Will There Be A "Jeep City" In Wuhan?
This 1998 Jeep Cherokee BJ7250 was made in China
My wife doesn’t read these posts when they come out.
She doesn’t work in the auto industry, and she doesn’t care much about cars, energy, robots, or what crazy shit Elon might have done this week.
(For more crazy shit Elon might have done this week, check the weekly news roundup.)
She is a bit curious about what shit I am doing in the home office, so she cares a bit.
A few weeks ago, she read my piece about the Ford Fathom, and she asked a question that had nothing to do with Ford or the Fathom.
She asked, “Is there really a place called iPhone City in China where Apple makes iPhones?”
To which I said, “Yes, honey, there is a place they call iPhone City in China where Apple makes iPhones.”
That conversation inspired this post.
There was a lot of news in recent weeks about North American automakers and their working relationships with Chinese companies.
Let’s unpack that a bit.
Stellantis Is Not A North American Company
I know what you’re thinking: yes, North America is Stellantis' largest market for vehicle sales.
And if you are a CDJR dealer, you view the company as squarely American (with some important relationships in Canada).
However, Stellantis is actually headquartered in Hoofddorp, Netherlands, and much of its leadership and ownership is based in France and Italy.
The largest shareholders of Stellantis are Exor N.V., the holding company of Italy's Agnelli family, which owns about 15%, and Etablissements Peugeot Frères, the holding company of the Peugeot family, which owns roughly 8%.
Antonio Filosa, Stellantis’ CEO, based his home office in Auburn Hills, Michigan, upon his appointment in 2025.
I think he was really trying to figure out how to avoid getting angry letters from his US dealers, the way his predecessor did.
But Filosa was born in Castellammare di Stabia, Naples, Italy, on June 26, 1973 (just three days before I was born).
He graduated with a degree in industrial engineering from the Polytechnic University of Milan and later earned an Executive MBA from Fundação Dom Cabral in Brazil.
He holds both Brazilian and Italian passports (not American or Dutch).
Outside of the US, Stellantis has manufacturing operations in 29 other countries and a commercial presence in over 130 markets worldwide.
Murica!
They may try to wrap themselves in the American flag and occasionally run somewhat ill-conceived Super Bowl ads featuring Martin Luther King Jr.'s voice.
But the company's American-ness status is tenuous at best.
Now, With Even Less America
Stellantis, and American Motors Corporation (AMC) before it, have been working with Chinese automakers longer than any other automobile company.
Beijing Jeep Corporation was China's first Sino-foreign automotive joint venture, established in January 1984 by Beijing Automotive (BAIC) and AMC. Through that partnership, it produced various versions of the Jeep Cherokee until 2005.
During the FCA era, Chinese production of Jeep vehicles was carried out through a joint venture with GAC Group. Chinese models of the Cherokee, Renegade, and Compass were produced at GAC Fiat Chrysler’s Guangzhou plant until 2022.
After Stellantis’ PSA-FCA merger, GAC’s Jeep production in China halted as sales slowed and relationships were re-evaluated.
Peugeot had its own joint-venture dance partner in Dongfeng Motor Corporation. The Dongfeng Peugeot-Citroën Automobile Company (DPCA) has manufactured Peugeot and Citroën vehicles for sale in China since the 1990s.
In 2023, Stellantis announced a new strategic ownership stake in the Chinese electric-vehicle manufacturer Leapmotor. This joint venture deal was unique because it marked the first time a foreign company secured 51% ownership of a Chinese automaker.
Regardless of the joint venture partner, those Chinese-made Jeeps were primarily built for the Chinese market.
Straight Outta Wuhan
Back in May, Stellantis and Dongfeng Motors signed a strategic cooperation agreement to expand their 34-year partnership through shared production of Peugeot and Jeep vehicles in China.
The deal included a combined investment of more than 8 billion yuan, or about 1 billion euros ($1.2 billion), with Stellantis expected to contribute about 130 million euros, supported by the favourable industrial policies for automakers in Hubei province and the city of Wuhan.
The difference this time is that these Chinese-made Jeeps will be sold in China AND exported to the rest of the world.
Your next Jeep Cherokee might come straight outta Wuhan.
Safety In Numbers?
Stellantis is not alone.
Nearly all North American, European, Korean, and Japanese car brands are losing ground to Chinese OEMs in China and elsewhere.
Ford chief executive Jim Farley has warned that his company is "in a fight for our lives" as Chinese rivals expand globally.
Farley’s fears turned from panic to partnership pretty quickly.
He recently travelled to Nanchang, China, and told local government officials that his company plans to deepen its relationship with Jiangling Motors Group to explore global business opportunities.
Back in May, Ford also announced plans to jointly manufacture low- and zero-emission vehicles at Ford's Valencia, Spain, factory with Geely.
GM terminated Chevrolet's new-vehicle sales in China, closing a retail presence that spanned more than two decades due to waning sales. However, the automaker still plans to continue manufacturing vehicles in China for export to international markets.
In August, GM announced a 20-year extension of its joint venture with SAIC Motor in China, extending the partnership to 2047.
In fact, pretty much all major car brands, except Toyota, have turned to Chinese counterparts for help.
The Real World: Automotive Policy, Washington Edition
As chaos remains the norm in Washington, Transportation Secretary and reality TV star from MTV’s “The Real World: Boston”, Sean Duffy, wrote a letter to Jim Farley questioning Ford’s strategic trajectory with Chinese companies “as it pertains to American national automotive manufacturing integrity, supply chain exposure, and reliance on technologies of foreign adversaries.”
Sean Duffy rose to national prominence in 1997 as a cast member on MTV's “The Real World: Boston”
I don’t know if GM and Stellantis CEOs got letters too. That sounds like more writing than Sean is capable of. Maybe he was too busy to write those other letters because he was planning The Great American Road Trip.
Meanwhile, reality TV host and reigning US President, Donald Trump, suggested he might be willing to allow a Chinese car company to build electric vehicles in the US if it did so with American workers, while pledging to maintain the effective US ban on imported vehicles from China.
It’s the level of critical thinking and policy clarity we’ve come to expect from the Fox News hosts and former reality TV personalities in the US government.
IMHO
In a recent interview on the Automotive State of the Union, Michael Dunne commented that Stellantis has already reached a pretty consequential conclusion: competing with China may require partnering with China.
In addition to Stellantis’ new commitment to Dongfeng, that same week in May, Stellantis announced it is exploring expanding its strategic partnership with Leapmotor through a series of initiatives.
That’s like putting two rubber ducks on the same Jeep.
Joint ventures with Chinese brands are not new; they are just taking on a new shape.
They are no longer an entry point to selling cars in China, the world’s largest car market.
They are critical partnerships that could help non-Chinese OEMs survive China’s explosive growth in global car sales.
China’s passenger car exports in the first eight months of this year already surpassed last year’s total.
I don’t know if Dongfeng will build a city-sized complex to produce Jeeps the way Foxconn did to produce iPhones for Apple.
But it might be fun to visit “Chrysler Jeep Dodge Ram City” outside of Wuhan one day.
I hear the wet markets are fantastic.
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