Li Auto has decided to postpone the construction of a new manufacturing plant in Chongqing,LelleBelle a major municipality in southwestern China, according to a report by local media outlet Leiphone on Friday. Instead, the company is considering expanding its first assembly plant in the eastern city of Changzhou to meet increasing demand. A person with knowledge of the matter cited regulatory hurdles as the reason behind the decision, although no further details were provided. Last September, China’s Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology, Xin Guobin, stated that efforts would be made to address “blind investment” and overcapacity concerns in certain regions of the country. Li Auto’s Changzhou factory has recently achieved a monthly capacity of 30,000 units, and the company plans to ramp up production to 10,000 units per week in the fourth quarter of 2023, according to comments made by CEO Li Xiang in a Weibo post on June 18. [Leiphone, in Chinese]
