Cars Make Canada Go

Ontario's automobile industry is central to the province's economic prosperity. Fourteen major automobile assembly plants are located in the province, employing more than 130,000 workers. Vehicle assembly capacity has grown 28 percent in Ontario since 1996, compared to just 3 percent at U.S. plants.
        Employment at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada's Cambridge plant will climb to 3,900 once 700 newly created jobs are filled. TMMC announced in September that it would boost production of its Matrix and Corolla models and begin production of the Lexus — the first time the car will be produced outside of Japan.
        Once the added capacity is in place, the Cambridge plant will be more than three million square feet (278,700 sq. m.) in size; more than $1.9 billion will have been invested.
        Ford, on the other hand, is closing its pickup truck assembly plant in Oakville as part of its restructuring plan. As many as 1,500 workers are affected. Mitigating that news is General Motors' plan to start a third shift at its Oshawa plant, which will add 1,000 jobs to the payroll, and to invest via its CAMI alliance with Suzuki Motor Corp. $315 million in the joint venture's plant in Ingersoll, Ont. CAMI will produce a Chevrolet compact SUV called the Equinox at the site. DaimlerChrysler announced in February its intention to invest $290 million in its Windsor plant to build the Pacifica.
        Nemak of Canada, a joint venture between Ford and Mexican Alfa Corporation, is expanding its aluminum engine block plant in Windsor by a third. The expansion will increase annual capacity from 890,000 to 1.2 million engine blocks and allow Nemak to rehire about 90 laid-off workers.
        Suppliers, too, are expanding operations or establishing new facilities. Futaba Industrial Co. Ltd., a Japanese manufacturer of stamped components for the Toyota Lexus RX300, is investing $20 million in a 120,000-sq.-ft. (11,150-sq.-m.), 30-acre (12-hectare) plant in Stratford.
        "The products for which we have already received orders are relatively large body structure sub-assembly parts which in the past had been assembled in-house by Toyota," says Keita Asakawa, manager of the overseas business office for Futaba. "Our objective is to reduce both production and transportation costs by manufacturing and assembling them for delivery in the vicinity of the Toyota plant."
        That meant a need for a site within an hour's drive of Toyota. He cites highway accessibility, land price and the advanced level of site development by the City of Stratford as other key selection considerations.
        Keiper Canada Ltd., a division of Dutch metal seat structures manufacturer Keiper, opened a new factory in London, Ont., in 2001. Assembled seat structures are shipped to first-tier supplier Johnson Controls in Detroit and other locations. The facility has 140,000 sq. ft. (13,000 sq. m.) on 10 acres (4 hectares) of land. The plant, Keiper's first manufacturing facility in North America, employs 300 people.

Uwe Schorpp

        Keiper selected London over five other Ontario cities — Guelph, Waterloo, Kitchener, Woodstock and Chatham. Locations in Indiana, Ohio and Michigan also were given consideration, according to Uwe Schorpp, general manager of the new plant.
        "The main criteria we used to decide on this location were availability of the work force, qualification of employees, the unemployment rate, supplier options, infrastructure — energy and raw materials, the health care system, education and training and recreational services — and the cost of living," says Schorpp. "Ontario's advantage is having the lowest logistics cost in the supply chain. This helped us determine the location of the new production plant. It was the decisive factor, leading to southwestern Ontario."