GWM targets 300,000 European-built vehicles by 2029, starting in Bulgaria

GWM has set itself a European production target of roughly 300,000 vehicles per year by 2029, and it will take the first step in Bahovitsa, a village in Bulgaria's Lovech Province, where series assembly of the electric compact SUV Ora 5 is due to start in the first quarter.

The Chinese group does not want to remain an import-only brand in Europe in the long term. The EU's punitive tariffs on Chinese electric vehicle imports are a key driver of the strategy: local production would let GWM avoid those duties. The company began evaluating European locations for its first plant in 2025, with Spain and Hungary among the contenders before Bulgaria won the contest.

Why Bahovitsa?

The site is not new to GWM. The company established a presence there in 2012, operating an assembly plant for semi-knocked-down kits (SKD, a method where vehicles are assembled locally from partially disassembled kits shipped as components). That move made GWM the first Chinese automaker to enter Europe.

The facility did not last. Instead of expanding, production stopped in 2016 after the bankruptcy of GWM's Bulgarian partner, Litex Motors. The factory buildings passed to Bulgarian Automotive Industry (BAI), which has since renovated them.

The ownership structure of the new arrangement is unusual. The plant will remain owned by BAI, but GWM will take it over from 2027. Until then, and alongside GWM's own operation, BAI will act as an independent contract manufacturer producing contractually agreed volumes.

Anton Dontschew, Director of International Business at BAI, said the step marks only the beginning of a broader collaboration between the two companies.

What is the capacity gap?

Bahovitsa will have an annual production capacity of 50,000 vehicles. That figure leaves a wide gap against GWM's stated goal: 300,000 European-built cars per year by 2029. To close it, the group will need to open additional production sites in Europe or significantly expand existing capacities in the coming years.

Put simply, Bahovitsa covers one sixth of the target. The announced 300,000 figure is a corporate aim rather than a confirmed, site-by-site capacity plan, and GWM has not yet named the follow-up locations.

The first product is already on the market. The Ora 5 electric compact SUV is available in Europe as an imported vehicle, so the Bahovitsa line replaces imports for that model rather than launching a new nameplate.

What did GWM say about localisation?

Nicole Wu, GWM's Chief Technology Officer, set out the strategy at the company's Tech Day 2026 event in Milan, Italy.

"From local R&D to local manufacturing, we are building a fully localised ecosystem for Europe, and aim to grow together with European customers and partners through long-term investment and collaboration," Wu said.

She also addressed the manufacturing method directly: "We'll start with SKD assembly, but supply of some parts will be localised from the very beginning."

That detail matters for the tariff question. SKD assembly alone may not satisfy the EU's rules of origin (the criteria determining whether a vehicle counts as European-made for customs purposes), so the pace of parts localisation will determine how much of the tariff burden GWM actually avoids.

What to watch next

Three milestones will show whether the plan is real. First, the start of Ora 5 series assembly in Bahovitsa in the first quarter. Second, the formal handover of the plant from BAI to GWM in 2027. Third, and most telling, the announcement of further European sites — without them, the 300,000-unit target for 2029 remains arithmetic rather than capacity.