Faurecia Forms Seating JV in China

France’s Faurecia SA has formed a joint venture with China’s Liuzhou Wuling Industry Co. to supply seating systems for SAIC-GM-Wuling Automobile Co. and other carmakers in China.

The new Faurecia Liuzhou Automotive Seating Co. will build complete seats, frames and other seat components at Liuzhou Wuling’s existing plants in Chongqing, Liuzhou and Qingdao. The partners, which plan to build a fourth factory at an unspecified site in the future, target annual sales of 1.8 billion yuan ($265 million) by 2022.

The joint venture initially will supply seating systems to SAIC-GM-Wuling. Formed in 2002 by General Motors Co., SAIC Motor Corp. and Wuling Motor Holdings Ltd., the partnership produces Wuling microvans and Baojun passenger vehicles.

Liuzhou Wuling Industry is jointly owned by Wuling Motor and Guangxi Auto Group Co. The venture, which produces a variety of auto parts and assemblies, had sales of 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion) in 2016.