VinFast Sets Kickoff Date For North Carolina Factory
With all the odd press it’s gotten over the last year, it’s easy to assume VinFast is looking to roll up the carpet and head back home. That’s not what’s happening, however, as the automaker recently announced a groundbreaking date for its new manufacturing facility in North Carolina.
The Vietnamese automaker builds its vehicles on its home turf, but the North Carolina plant will give it a North American manufacturing presence starting in 2025. The original plan was to break ground in late 2022 and start production in 2024, but a series of delays and missteps have pushed the date back.
VinFast set July 28 as the kickoff date for its factory, and the company received a sweet incentive package from North Carolina to do so. The state awarded the company $1.2 billion for its efforts, the largest in North Carolina history. VinFast said the campus will eventually sprawl across 1,800 acres and produce 150,000 vehicles annually.
Though it only sells EVs in California for now, VinFast said it plans to continue its expansion in the coming years. The company’s first EV, the VF 8, began hitting customers’ driveways earlier this year, and there are three other models listed as coming soon on its website. The smaller VF 6 and VF 7 share some styling elements with the VF 8 but will likely be less expensive with shorter ranges. The seven-passenger VF 9 has an $83,000 starting price and is available for reservations now.
[Image: VinFast]
Become a TTAC insider. Get the latest news, features, TTAC takes, and everything else that gets to the truth about cars first by subscribing to our newsletter.
Chris grew up in, under, and around cars, but took the long way around to becoming an automotive writer. After a career in technology consulting and a trip through business school, Chris began writing about the automotive industry as a way to reconnect with his passion and get behind the wheel of a new car every week. He focuses on taking complex industry stories and making them digestible by any reader. Just don’t expect him to stay away from high-mileage Porsches.
More by Chris Teague
Comments
Join the conversation
After reading road tests of some of Vinfast's vehicles, I will not be buying one any time soon. Judging by how harsh the critics were of their vehicles, they will need a lot of work to make them competitive in the U.S. market. I'll pass.
I wonder if the American factory will have the same 'incentives', 'free housing' and 'meals' that are provided in the Asian factories.
VinFast will do to NoCar what FoxxCon did to Wisco.
I checked, and indeed, the $1.2 billion was mostly grants - gifts - from a variety of sources, most of which are public funds. Usually these 'incentives' take the form of tax breaks instead.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/vinfast-receives-1-2-billion-in-incentives-for-us-manufacturing-hub-in-north-carolina-301586849.html
So communist Vietnam got its first US car plant ahead of communist China, and the red Republicans in North Carolina are helping to pay for it.