Geely

Geely (officially Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd) is a Chinese multinational automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. Its principal products are automobiles, taxis, motorcycles, engines, and transmissions. It sells passenger cars under the Geely and Volvo brands and taxis under the London Taxi brand.

Geely has owned the Swedish passenger car maker Volvo Cars since 2010, when it acquired the company from Ford. It has owned the British taxi maker The London Taxi Company since 2012.

Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd (Chinese: 吉利汽车; pinyin: Jílì Qìchē) (SEHK: 0175), a subsidiary of Geely, is listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Name

Geely (Chinese: 吉利; pinyin: Jílì) means "auspicious" or "lucky" in Mandarin Chinese.

History

Founding Geely in 1986 as a refrigerator maker with money borrowed from family,Li Shufu transformed the company into a successful private automaker selling inexpensive products to Chinese consumers. A pioneer private Chinese automaker, in 2003 it remained the only domestic car manufacturer to lack ties to the Chinese state, although another indigenous, politically independent automaker, BYD Auto, was rising around this time. (Great Wall Motors may be considered another Chinese automaker less burdened with ties to the state.)