(Yicai) April 25 -- Shares in Zhejiang Rongtai Electric Material climbed today after the Chinese manufacturer of high-temperature-resistant insulators logged big jumps in profitability and earnings in the first three months and after it said it will build a factory in Mexico as the firm’s overseas business expands.

Rongtai’s share price [SHA:603119] closed up 0.31 percent at CNY25.60 (USD3.53). Earlier in the day it advanced 2.7 percent to hit CNY26.22.

Rongtai will invest USD10.8 million through its Singapore unit to build a factory in Mexico, the Jiaxing-based company said today. The plant will make new energy vehicle parts and will have an annual production capacity of 500,000 units. The types of components, the construction timetable and the location of the factory were not mentioned.

Rongtai has gathered several orders from overseas clients in the last four months. In March it said it had bagged a USD51.4 million order for insulators that can prevent battery packs’ thermal runaways from a North American client. It follows an order in December worth up to USD358 million for similar insulators from another foreign NEV maker and the same month it secured an order for USD110 million of battery insulators from an overseas battery manufacturer.

Rongtai, which counts major Chinese battery manufacturer Contemporary Amperex Technology and foreign carmakers such as BMW and Tesla among its clients, is reaping the benefits from a boom in global new energy vehicle sales.

The firm’s profit in the first three months surged 51.1 percent year on year to CNY46.8 million (USD6.4 million), according to the first quarter report released yesterday. Revenue soared 40.4 percent to CNY215 million (USD29.7 million).

And over the course of last year, Rongtai logged a 28.4 percent jump in net profit from the year before to CNY172 million (USD23.7 million), while revenue surged 19.9 percent to CNY800 million (USD110.4 million), according to its 2023 earnings report also published yesterday.

Sales of its insulators that prevent thermal runaways soared 22.4 percent year on year to CNY575 million, accounting for 71.8 percent in Rongtai’s yearly revenue.

Editor: Kim Taylor