Workers assemble vehicles at a joint venture between Guangzhou Automobile Group and one of its Japanese partners, Honda, in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

Partnerships with leading multinationals have helped Guangzhou Automobile Group, also known as GAC, the major automobile manufacturer based in southern China, to develop an efficient production and trade platform, according to a senior executive of the company.

"After establishing joint ventures, especially with top automakers in Japan and the United States over the past few years, we developed our own production methods which helped to greatly increase output capacity and reduce costs," said Wu Song, executive vice-president.

GAC, based in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province, has established joint ventures with Japanese brands including Honda, Toyota and Mitsubishi, Fiat from Italy and Chrysler from the US, producing several varieties of the top brands.

"The joint ventures helped our expansion in the domestic market, bringing huge market growth to us," Wu said.

Last year, GAC produced 1.66 million vehicles and sales reached 1.65 million units, an increase of about 30 percent and 27 percent, respectively, from the previous year, Wu said.

In the first quarter of the current year, the company sold more than 450,000 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 37.64 percent.

"The dramatic increase both in production and sales was attributed to the establishment of an efficient production and trade platform, which resulted from cooperation with top overseas automobile manufacturers," Wu said.

After upgrading its manufacturing line in 2014, GAC says it is now able to produce a vehicle in 57 seconds.

"The upgraded manufacturing line also greatly boosted our product quality, which helped us to maintain a leading position in the domestic automobile market," Wu said.

Partnerships with Japanese carmakers helped to integrate domestic resources with advanced overseas technology and management expertise in GAC's production.

"We will launch more joint-venture varieties to optimize the production structure and meet growing market demand."

In the wake of big sales of vehicles made from joint ventures, GAC is also positioning itself to develop homegrown vehicles－under the brand of Trumpchi, which was launched in 2008.

"We will give priority to developing our proprietary brands in the near future, as the Chinese market has entered an era of homegrown vehicles," Wu said.

GAC Group sold more than 380,000 Trumpchi vehicles in 2016, a year-on-year surge of 96 percent.

"A self-innovated production line and global research and development and supply chain network played a key role in boosting sales of homegrown vehicles," he said.

According to Wu, GAC Group is also focusing on overseas expansion and exporting more homegrown vehicles to developed markets.

GAC's auto R&D center in the US is under construction, which will enable the company to develop more advanced technology.

The group's goal is to produce nearly 3 million vehicles and sell more than 2.4 million vehicles in 2020, with sales projected to exceed 400 billion yuan ($58.10 billion).

Guangzhou, in the heart of the Pearl River Delta, has facilitated cooperation in trade and investment with Japan, since China's reform and opening-up started in the late 1970s.

In addition to cooperation in the auto sector, some technology powerhouses and leading bankers from Japan－including Sony, Panasonic, Hitachi, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp and Mizuho Bank－have also opened businesses in Guangzhou.

In 2016, Guangzhou's imports and exports with Japan were worth a total of 84.68 billion yuan, an increase of 12.5 percent year-on-year.

By the end of 2016, Japanese companies had invested an estimated $5.24 billion in the region and established 626 joint ventures in Guangzhou.

Meanwhile, Guangzhou-based enterprises have invested a combined $6.56 million in 16 joint businesses in Japan, according to Guangzhou government sources.