LAS VEGAS — Chinese automaker Chery Automobile Co. and distribution partner HAAH Automotive Holdings are looking for an existing U.S. factory to assemble vehicles for the Vantas brand they announced this week.
The site selection team wants to reuse a facility, rather than build one, to expedite production and sales, according to a statement issued Friday. The brand will start with knock-down kits before transitioning to full manufacturing for the new brand. It aims to begin delivering crossovers in the U.S. and Canada by late 2021 or early 2022.
HAAH, which is working to distribute Zotye autos from China next year, will be recruiting dealers and meeting with economic-development officials at the NADA Show here this weekend.
Chinese automakers’ ambitions to set up retail networks in the United States have fizzled. Within a decade of its 1997 founding, Chery went public with plans to sell in the U.S. It still hasn’t arrived.
The Vantas plant could employ more than 1,000 Americans, HAAH CEO Duke Hale said in a radio interview this week.
