Mazda has declined to comment in detail on media reports it is to axe its unprofitable US car making joint venture AutoAlliance International.
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In a statement, the Japanese automaker said the reports were “not based on information released by Mazda. Mazda and Ford are jointly studying various possibilities for AAI, and we have nothing to announce at this time. We do not comment on speculation.”
Both the Nikkei business newspaper and Japan’s Kyodo news agency had said Mazda Motor was talking with Ford about ending the 50-50 joint venture in Flat Rock, Michigan, in 2013, selling its stake to its partner.
Mazda cars for the US would then come from Japan and a new plant to be built in Mexico, the Nikkei said.
Kyodo said the plant’s capacity use rate had dropped since the beginning of the global economic downturn in September 2008, Kyodo said.
Annual capacity is 240,000 units but Mazda built only 45,000 cars in the year ended March 2011, well short of the available 120,000,Kyodo said.
US production of Mazda’s 6 would revert to the Hofu plant in Yamaguchi Prefecture [the main source for units sold elsewhere – ed], Kyodo added.
The 6 is called the Atenza in Japan. It is also built in China where, late last year, reports said Ford and China joint venture partners, Mazda Motor and Chongqing Changan Automobile, had received government approval to end their three-way agreement.
Ford and Mazda would each set up separate 50-50 joint ventures with Changan at the end of 2010, the 21st Century Business Herald said.
