Li Shufu started Geely in Taizhou in 1986 making refrigerator parts, moved into motorcycles in the 1990s and produced the first Geely car in 1998. Geely bought Volvo Cars from Ford in 2010 and took stakes in Proton and Lotus in 2017. It launched Lynk & Co and Zeekr as new brands. By 2025 the group's brands were selling more than four million vehicles a year. In August 2026 Li stepped down as chairman of Geely Auto, handing the role to An Conghui, but he remains chairman of Geely Holding. The company is headquartered in Hangzhou, China.
Geely Holding is a holding company rather than a single carmaker. Most of its volume comes from Geely Automobile Holdings, the Hong Kong-listed unit that sells Geely, Geely Galaxy, Lynk & Co and Zeekr vehicles; that unit sold 3,024,567 vehicles in 2025 and reported revenue of ~$48 billion (RMB 345.2 billion). Separately listed or partly owned affiliates such as Volvo Cars, Polestar and Lotus Technology serve premium and performance segments in Europe and other export markets, while smart is run as a joint venture with Mercedes-Benz and LEVC, Proton and Farizon cover taxis, the Malaysian market and commercial vehicles. The group shares vehicle architectures, powertrains and purchasing across brands. Its January 2026 strategy, called One Geely, targets deeper coordination between these brands.