Israel develops and produces a lot of things, from microchips to cosmetics. But, discounting the odd dune-buggy or army jeep, cars aren't one of them. So it came as a bi t of a surprise when Quantum, an American subsidiary of (the imaginatively named) holding company Israel Corp., announced it was embarking on a joint venture with an unnamed Asian automaker back in the spring.
Israel Corp. has now won approval from China's still heavily centralized government to set up shop in partnership with Chery Automobile. The Israeli partner will take a 45% stake in the venture, worth about $225 million, with Chery presumably taking the other 55%. The news of the deal hit the wire shortly after the now-refuted
reports of an ambitious plan to put 10,000 electric cars on Israeli roads by 2010.
Chery was the first of a plethora of Chinese automakers that now manufactures outside of China, operating its own plants in Iran, Malaysia, Bangladesh and Argentina. While it's still not known where the new Sino-Israeli cars will be built, they could very well find their way to our shores as Chery gears up for its assault on the American market.
[Source: Detroit News]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
waiownsyou @ Dec 26th 2007 6:43PM
Why does the Chery logo look like Infiniti's? And why does Israel Corp's look like the Star Trek/Starfleet logo mixed with that triangle from those Zelda games?
S1500 @ Dec 26th 2007 7:54PM
This deal was made on Christmas day, at the local Chinese resturaunt.
Cyx @ Dec 27th 2007 8:01AM
I don't think so,the reverse V in Chery's logo means the highway,but what's the meaning of Infiniti's?It's definitely not as the same!
I_Hate_China @ Dec 26th 2007 10:09PM
Papertiger Chery is so short on cash that it set up a fake joint venture like this to bring in badly needed cash for expansion. While $225 million is a pocket change for an auto major, it is a life-or-death deal for cash-strapped Chery.
Furthermore, Dodge Hornet deal is apparantly canned(Chery cannot deliver a car that can meet US regulations by deadline and on cost), with Chrysler looking to source Hornet from Nissan instead.
So much for a company that is supposed to take the US market by storm.
3000GT TwinTurbo @ Dec 27th 2007 12:12AM
did anyone really think it would though? i know i didnt.
a plus for chrysler though, if it's going to do the Hornet thing with nissan instead.
Sir X @ Jan 2nd 2008 8:29PM
The hater is making up crap. You are full of crap
Chery is not short of money - Shanghai Automobiles, a slightly bigger company is worth US$24 billions.
Chery will be worth $20 billions when it goes IPO later this year or next year.