EcoMotors Starts Second Joint Venture in China

Michigan-based EcoMotors International Inc. has launched a venture with China's FAW Group Corp. to produce its opposed-piston diesel engine, The Wall Street Journal reports.

The company claims its engine is cleaner, simpler, cheaper, half the size and as much as 50% more fuel efficient than a similarly powered turbo-diesel.

FAW's Jingye Engine Co. will own 51% of the new venture and invest more than $200 million to launch production, according to the Journal. EcoMotors is contributing intellectual property on a nonexclusive basis. The partners plan to open a factory late next year in Shanxi province with capacity to make 100,000 engines annually.

The deal is the second for EcoMotors, a five-year-old startup backed in part by Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates.

Last year the company and China's Zhongding Holding Group Ltd. started a nonexclusive venture to make engines for power generators, off-road equipment and commercial trucks. The partnership is expected later this year to begin making as many as 150,000 engines annually in a $200 million factory in Anhui province.

The EcoMotors engine consists of two horizontally opposed cylinders connected in the middle by a single crankshaft. Each cylinder contains a pair of pistons linked to the crankshaft in such a way that they alternately compress and expand the space between them.