(Yicai Global) July 3 -- The first television set has rolled off the production line at TCL Electronics Holdings’ Mexico plant, online news portal China News reported today.

Mass production at the first phase of the plant in Juarez, northern Mexico, started on June 30, after nine months of construction, the report said. The second stage will be built at a later date.

The plant, called Masa, mainly produces smart 8K resolution TV sets with 55-inch and above-sized screens for the North American market, Chief Executive Officer Wang Cheng said. It has the capability to make and assemble sophisticated modules and inner wiring and will use display screens supplied by TCL’s plants in China.

Last year, the Huizhou, Guangdong province-based electronics firm sold 20.64 million smart TVs, ranking it third in the world, the report said, citing US market survey firm NPD Group.

The company’s US market share of smart TVs rose to 17.4 percent in May from 14.8 percent in January. Its Mexico sales jumped nearly 80 percent in May to 8 percent from a year earlier.

TCL has a global production capacity of over 26 million TV sets a year with more than 10 plants in Vietnam, Brazil and Mexico. It also has research and development centers in the US, Europe and Japan.

Editor: Kim Taylor