An investment arm of Goldman Sachs is in talks with China's biggest privately-owned car maker Geely Automotive to buy about $250 million (£154 million) of the company's convertible bonds and warrants, it emerged today.

"The two sides have basically agreed on the investment in Geely already, but have yet to work out some technical details," one source told Reuters.

Geely, whose parent Geely Holding Group is eyeing Ford's Swedish car brand Volvo, plans to use the proceeds to boost its production capacity, including adding 150,000 units of annual capacity in the central province of Hunan, which is producing 50,000 units per year, said the source.

It will also buy auto-related assets from its parent, said the source.

Geely said this month its parent was considering a bid for Volvo with a local government-backed investment firm. Geely was said to be in talks with Canadian car parts group Magna to help out on its takeover of the Vauxhall/Opel car operations in Europe.

Founded in 1986, Geely rapidly moved from its original task of making refrigerators to motorbikes and then cars.