SEOUL, Aug 30 (Reuters) - South Korea’s Samsung SDI plans to invest about 400 billion won ($358 million) to build a plant to make electric vehicle batteries in Hungary, the company said on Tuesday, joining the race to build capacity and tap European demand at a time of disappointing Chinese demand.

Samsung SDI, whose customers include BMW, said the proposed factory near Budapest would start production in the second half of 2018 and it would be able to produce batteries used for 50,000 pure electric vehicles.

The plant will “help us save logistics costs and quickly cope with demand from customers, as European companies have manufacturing bases around Hungary,” Samsung SDI, an affiliate of Samsung Electronics, said in a statement. ($1=1,118.2100 won) (Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)