(Yicai Global) Nov. 25 -- China's Great Wall Motors and global automobile giant BMW have made great progress in their CNY5.1 billion (USD725 million) cooperation project.

The Jiangsu Provincial Development and Reform Commission last week passed the project, which will finish and go into operation in 2022.

The completed complex will produce 160,000 vehicles per year for export and will research and develop pure electric passenger cars.

Baoding, Hebei province-based Great Wall Motors' shares [SHA:601633] ticked up 1.1 percent to CNY9.4 (USD1.37) at 10.30 a.m. today while the overall benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose a mere 0.7 percent. The stock closed up 0.54 percent at CNY9.33.

The project will break ground next year in Zhangjiagang, a Yangtze River port in China's eastern Jiangsu province. Its construction period is 24 months, per the commission's approval document, Great Wall said in a statement it released on Nov. 22.

Only production of fuel passenger cars got the green light, however. Pure electric cars will need a separate approval, according to the document.

The project also still needs to pass muster with the country's commerce ministry.

The Great Wall Motors-BMW wholly-owned subsidiary BMW Nederland inked a deal in July last year to form a 50-50 joint venture company to build a plant making fuel passenger cars and developing pure electric vehicles, but that project has made no significant progress, with talks deadlocked over strategic and cultural differences in August, per a report by German media, which Great Wall Motors immediately denied.

Editor: Ben Armour