DETROIT - General Motors said today it will spend $200 million to build an engine and components plant in Joinville City, Brazil.
Production will begin in the fourth quarter of 2009. Once operating, the plant will employ 500 workers and generate 1,300 indirect jobs, GM said in a statement.
"The decision to build a new engine plant in Brazil is essential to our ability to expand vehicle production capacity throughout the Mercosur Region," said Jaime Ardila, President of General Motors Brazil and Mercosur. Mercosur is a free-trade zone created by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.
The plant, about 320 miles south of Sao Paulo, Brazil, will have capacity to build 120,000 engines and 50,000 cylinder heads annually. At full capacity, it will run three shifts.
Last year, GM spent $500 million on its Brazilian unit to develop small cars and to expand its product development center there. GM also designated Brazil as its lead center for designing mid-sized trucks. The cars and mid-sized trucks are intended for emerging markets, but in an interview with Automotive News in December, GM’s head of that region indicated that might change.
"GM will play that global engineering talent as it needs it, and it recognizes the huge amount of talent we have," Maureen Kempston Darkes, GM's group vice president and president of Latin America, Africa and Middle East, said in an interview. "When you've been designated the lead of mid-sized trucks, that also opens up new and important opportunities, so watch for that to come."
At that time, Darkes said the engineering center in Brazil is very important to GM. She added: “It's been designated as one of the six global engineering centers."
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