Three years after retiring, An Jin, a former chairman of Jianghuai Automobile Group, or JAC Motors, is brought back into the public eye due to a corruption investigation.

An, 67, is suspected of serious violations of discipline and law, the local regulator of party discipline in Anhui province said on its website today.

An retired in 2021 after being the chairman of the maker of passenger vehicles and trucks since 2012. Before that, he was deputy general manager and institute director, climbing the corporate ladder since 1975, according to public information.

During An’s tenure, JAC partnered with Nio to help the electric vehicle startup produce its early models but last year, the manufacturer sold two plants to Shanghai-based Nio. Moreover, in 2017, JAC set up a joint venture with Volkswagen to make EVs and the German partner hiked its shareholding in the JV to 75 percent in 2020.

JAC may have turned its profitability around last year as the company expects to report a net profit of CNY136 million (USD18.8 million) with sales of 592,500 units, up by 18 percent from 2022. The firm exported 169,600 units last year, rising by 48 percent.

In 2022, JAC recorded a loss of CNY1.6 billion (USD221.2 million) while revenue slid by 9 percent to CNY36.6 billion (USD5.1 billion), according to its earnings report. The golden era seems to have been before 2016 as the firm hiked its revenue year by year to CNY52.5 billion in 2016 from CNY29.1 billion in 2012. Meanwhile, net profit rose to CNY1.2 billion from CNY495 million during those five years.

（Picture: Veer）