Mitsubishi acquires Ford’s former PH assembly plant in Laguna

By: Ben O. de Vera - 11 years ago

Screengrab from www.mmpc.ph

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine unit of Japanese car-maker Mitsubishi confirmed Monday a Nikkei report that it has acquired the former assembly plant of Ford in Laguna province.

“Recognizing the sustained growth in the economy and the coming age of motorization in the Philippines, Mitsubishi Motors Philippines Corp. (MMPC) acquires the 21-hectare closed manufacturing plant of Ford Motor Company Philippines situated in Greenfield Automotive Park in Sta. Rosa Laguna. The acquisition of the plant is part of Mitsubishi Motor Corp.’s (MMC of Japan) strategy to further strengthen MMPC’s role of expanding sales and production capacity, which is part of its new stage of growth mid-term plan until the end of 2016 fiscal year,” MMPC said in a statement.

“Currently, MMPC’s 18-hectare plant is located at the growing residential area of Cainta, Rizal, and has a capacity to produce 30,000 units annually. Last year, MMPC has produced around 15,000 units given its existing completely knocked down (CKD) models such as the L300, Adventure and Lancer EX. MMPC plans to relocate to this new site and start vehicle production by January 2015,” the company said.

“The acquisition of the Sta. Rosa factory will further strengthen our assembly operations, utilizing heavy stamping machines, advanced equipment and facilities engineering that will support MMC’s business objectives for the new mid-term business plan,” said Hikosaburo Shibata, MMPC president and chief executive officer.

“MMPC is looking forward to the new Philippine government auto policy, which is aimed at strengthening the local auto manufacturing operations to make it competitive against other Asian and ASEAN countries. Strengthening the auto manufacturing operations through this new auto policy, will eventually provide huge job employment opportunities not only to car assemblers, but also to the industry-related companies and businesses such as first, second and third tier suppliers,” the company said.