Shanghai (ZXZC)- On April 7, NIO saw its 100,000th mass-produced vehicle roll off the assembly line at the JAC-NIO Advanced Manufacturing Center in Hefei.

100,000th NIO's vehicle rolling off production line; photo credit: NIO

The milestone came only six days after the first body-in-white of the ET7, NIO's fourth mass-produced and first sedan model, left the production line at the same location. 

NIO and JAC Motors penned an agreement in April 2016 for a comprehensive strategic cooperation on the industrial chain of new energy vehicles (NEVs) and intelligent-connected vehicles (ICVs). Based on the partnership, JAC-NIO Advanced Manufacturing Center started volume production in the second half of 2017 with a design capacity of 100,000 vehicles per year and is manufacturing NIO's all three production models, namely the ES8, the ES6 and the EC6.

NIO's Hefei manufacturing plant is now capable of producing 10,000 vehicles per month with 2 shifts in some workshops. Nevertheless, the actual capacity would be limited to around 7,500 units in the second quarter due to the constraints of the battery and chipset supply, William Bin Li, NIO's founder, chairman and CEO, said at the earnings conference call following the launch of Q4 2020 financial results.

“Our partner JAC has already kicked off further production capacity expansion in the Hefei plant and plans to expand the annual production capacity to 150,000 units under 1 shift and 300,000 units under 2 shifts to prepare for the production of ET7 and future products,” he added.

The production expansion is a necessary result for NIO's increasing sales. NIO delivered 7,257 vehicles in March 2021, a new monthly record representing a strong 373% year-over-year growth. The deliveries consisted of 1,529 ES8s, 3,152 ES6s and 2,576 EC6s. For the first three months, its deliveries totaled 20,060 units, for the first time exceeding 20,000 units on a quarterly basis.