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Wire & Cable ASIA – September/October 2011
45
From the
americas
spare for the host country was devoted to his company’s
plans to move production of the Mercedes C-Class for the
North American market to its facility in Alabama in 2014.
He also mentioned the opening of a new dealership on the
West Side of Manhattan, the only company-owned Mercedes
location in the United States.
❖
❖
An announcement of Daimler’s joint venture with Aston
Martin to revive the moribund Maybach nameplate
could be expected within the month, Dr Zetsche told
the roomful of journalists in June. Otherwise, Mr Schultz
reported, everything said by the Daimler chairman was
to do with emerging markets. While buyers for a low-
volume luxury limo might come from the West, Dr Z made
plain his expectation that the customers who will support
Mercedes “for another 125 years” would be sought and
found in the East.
Volkswagen, having regained some
ground in the US, raises its goal:
sales of more than a million vehicles
per year by 2018
If the misbegotten DaimlerChrysler merger and breakup
have left Daimler AG with a jaundiced view of the United
States, another important German car maker has no such
qualms. Volkswagen intends to rebuild its brand in the US
with a Passat for the American market, and it is setting the
bar very high at its new $1-billion factory in Chattanooga,
Tennessee. “We know what we have to do here,” Hans-
Herbert Jagla, who heads human resources at the plant, told
the
Los Angeles Times
at the opening in June. “Everyone
should know that the customer is expecting a perfect car.”
Reporting from Chattanooga, the
Times
’s Jerry Hirsch noted
that Volkswagen, the world’s third-largest auto maker, is
looking to triple its US sales over the next seven years. To do
so, the company must reverse a troubled history. A previous
project to manufacture cars in the US was an acknowledged
debacle. Over two decades ago, quality problems and
slumping sales prompted VW to close its first US factory, in
Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania.
Mr Hirsch, who covers the automotive industry for the
Los Angeles paper, wrote: “It was a huge setback for the
company that brought the iconic Beetle across the Atlantic,
making VW America’s first import darling.”
Now, however, having made a commitment to remedy
management and production problems that plagued its first
American factory, VW is beginning again in the United States.
Its target for US sales is more than a million vehicles per
year by 2018, within which time frame the company wants to
command a US market share of 6%. (“VW Opens Tennessee
Plant with New Focus on Quality,” 3
rd
June).