DaimlerChrysler - To increase plant size in Vance, Alabama - Brief Article

DaimlerChrysler will spend $600 million to double the size and annual capacity of its U.S. plant in Vance, Ala., by late 2003. The expanded facility will go on line in time for the launch of a completely redesigned M-Class SUV, and will be capable of building 160,000 units a year. Consequently, Mer cedes will end supplemental production of the M-Class at the Steyr-Daimler-Puch plant in Graz, Austria, when the three-year contract expires at the end of 2003. The SDP plant is owned by Canadian super-supplier Magna.

Overseeing the expansion is Helmut Petri, the divisional board member for production. Petri, 60, keeps Mercedes-Benz assembly plants in Germany, South America, Brazil and the U.S. humming. He is the prime architect of the Mercedes-Benz production system, which incorporates many of the lean processes first used by Mercedes at the M-Class plant.

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