VinFast plans to resume construction of its manufacturing plant in North Carolina, in the United States by 2028, as reported by Automotive News.
The decision comes even as the Vietnamese automaker faces heavy financial losses and surging construction costs.
Those winds had already led VinFast to pause construction of the assembly plant project in 2024 so that it could re-evaluate the situation. It has evidently now decided move go ahead once again, but there’s a consequence to all that re-evaluating: the facility will likely be considerably smaller than originally planned. And that means fewer jobs. Current forecasts suggest the site could eventually employ up to 1,400 people—nowhere near the 7,500 jobs the manufacturer initially promised to create.
Given the terms of the contract signed with the state of North Carolina, VinFast may be required to pay penalties. Namely, the automaker might forfeit the subsidies originally promised by various levels of government.
VinFast “recently resumed development activities,” the company told Automotive News. “As with any large-scale, multi-phase industrial project, we continually re-evaluate the project scope and implementation timeline to align them with current market conditions and our global manufacturing strategy.”
VinFast in Canada
VinFast’s first vehicles arrived in Canada in 2023. At that time, the lineup consisted of only one model, the VF 8 electric crossover, comparable in size to the Tesla Model Y. When it debuted, the model held a distinct advantage over the competition: immediate availability, but that no longer is the case. The manufacturer has since expanded its offering by adding the VF 9 to its Canadian roster, but that three-row midsize SUV has generated only limited sales to date.
While the development of the dealership network has stagnated in Canada, the manufacturer continues to struggle with an unenviable reputation regarding the quality of its products.