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A young Moroccan entrepreneur is hoping to create the first African-designed and engineered electric car.

Twenty-four-year-old Mohammed Yehya El Bakkali, who studied and lives in the UK, has founded the Atlas E-Mobility Group, along with his business partner and engineer Hicham Senhaji Hannoun.

Their company, officially launching on Thursday, wants to join forces with an established international car manufacturer to produce an electric SUV - but with a traditional and distinctive Moroccan design for the car's interior.

The idea is to construct the vehicles at a factory in Morocco.

The North African country has already transformed itself into a car-making hub, for multinationals such as Renault, and aims to produce one million vehicles a year.

Mr El Bakkali also hopes they can be involved in developing Africa's electric infrastructure.

"For us, the main three challenges that we find are: first - the range anxiety; second - the charging infrastructure availability and third - affordability," says Mr El Bakkali.

But he is confident the company can overcome these challenges and produce cars for the expanding middle class on the continent.

There have been announcements about similar projects by other companies in the past, but so far none of them have reached the production stage.

Production of the Atlas E-Mobility Group vehicles is planned to start in 2026.