SANTA ROSA, Calif.,
Aug. 13, 2014 /PRNewswire/
-- ZAP (ZAAP), an Electric Vehicle (EV) automotive company
incorporated in California and
headquartered in Santa Rosa,
California, and its subsidiary Jonway Auto are realigning
its resources to support volume production of their EV product line
by putting in three parallel EV production lines in their
manufacturing plant in Zhejiang Province. Two of the new EV
production lines are already in full operation producing the Urbee,
a city neighborhood vehicle that has drawn orders from multiple
large dealerships in China,
resulting in backlog over the next year of over 25,000
vehicles. The additional third new EV production line being
put in place will switch from producing gasoline versions of SUV
and Minivans, to supporting full electric vehicle models of the SUV
and Minivan by 4th quarter of 2014. As Jonway Auto
transitions from their prior focus of the gasoline vehicle business
to focusing on electric vehicles as its mainstream business going
forward, its current team of manufacturing engineers, technicians
and managers are being retrained to expand their expertise to do
mass production of EVs.
Jonway Auto is authorized by the Chinese government through
Jonway Group's separate licensing entity in Hangzhou to do auto manufacturing and has the
formal auto manufacturing and sales license to get the type
approval for both the SUV and Minivan models for highway speed EV
products. With this license and the type approvals, the
electric vehicle purchases are eligible for full EV rebate
incentives offered by the Central and local governments.
Recent announcements confirmed that the rebate incentives will
continue through to the year 2020, with additional exemptions of
registration fees and sales and consumer taxes for EVs. This
recent announcement also declared that 30% of the government new
vehicles have to be Chinese Auto manufacturer's EVs, and when
pollution indices exceed the allowed levels for the major cities,
government gasoline vehicles are banned from being on the road
while the pollution indices are exceeded. These economic and
regulatory factors are driving government organizations to purchase
full electric vehicles.
ZAP Jonway Auto's SUV can go up to 135km/hour (over
80 mph) with a range of over 200km (over 124 miles), and the
minivan which has a lighter body, is engineered to reach a peak
speed of over 120km/hour (75mph) and a range of over 250km
(150miles) for the lithium battery versions. With the Chinese
government rebates that are offered by both the central government
and the local governments in major cities, the EV SUV and the EV
minivan could be bought at a lower cost than the gasoline versions
for the same models. These two EVs are the flagship products
of ZAP and Jonway Auto. Currently Jonway Auto and ZAP's
Hangzhou JV are both working on several government fleet
opportunities for the EV minivan, aiming at city delivery fleets,
and focusing initially on a few cities like Tianjin, Ningbo and Hangzhou. They are also
working on orders for EV SUVs delivered for government
organizations to replace the vehicles that their drivers use to
drive around in the cities.
The minivan also comes in a lower cost lead acid model which is
ideally suited for city delivery vans and has a lower range of 130
km (80 miles) with a peak speed of 100kph (62mph), and
competitively priced. This is targeting international markets
where there is no rebate available, but due to the competitive
pricing, is well positioned for many of the SE Asian countries as
well as Eastern European countries.
The Urbee was recently DOT approved for the US under NEV/LSV and
is also already EU type approved for the European markets, under L6
category. The attractive lower price of the Urbee which is
lead acid, will be suitable for city commuting because of the ease
of parking and compactness. The range of the Urbee is over
160km (100miles) and for the L6 and DOT type approved versions, the
speed is locked at 45kph (28mph) even though it is capable of peak
speed of 70kph (43.5mph). This product, although focused at
the lower price sector, could deliver the volume for Jonway Auto
over the next year that could provide Jonway Auto's plant the
production volume that they need to drive costs down for all of its
other EV products, and absorb the overhead costs.
About ZAP and Jonway Auto
ZAP and Jonway Auto designs and manufactures quality, affordable
new energy and electric vehicles (EVs). Jonway Automobile has
ISO 9000 manufacturing facilities, engineering, sales and customer
services facilities in China,
Jonway has production capacity of up to 50,000 vehicles per year,
and has established sales distribution network in China. ZAP, an early pioneer of EVs, brings to
both companies a broad range of EV product technologies. ZAP is
headquartered in Santa Rosa,
California and Jonway Auto is located in Zhejiang Province of the People's Republic of China. Additional
information about ZAP Jonway is available at
http://www.zapworld.com.
This press release contains certain forward-looking
statements is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform
Act of 1995. The words "anticipate," "believe," "estimate,"
"expect," "intend," "plan," and similar expressions that may tend
to suggest a future event or outcome are not guarantees of
performance, which cannot be predicted or anticipated. These
forward-looking statements are based largely on expectations and
are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, many of which
are beyond the control of the Company. Actual results could
differ materially from these forward-looking
statements.
Contact: Michael Ringstad
Mringstad@zapworld.com
707-525-8658x104
SOURCE ZAP and Jonway Auto