Renault says it is looking to establish suppliers as close as possible to its French sites in a bid to drive component delivery efficiency.
Addressing delegates at this year’s Forum on the European Automotive Industry in Lille (FEAL), the French automaker stressed the vibrancy of its home market, while also revealing its intent to group suppliers where possible, near to its factories.
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France has undergone a torrid economic time both during the depths of the recent economic recession, but also as it looks to exit the global malaise, which is still seeing unemployment figures remain stubbornly high at around 10.3%, although better data has emerged of late.
“I hear a lot of French people are very pessimistic about the future [but] France has a great number of assets,” said Renault production and logistics director, Jose-Vicente de los Mozos, addressing the Lille delegates. “I am very optimistic with regards to France’s industrial future. Industry is something we have to work on every day.
“Suppliers next to our plants would allow us to improve our industrial tools. It is a extremely important to be able to have good suppliers, so we are working on a strategy where all the major parks will be next to our factories.
“We think we could really improve on that so we could have a very short response time as well. It is extremely important [also] to work on automation of our sites.
“We would like to make sure our suppliers are closer to our sites so we can reduce our stock and logistics costs.”
De los Mozos noted Renault, as the world’s 11th largest automaker, was the only domestic manufacturer “not to close a site in France,” but that Europe remained “extremely volatile” which had translated to some extent to France.
“Nowadays, we don’t know what is going to happen in the next 12 months, so we have got to prepare nevertheless,” said De los Mozos. “From a society point of view it can cause a lot of anxiety.
“We have got to give the impression of calm and tranquillity. Management is not a question of powerpoint – it is about observing what is on the ground.”
