News

Cenntro Automotive, a leading electric vehicle (EV) technology company with advanced, market-validated commercial vehicles, has selected Jacksonville for its first U.S. manufacturing facility. The company will create 34 jobs including research and development specialists, highly skilled technician positions and administrative support, at the $25 million state-of-the-art facility.

Cenntro will open the 100,000-square-foot facility to support the Company’s production of its vehicle lines, with a possible expansion to support additional vehicles and a battery packing operation. The new facility will support annual production levels of more than 50,000 vehicles within four years as well as assembly, quality and testing processes, parts warehouse, distribution and administrative functions. Cenntro Automotive expects to begin assembling vehicles in the first quarter of 2022.

Cenntro will use JAXPORT to import materials to produce their vehicles and export some of the finished vehicles to partners and clients across the globe.

“Jacksonville is the ideal spot for our first U.S. manufacturing facility with JAXPORT providing a strong foundation in advanced manufacturing and a growing innovation ecosystem,” said Peter Wang, Chairman and CEO of Cenntro Automotive. “We believe Jacksonville provides a great talent pool as we look forward to contributing to the growing advanced manufacturing environment. Our new Jacksonville hub will serve as a cornerstone for our U.S. commercial electric vehicle sales and manufacturing efforts as our seventh assembly plant worldwide.”

JAXPORT CEO Eric Green, added, “Many of the region’s efficiencies that have made JAXPORT one of the nation’s top vehicle-handling ports also make Jacksonville an ideal location for commercial and passenger vehicle manufacturing. We look forward to putting these advantages to work for Cenntro and thank them for bringing new jobs and business to our community.”

Cenntro’s product portfolio includes Class 1-Class 4 vehicles in addition to off-road offerings. Cenntro currently distributes vehicles in more than 30 countries to target customers, which include corporate fleets (i.e., utilities companies), medium and small companies (i.e., small processing facilities, farms, solar farms, resorts, planned communities, etc.), as well as both state and federal government fleets.

The state of Florida has taken major steps to grow its foothold in the auto supply chain, including a historic investment in improving the state’s electric vehicle charging grid, as well as becoming a national leader in autonomous vehicle (AV) testing and development. Jacksonville has made a name for itself as a testing ground for this type of technology with the Jacksonville Transportation Authority Test & Learn track and partnerships with private businesses.