Leapmotor and Stellantis officially marked the start of production of the Leapmotor B10 at Stellantis’ plant in Zaragoza, Spain, on Friday, a milestone the companies said brings their alliance to life and reinforces their commitment to electric mobility that is “more accessible, competitive and made in Europe.”
Leapmotor had already said at the Paris Motor Show on October 12 that B10 production had officially started, and Friday’s event was the companies’ formal celebration of that milestone.
The compact electric SUV is the first Leapmotor model to be built in Europe since Stellantis halted assembly of the T03 city car at its Polish plant in April 2025, saying then that it was “evaluating different production options.”
Stellantis presented the project as part of its FaSTLAne 2030 strategy and described it as “a win-win partnership built on complementary strengths,” pairing its industrial expertise, manufacturing, quality standards and international presence with Leapmotor’s “innovation and technology capabilities.”
“This partnership goes beyond manufacturing, reflecting the strategic value that both Stellantis and Leapmotor bring to the project,” the statement said.
“The electric transition must also be an industrial transition,” said Silvia Vernetti, speaking for Stellantis. “If our partnership is the strategy, Zaragoza is the proof that we can combine global technology, competitiveness and European industrial capabilities.”
For Leapmotor, building the B10 in Spain is a further step in an internationalization strategy in which Europe is “a strategic part of its global plan,” the companies said.
“Our roots are in China and our ambition is global,” said Leapmotor Founder and President Zhu Jiangming. “Europe is a strategic part of that ambition, and producing in Zaragoza allows us to bring our technology closer to European markets and customers.”
The event drew an institutional delegation led by Aragon’s regional President Jorge Azcón and Spain’s Secretary of State for Industry Jordi García Brustenga, which the companies said underscored the project’s importance for Spanish industry and for positioning Aragon as a strategic region in the industry’s transformation.
Stellantis called the start of production “a new model of industrial cooperation that brings together global technology, European manufacturing and Spanish competitiveness.”
Leapmotor registered 73,297 cars in the European Union, the European Free Trade Association and Britain from January to August, up 449.9% from a year earlier, for a 0.8% market share, according to data from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA).
Why Zaragoza
The B10 joins the Opel Corsa, Peugeot 208 and Lancia Ypsilon at the Figueruelas plant, which Stellantis said was selected for its “quality, available capacity and industrial expertise.”
Neither company gave a capacity or volume figure in Friday’s statement, though the plant has an initial capacity of 40,000 cars a year, and Leapmotor Global Quality Director Ding Yongfei said in December that the B05, A10 and A05 would follow at the plant in 2027.
Building in the EU spares Leapmotor the countervailing duties the bloc has charged on Chinese-made electric cars since October 2024, on top of a standard 10% import duty, though neither partner has disclosed the rate Leapmotor’s imports pay.
Britain imposes no such additional duties, and Leapmotor has said UK buyers will keep receiving Chinese-built cars, with Spanish output directed at EU markets.
British ministers have said tariffs on Chinese-built EVs are under review, and Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds called the decision “finely balanced” on September 28.
Stellantis became Leapmotor’s largest shareholder in October 2023 with a stake of about 21%, since diluted to about 19%, and controls 51% of Leapmotor International, the joint venture with exclusive rights to sell and build Leapmotor cars outside Greater China.
The partnership is set to widen further.
Stellantis said in May it was assessing a new line at Zaragoza for an all-electric Opel C-segment SUV using Leapmotor technology, with a possible start in 2028, and allocating a new Leapmotor vehicle to its Villaverde plant in Madrid from the first half of 2028, while discussing a potential transfer of that plant’s ownership.
Sales Across Europe
Leapmotor’s best European month so far was June, with 12,829 registrations, while August, a seasonally weak month, brought 7,630, according to ACEA data.
In the European Union alone, registrations rose 526.7% in the first half to 48,261, ACEA data show.
National data for September show 2,652 registrations in Germany, according to the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA), 2,199 in Italy, according to importers’ association UNRAE, and 1,705 in Spain, according to ANFAC.
In Britain, Leapmotor had registered more than 11,000 cars by June, when its 2,150 registrations gave it 1% of the market, the company said.
Its European network reached 1,020 retailers in 36 countries in September, putting buyers an average of 22 minutes from a dealer, Leapmotor said.
The same statement said Europe “accounted for 27% of the brand’s August sales,” a figure that would imply about 27,800 cars against Leapmotor’s 103,129 global sales that month, far above the 7,630 August registrations ACEA recorded.
Stellantis put Europe’s share of Leapmotor’s 2026 global sales at 13% in an October 5 statement.
Leapmotor delivered a record 105,656 vehicles worldwide in September, up 59% from a year earlier, and 310,052 in the third quarter, up 78.34%.
Its deliveries for the first nine months reached 666,539, up 68.5% and already above its total for all of 2025, company data show.
It said it exported more than 27,000 cars in September and more than 150,000 in the first nine months, against a target of 150,000 to 200,000 vehicles outside China this year.
The B10 accounted for 17,598 of the 25,923 Leapmotor vehicles exported from China in September across the models listed in China Passenger Car Association data, about 68% of the total, though those figures cover all overseas markets and fall short of the company’s own export count.
The Paris Motor Show
Leapmotor used the Paris Motor Show to give the B03 hatchback its European premiere and to show the D19 flagship SUV outside China for the first time, on a 500-square-meter stand it called its largest in Europe, according to its Paris statement.
The B03 is a B-segment electric hatchback with up to 390 kilometers (242 miles) of WLTP range, a motor of up to 145 kilowatts and a 10% to 80% charge in 21 minutes, Leapmotor said.
It is due in Britain in early 2027, with no price announced, and carries a 53-kilowatt-hour lithium iron phosphate battery, according to Leapmotor.
Leapmotor has not said where UK-bound B03s will be built, although its Chinese-market twin, the A05, is among the models Ding has said will follow at Zaragoza.
The smaller B03X crossover is due in Britain before the end of this year, the company has said.
The D19, a six-seat range-extender SUV, has no European launch date, and Danilo Annese, Chief Executive Officer of Leapmotor International, questioned whether it suits the region.
“The issue isn’t the price of the car, it’s the dimensions,” Annese told Electrifying. “What worries me is that the 5.25-meter length of the car is more than some garages.”
He said the Middle East would get the D19 first and called Europe “still a question mark.”
The stand also carried the rest of the European lineup, the B03X, B05, B10, C10 and T03.
New Models and New Management
The B05 hatchback received a five-star rating from Euro NCAP, Leapmotor said in September, and it introduced a model-year 2027 C10 with longer range, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, and five new driver-assistance functions.
The company has also added plug-in hybrids as a third powertrain alongside battery-electric and range-extender models, and plans a second brand whose first product is due between late 2026 and mid-2027.
Annese took over as CEO of Leapmotor International on September 1, succeeding Tianshu Xin, who now runs Stellantis’ China and Asia-Pacific region, according to an October 9 statement.
Sander Jansen, General Manager of Stellantis Netherlands, will take over Annese’s former role running commercial operations for Enlarged Europe on November 1.
ACEA will publish September registration data for Europe on October 22.
