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TAIPEI, July 24 (Reuters) - Taiwan's largest carmaker, China Motor Corp , said on Wednesday its joint venture in China, South East (Fujian) Motor, or Soueast, will become the mainland's largest van maker in 2003.
Soueast expects to sell 90,000-100,000 vans next year, compared with an expected 45,000 in 2002 and 30,022 in 2001, vice president Jan Yi-ching told Reuters.
Sales for the China venture will even jump to 150,000 vans in 2004 and 250,000-300,000 in 2005, he said in an interview.
"Demand has been unexpectedly strong. We may reach our goal of selling 300,000 cars on the mainland ahead of schedule. We didn't expect our goal to be realised so fast," Jan said.
The 2003 forecast will exceed the production of China's biggest van maker, Brilliance China , which now has capacity of just over 60,000.
Soueast's pretax profit this year is expected to be around 300 million yuan (US$36 million), up 50 percent from 200.3 million yuan in 2001. Soueast is a 50-50 joint venture between China Motor and Fujian's provincial government.
The interview was conducted after close of trade on Wednesday. China Motor shares edged down 0.24 percent to close at T$41.20, outperforming a 2.32 percent decline in the benchmark TAIEX index.
(US$1 = 8.3 yuan)