 |
|
|
Something new in your business? Click here to submit your business press release Chamber Corner | Main Street News | Job Hunt | Classifieds | Calendar | Illinois Lottery |
||
|
||
|
BMW said the United Kingdom would still be the
main manufacturing base for the MINI but said production of the
MINI Hatch model would be split between Oxford and a factory in
Born, Netherlands run by contract manufacturer VDL Nedcar. The company expects MINI production volumes at the Dutch factory
to reach a five-digit figure this year, with around 1,500 people
responsible for building the new MINI. "The MINI brand is showing substantial growth," BMW's head of
production Harald Krueger said in a statement. "This is why we need additional, external production capacity on
top of the capacity of the MINI plant in Oxford which stands at
about 260,000 units per year in the medium term." BMW Group is further diversifying production of the MINI as part
of a growth strategy to reach a sales target of over 2 million
vehicles by 2016. BMW already has a production agreement with MSF in Graz, Austria
where it made 125,559 MINI Countryman and MINI Paceman models in
2013. Of the overall 303,177 MINI vehicles produced in 2013 only just
over half, or 175,986 versions of the MINI Hatch, Convertible,
Clubman, Clubvan, Roadster and Coupé models, were made in
Oxford. VDL Nedcar staff are currently receiving training on the BMW
Group production system at the BMW plants in Leipzig, Oxford and
Regensburg, BMW said. Since the relaunch of the brand in 2001, nearly 2.8 million MINI
vehicles have been produced, according to BMW. (Reporting by Edward Taylor; editing by Arno Schuetze) [© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved.] Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
