Whirlpool, the world's leading home appliance maker, and Chinese conglomerate Hisense have formed a joint venture for global consumers.

The 50-50 joint venture will invest about 900 million yuan (129 million U.S. dollars) to produce high-end washing machines and refrigerators under the Hisense and Whirlpool brands, they announced in statement on Monday.

The two companies will cooperate on capital management, research, manufacturing, procurement and global marketing. The planned production capability is two million washing machines and one million refrigerators annually.

"The strong union of Hisense and Whirlpool will improve the structure of the Chinese appliances industry and prompt the research, development and manufacturing ability of Chinese companies to reach international levels," said Huo Dufang, the China Household Electrical Appliances Association director-general.

Hisense is a large electronics and information industry unit with Hisense Company Limited its main investor. It operates in the fields of household appliances, telecom, information, real estate and commerce.

Last year, U.S. giant Whirlpool had annual net sales revenue of more than 19.4 billion U.S. dollars.

(Xinhua News Agency April 30, 2008)