A team of lawyers from Morris, Manning & Martin is advising HK Motors in its deal to launch a hybrid car manufacturing plant in Baldwin County, Ala.
The would-be carmaker most recently inked a $500 million development agreement with Italdesign Giugiaro to design and engineer a fleet of hybrid cars that Pasadena, Calif.-based HK Motors plans to begin producing in 2013 at a yet-to-be built plant in Bay Minette, Ala.
HK Motors has said it plans to make an initial $1.5 billion investment in the plant that will eventually make low-emission vehicles including sedans, SUVs, vans and taxis with hybrid engines that run on compressed natural gas, electricity and gasoline. The total planned investment is $4.3 billion
Morris Manning partners Tim Xia, Sandra S. Gardiner and F. Lawrence Street advised HK Motors on the development agreement with Turin, Italy-based Italdesign, which also has collaborated with companies such as BMW and Lamborghini. The firm also advised HK Motors on its organizational structure, production agreements, financing, employment issues, intellectual property, technology transfer and local government incentives.
Xia, through a spokeswoman, declined to comment on the deal.
HK Motors, according to press reports, has creative funding plans for its venture, which include raising money via the EB-5 visa program, which offers U.S. citizenship to Chinese who invest at least $500,000 in the project. The company has said it intends to meet this year's goal of raising $1.3 billion via a Hong Kong stock filing submitted by Far East Golden Resources, a company controlled by HK Motors' founder and CEO, Benjamin Yeung.
Yeung is the former chairman and CEO of Chinese automaker Brilliance Group.