General Motors has announced an additional US$1bn spend on its US manufacturing operations, as heralded by earlier media reports.
“These investments follow $2.9bn announced in 2016 and more than $21bn GM has invested in its US operations since 2009,” the automaker said in a statement.
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“The new investments cover multiple new vehicle, advanced technology and component projects. A combination of 1,500 new and retained jobs are tied to the new investments. Details of individual projects will be announced throughout the year.”
The company also announced it will begin work on in-sourcing axle production for its next generation full-size pickup trucks, including work previously done in Mexico, to operations in Michigan, creating 450 US jobs.
“As the US manufacturing base increases its competitiveness, we are able to further increase our investment, resulting in more jobs for America and better results for our owners,” said GM chairman and CEO Mary Barra. “The US is our home market and we are committed to growth that is good for our employees, dealers, and suppliers and supports our continued effort to drive shareholder value.”
GM said its announcement is part of the company’s increased focus on overall efficiency over the last four years. With a strategy to streamline and simplify its operations and grow its business, it has created 25,000 jobs in the US − approximately 19,000 engineering, IT and professional jobs and 6,000 hourly manufacturing jobs – and added nearly $3bn in annual wages and benefits to the US economy over that period. At the same time, GM reduced more than 15,000 positions outside the US, bringing most of those jobs to America. During that period, the company moved from 90% of its IT work being outsourced to an insourced US-based model.
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By GlobalData“We will continue our commitment to driving a more efficient business,” added Barra, “as shown by our insourcing of more than 6,000 IT jobs that were formerly outside the US, streamlining our engineering operations from seven to three, with the core engineering centre being in Warren, Michigan, and building on our momentum at GM Financial and in advanced technologies. These moves, and others, are expected to result in more than 5,000 new jobs in the US over the next few years.”
GM has also been facilitating its supplier base to do the same. The company has been building supplier parks adjacent to its US manufacturing sites (already accomplished at Fairfax Assembly Plant in Kansas, Spring Hill in Tennessee, Fort Wayne in Indiana, and Lordstown in Ohio), and will continue to expand this effort.
“Supplier parks locating near assembly plants result in significant savings from reduced transportation costs, higher quality communications and continuous improvement activities as suppliers are located closer to the final assembly location,” GM said.
In addition, GM is confirming that another supplier has committed to make components for GM’s next-generation full size pick-up trucks in Michigan, moving 100 supplier jobs from Mexico to the US.
