Just about everything I have bought out of the MB Lifestyles Collection catalog was made in China (flashlight, umbrella, keychain, etc.) and they seem to be of good quality. I think it’s reasonable to assume that the cars might be next.
January 30, 2008 – Chinese-made Mercedes-Benz C class will be launched in Chinese market by mid-March and it will be slightly cheaper than imported units, a sales official from Beijing-Benz-Daimler-Chrysler (BBDC) told SZBENZ.com
Mercedes Benz C class was imported to Chinese market early November last year and it was priced at 398,000 yuan ($55,278) to 497,000 yuan ($69,000) in Chinese market.
The home-made Benz C class vehicles, available in C200 and C280, will be 10,000 yuan ($1,389) to 20,000 yuan ($2,778) cheaper than imported units as it has some home-made local auto parts contents.
Mercedes also sold 2,000 C class vehicles in Chinese market just one month after being launched in last November.
Last year, Mercedes sold 11,500 S class vehicles in Chinese market, which has become the model’s largest market world wide after the United States.
E class is the only Mercedes- Benz model locally produced in China. Last year, Beijing Mercedes-Benz produced 6,882 E class vehicles, up 25 percent from one year earlier.
Mercedes-Benz sold a total number of 30,630 vehicles in Chinese market (including Hong Kong and Macau) last year, an increase of 50 percent from one year earlier.
The C class is cheap, price is the same compare to Honda Accord and VW Passat, So that makes lots of people buy it recently, you can see C class everywhere on the street, just as VW Passat.
For the E class, E200 W212 will be put into production in the start of 2010, Mercedes Benz designing center in China will make few changes towards the German version W212. The whole chassis will be made more stronger in order to pass the 5000kg roof crash test, and the fuel system has to be changed to become more friendly to Leaded gas. Last, the whole body will be stretched about 15cm in order to give more leg room on the back seat. All those changes will be made based on German E200 CGI model, but CGI won’t appear on chinese version W212 due to unsuitable gas quality.
For the S class and ML class, Mercedes Benz of China will make careful consideration to judge it whether it’s nice to manufacture in China or not. But for sure, S class W221 will be made in Beijing within 2 years, but not sure for the ML class……
For all… What will Chinese-Citizens think about German starts to grab their money away???….LOL…
October 8th, 2009 at 9:56 am
Bought this car for my wife…..what a way to get points and out of the dog house. She loves it and has fun driving it as well. So far so good with no let downs. Good visiability with no blind spots. It likes tires though…..
We will definitely look at the new C-Class models when it’s time to retire this one, which it appears make take a while.