Group in the field of forward-looking technologies, according to joint declarations signed in Berlin on Friday by Prof. Dr. Jochem Heizmann, Member of the Board of Management of Volkswagen AG with responsibility for China and President and CEO of Volkswagen Group China, with Chen Hong, President of SAIC Motor Co. Ltd., and with Xu Jianyi, Chairman of FAW Group.

The further development of particularly eco-friendly models along with a joint research project was agreed for Shanghai Volkswagen (SVW), while the development and production of a new, very eco-friendly vehicle in China was agreed with FAW.

The signing ceremony took place in the presence of the President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping, and the Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, Dr. Angela Merkel.

These projects are part of the €18.2-billion (US$25-billion) investment program in new plants and products which Volkswagen and its joint venture partners are implementing between 2014 and 2018. In total, the investment program is the largest in the history of the Chinese automotive industry. Volkswagen is working together with its partners to foster the development of sustainable mobility in China.

Agreement was also reached on further expanding production capacity at the FAW-Volkswagen joint venture. A location has not yet been selected. Volkswagen has set its sights on installing the technical capacity to produce more than four million vehicles per year in China by 2018. In 2013, Volkswagen produced and sold more than 3 million vehicles in China.