By Margit Feher

BUDAPEST--South Korean firm Samsung SDI Co. Ltd. (006400.SE) will spend 100 billion forints ($362 million) on building an electric-car battery plant near Budapest, a Hungarian government official said on Tuesday.

The plant, which will create 600 jobs, is expected to manufacture 50,000 batteries annually by 2018, when running at full capacity, Jeong Seh-Woong, executive vice president at Samsung SDI Co. Ltd., said at a press conference.

Electric vehicles are getting more cost competitive and Samsung SDI projects that more than 25 million electric vehicles will be manufactured a year by 2025, the Samsung executive added.

Samsung SDI supplies car batteries for German luxury car maker BMW AG (BMW.XE) in South Korea.

Hungary, which is home to several car makers, will support the investment with infrastructure development near the site and a local-tax holiday, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said.

With the investment, Samsung SDI will return to Hungary as a manufacturer after it closed in 2014 a color picture television tube plant in God, north of Budapest, where the new plant will also be built.

Write to Margit Feher at margit.feher@wsj.com; Twitter: @margitfeher

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 30, 2016 06:20 ET (10:20 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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