China’s BYD has produced its 70,000th vehicle at its Thailand manufacturing plant, about 16 months after the facility began operations, the company said on Wednesday.
The milestone vehicle, a Sealion 06 sport utility vehicle rebranded locally as the Sealion 6, rolled off the production line on Nov. 27 and was delivered to an employee of BYD’s Thailand plant, the company said in a statement.
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Construction of the plant began in March 2023, with production starting in July 2024 at the WHA Rayong 36 Industrial Estate. The facility, which spans nearly 960,000 square metres, reached its 10,000-unit production milestone in November 2024 and has an annual designed capacity of 150,000 vehicles.
BYD said more than 92% of the workforce at the plant consists of Thai nationals. The factory serves both the domestic market and as an export hub for shipments to Europe and the Asia-Pacific region. In August, it dispatched its first export batch of locally produced Dolphin electric vehicles to Europe.
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The Thailand output milestone comes as BYD reported November sales of 480,186 new energy vehicles globally, its highest monthly total this year, and record exports of 131,935 units.