{"id":131815,"date":"2018-11-30T09:09:24","date_gmt":"2018-11-30T14:09:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=131815"},"modified":"2018-11-30T10:05:14","modified_gmt":"2018-11-30T15:05:14","slug":"fca-pledges-5-7b-investment-in-italian-auto-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2018\/11\/fca-pledges-5-7b-investment-in-italian-auto-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"FCA Pledges $5.7B Investment in Italian Auto Plants"},"content":{"rendered":"
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FCA CEO Mike Manley signed off on a $5.7 billion investment plan in the company's facilities in Italy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles said this week that its plants in Italy would return to full employment with a $5.7 billion investment in new cars and engine technology, including a fully electric version of the Fiat 500 city car and a plug-in hybrid Alfa Romeo compact utility vehicle.<\/p>\n

The FCA announcement plans to mollify anxious union workers\u00a0\u2013 and uneasy political factions in its home country \u2013 offer a sharp contrast to the tack taken by General Motors Co., which announced plans to close seven plants and eliminate 15,000 jobs.<\/p>\n

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Dig Deeper!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

GM\u2019s announcement angered union officials in the U.S. and Canada as well as figures from opposite end of the political spectrum, such as U.S. President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.<\/p>\n

FCA is also expected to face pressure from the United Auto Workers and Unifor, the Canadian auto workers union, for further details on its future investment plans in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. FCA, however, is in the process of completing major investment in new products and equipment at plants in Toledo, Ohio, Sterling Heights, Michigan, and Belvidere, Illinois.<\/p>\n

During a meeting with unions representing Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V.\u2019s Italian workers, FCA\u2019s top executive said they plan to invest $5.7 billion in 13 new or restyled models during the next three years.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Part of the new $5.7 billion investment in Italy will result in a new battery-electric Fiat 500.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

(FCA, Honda and VW lead October auto sales. <\/em>Click Here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for the story.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

FCA CEO Mike Manley, who replaced Sergio Marchionne in July,\u00a0said during the meeting in Turin that the automaker would\u00a0also\u00a0continue its developing hybrid and fully electric engine technology.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Italian unions have been seeking reassurances for Italy’s under-utilized plants since a new five-year strategy was announced in June. The five-year plan was assembled under Marchionne\u2019s watchful eye prior to his sudden death.<\/p>\n

“It is a courageous plan in a difficult context, in which, for example, the U.S. automotive industry is significantly reducing its workforce,” said the secretary general of the Uilm metalworkers’ union, Rocco Palombella.<\/p>\n

(<\/em>Click\u00a0<\/a><\/span><\/strong>Here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for more about FCA’s Q3 profits.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The all-electric 500 will be built in Mirafiori, in Turin, while the Alfa Romeo utility vehicle will be built in Pomigliano, near Naples, along with a mild hybrid version of the compact Panda, according FCA executives.<\/p>\n

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The company plans to build a hybrid for Alfa Romeo with the new investment.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A big part of the investments in Italy will focus on the development of electric and hybrid models and the creation of common platforms that can be used to develop different vehicles to boost efficiencies and flexibility, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are investments that are capable of being implemented and kick off tomorrow morning,\u201d said Pietro Gorlier, who took over management of FCA\u2019s operations in Europe last month. Gorlier also noted that additional plans for Italy and other plants in Europe \u2013 in Poland, Serbia and Turkey \u2013 would be announced later.<\/p>\n

(To see more about FCA’s plan to move Ram pickup production out of Mexico,\u00a0<\/em>Click Here<\/a><\/span>.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

FCA\u2019s operating margin in Europe improved to 3.2% last year, but this compares with rival carmaker PSA Group\u2019s global automotive margin of 7.3%, analysts noted\u00a0FCA expects its margin to grow to between 5 and 7% by 2022, according to the plan outlined in June.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles said this week that its plants in Italy would return to full employment with a $5.7 billion investment in new cars and engine technology, including a fully electric version of the Fiat 500 city car and a plug-in hybrid Alfa Romeo compact utility vehicle. Find out more at TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4389,"featured_media":128101,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8,5,13,9],"tags":[],"make":[33,51,54],"post-state":[],"category_old":[208,150,151,123,289,155,299,191,262,171,154,132,125,139,148,278,288,141],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131815"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4389"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131815"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131815\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131815"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=131815"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=131815"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=131815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}