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A car workshop in Jiaxing, East China's Zhejiang province. [Photo/zj.zjol.com.cn]

The output value of the automobile manufacturing sector in Jiaxing, East China's Zhejiang province hit 37.8 billion yuan ($5.82 billion) in the first three quarters of this year, up 23.6 percent year-on-year, official statistics show.

The city has in recent years emerged as a production hub for new energy vehicles. From January to September, more than 115,000 units of new energy vehicles were produced in the city, accounting for 27.7 percent of the total in Zhejiang and more than any other city in the province.

Zhejiang Hozon New Energy Automobile is an example of how the new energy vehicle sector in the city is booming.

Located in Tongxiang, a county-level city in Jiaxing, the carmaker delivered over 110,000 units of new energy vehicles in the first three quarters of this year, a whopping 168 percent year-on-year rise.

The company's sales of new energy vehicles has also been rising for 27 months in a row. One of its bestselling models is the Nezha - which achieved more than monthly delivery of 18,000 units.

Shen Shuiwen, chief engineer and director of the Intelligent Driving Research Institute at Hozon New Energy Automobile, said the company's rapid development is partly due to the annual World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit that takes place in Wuzhen, an ancient town in Tongxiang.

"The summit has spawned many new scenarios, new applications and new models, bringing unprecedented opportunities for the development of the new energy vehicle industry," said Shen.

A slew of preferential policies rolled out by the local government, he added, have also increased the city's attractiveness to talents in the automobile field.

Jiaxing has set a target of lifting the output value of its auto manufacturing sector to 100 billion yuan during the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) period.