Audi's first transmission plant in China started operation on Monday in the northern municipality of Tianjin.

The plant, located in the Tianjin Economic and Technological Zone, has a designed annual production capacity of 240,000 units and can create 1,000 jobs. The factory covers an area of 95,000 square meters.

Joachim Wedler, president of Audi China, said the plant will add new core competitiveness to the development of Audi brand in China.

Jochem Heizmann, president and CEO of Volkswagen Group China, said the German carmaker will invest around 4 billion euros (4.5 billion U.S. dollars) in China this year and maintain similar investment in the next few years.

In May, FAW-Volkswagen started construction of its 19.5-billion-yuan north China production base in Tianjin. The base has a designed annual capacity of 300,000 cars.

In the first half of the year, Volkswagen China and its two Chinese joint ventures delivered a record high of 1.86 million cars in the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong, up 6.8 percent year on year.

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