[Photo provided to China Daily]

Shanghai Volkswagen became China's first car maker to produce 12 million vehicles after an orange Lamando rolled off its production line on Dec 27. It celebrated the debut of its 11 millionth car in June.

Statistics showed that the automaker sold more than 16.07 million cars in the first 11 months of 2014, a 14.2 percent rise from the same period last year.

The automaker said technological innovation guaranteed the popularity of its products. Shanghai Volkswagen established its research and development center in 1996. Now it has 11 research and development-related departments that employ 1,500 engineers. The automaker said more than 10 billion yuan was earmarked for research and development from 2011 to 2013.