BYD makes history with California bus factory

Investment by Chinese automaker to provide 'hundreds of jobs' in US

Billboards along Southern California's Antelope Valley Freeway read "Lancaster welcomes BYD", heralding the opening of a bus factory by the Chinese maker of electric vehicles and batteries.

BYD Co on Wednesday became the first company from China to announce it will produce vehicles in the United States. It plans to build as many as 1,000 plug-in electric buses a year at a refurbished recreational-vehicle factory in the Mojave Desert city of Lancaster.