Volvo, Geely Plan Global R&D Center in Sweden

Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. and its Volvo Cars unit are establishing a joint R&D facility in Gothenburg, Sweden, to develop modular architectures for both companies.

The center will employ 200 full-time engineers from Sweden and China when it becomes fully functional by year-end.

The new facility will be headed by Mats Fagerhag, who held several management positions at General Motors, including head of vehicle system engineering for GM Europe, and Saab before joining Volvo Cars a year ago.

Volvo has already developed a large "scalable platform architecture" and will introduce the first vehicle to use it, the next-generation XC90 crossover, in 2014. The new R&D center will focus on a new modular platform and related components for future C-segment cars to be developed for the Geely and Volvo brands.

The new facility will be headed by Mats Fagerhag, who held several management positions at General Motors, including head of vehicle system engineering for GM Europe, and Saab before joining Volvo Cars a year ago.