Volkswagen’s two joint ventures in China plan to start building EVs in 2014 and to ramp up to mass production by 2018, its China chief said on Tuesday. He added that Volkswagen, which has partnerships with SAIC Motor Corp and FAW Group, would launch its first plug-in hybrid in China in 2015.

Volkswagen’s Chinese plants will be producing 100,000 EVs per year by 2018, said Karl-Thomas Neumann, head of Volkswagen’s China operations, at an EU-China business convention in Beijing. “I am convinced e-vehicles will be a success in China because I think it is desperately needed.”

China’s government is pushing EVs in a big way – it’s pledged $1.5 billion per year for the next 10 years in subsidies and tax breaks to support the industry.

Image: Volkswagen