According to foreign media reports, on May 12, Japanese automaker Subaru announced that it will build a new electric vehicle factory in Japan. The plant will be located near Subaru's main plant in Ota, Gunma Prefecture and other production facilities, and will initially produce tens of thousands of vehicles a year. It is also worth mentioning that the factory will be the first electric vehicle factory in Japan to be built from scratch.

　　In addition to building the new plant, Subaru will retrofit existing plants to produce a certain number of electric vehicles, with a total investment expected to be around 250 billion yen ($1.9 billion). Subaru has been slow to transition to electric vehicles, with a higher share of gasoline-powered vehicles in its lineup than any other large automaker. The company hopes the new factory will significantly boost its electric vehicle production.

　　Image credit: Subaru

　　Subaru began taking orders on May 12 for the Solterra, the company's first electric vehicle sold globally, with a chassis co-developed with Toyota. However, the company outsourced production of the car to Toyota's Motomachi plant in Aichi Prefecture.

　　Subaru doesn't produce its own electric cars yet. Currently, the company produces 700,000 vehicles a year, mostly gasoline-powered, and its hybrids are also underselling rivals. Subaru hopes to make up more than 40 percent of its sales of electric and hybrid vehicles by 2030. The company will also consider having the new plant make electric vehicles for Toyota and others.

　　Major global automakers have announced plans to transition to electric vehicles. Honda said it would stop selling gasoline-powered vehicles and revealed plans to build new production lines dedicated to electric vehicles in China and North America. Volkswagen has announced a new electric vehicle factory in Germany. General Motors has also built an electric vehicle factory in the United States.

　　An automobile market research institution predicts that the global sales of electric vehicles will reach 35.44 million in 2030, an increase of 7.6 times over 2021. It is expected that the world's major auto markets such as China, Europe, and the United States will rapidly transform to electric vehicles.

　　This article is reproduced from Gasgoo