BMW's Plant Spartanburg in South Carolina is in the final phases of gearing up for production of the redesigned X5, which begins later this summer.
Since launch in 1999, the large SUV, now in its fourth generation, has sold 2.2m units world wide across the first three model generations. The plant has been expanded several times since it opened in 1994, initially building the 318 sedan.
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Generation four X5 will be the tenth X model to be produced at Spartanburg and follows the production launch of the X4 last April. The factory also builds the X3 and X6. Output is planned to ramp up to fully use yearly capacity of 450,000 units.
With President Trump's tariff war just beginning, BMW is keen to emphasise South Carolina is the single largest exporter of automobiles by value in the US. Since the introduction of the original X5, two of every three vehicles produced were exported for sale outside the US. When considering the Spartanburg-built X3, X4, X5, and X6 together, over 70% of annual production is exported.
Spartanburg workforce has grown from an initial 500 people in 1994 to around 10,000 today with another 1,000 expected to join by 2021.
A 2017 study by the University of South Carolina found for every 10 jobs that are directly generated at a US BMW facility, an additional 90 jobs are created elsewhere in the US economy as a direct result.
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By GlobalDataBMW US purchasing of parts and materials for production at the plant totalled nearly US$6bn in 2017 from over 300 US supplier companies.
