Leapmotor has reprised plans to build cars in Europe as part of an expansion that includes the imminent launch of two new, more European-friendly models.
The Chinese brand, of which Stellantis owns a majority of the international rights, will build cars in Spain, according to Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa.
Speaking at an event for financial group Kepler Cheuvreux, Filosa is reported by Automotive News Europe as confirming Spain as the European production site for Leapmotor from 2026, although he didn't say which factory or model.
The report claims the Zaragoza plant, which currently builds the Peugeot 208, Opel/Vauxhall Corsa and Lancia Ypsilon, is the most likely production site, given its planned expansion to include a new €4.1 billion gigafactory for LFP batteries as part of a joint venture between Stellantis and Chinese supplier CATL.
The B10 is the most likely model to be built initially in Spain – a 4.5m-long crossover pitched right into the heart of the C-segment. The related B05 hatchback could also follow.
European production will allow Leapmotor to avoid the additional 20.7% it has to pay in tariffs to the EU for importing EVs from China.
The brand's launch line-up in Europe, including the UK, are the T03 city car and the C10 SUV. Both of these models were designed and engineered before the Stellantis deal was struck. However, Tianshu Xin, CEO of Leapmotor International, said that future models will benefit from work at Stellantis's European R&D facilities to make them more Euro-friendly, including the impending B10 and B05 (pictured below).
"Being a brand making a car developed and produced in China, it takes time to understand European customer behaviour," Xin told Autocar. "Our job is to collect the feedback from customers and feed it into the engineering team, and they are able to fix and improve constantly.
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