Selon le Sunday mercury les projets d'usine aux U.S.A. semblent maintenus mais les partenaires américains s'impatientent devant la lenteur des dirigeants de la NAC. On apprend qu'une rencontre entre les principaux acteurs du projet d'usine à Ardmore et le boss de la NAC aura lieu prochainement. Ces difficultés ne concernent absolument pas l'usine de Longbridge qui doit bien redémarrer la production au printemps comme prévu. On apprend aussi qu'une trentaine de directeurs, d'ingénieurs et de comptables américains sont venus vivre et travailler 3 mois dans les Midlands (UK) pour préparer le projet.
[Il y a des erreurs dans cet article, il parle de ROVER au lieu de MG, puis de la MGF au lieu de la MG TF...]
Source :
STARS & GRIPES - Sunday Mercury, Birmingham
BY BOB HAYWOOD
7 January 2007
EXCLUSIVE Americans storm off in row with Chinese over Rover
THE Chinese owners of the Longbridge car plant in Birmingham have had a spectacular fall-out with their American partners, it was claimed last night.
Sources say a team of managers from the USA who have been working in the Midlands for the past three months have been abruptly ordered to return home.
The decision follows an alleged rift between the Chinese and the Americans about the future direction of the joint venture.
The team from Global Oklahoma Motors is said to have become 'exasperated' with the Chinese way of doing business, which they saw as 'slow and bumbling'.
The split between the partners has placed another huge question mark over the future of Longbridge.
Last night, a source close to the Nanjing Automobile Corporation in the UK insisted that the Birmingham plant is safe, although the company itself was more inscrutable.
The Chinese company paid £50 million to buy MG Rover after the firm collapsed with the loss of 6,000 jobs in April 2005.
Nanjing Automobile has announced plans to resume production of the MGF sports car at Longbridge this spring with up to 1,000 jobs being created.
The company is building a factory in the city of Nanjing with the target of producing 200,000 cars a year and 250,000 engines for the booming Chinese market.
Meanwhile, MGFs are to be built at a new plant in Ardmore, Oklahoma, employing 350 workers. Work on the midwest factory is due to start later this year, with production lines running for the first time in 2008.
MG is a coveted marque in the USA and Canada, although the model will be built to higher specifications because of tougher exhaust emission laws.
The Sunday Mercury has learned that for the past three months about 30 managers, automotive engineers and accountants from the USA have been working and living in the West Midlands.
The purpose of the team is to liaise with Nanjing representatives in the UK.
The aim was to Westernise the joint venture because Chinese methods were felt to be staid and likely to do few favours for MG in the UK and the USA.
But the senior US staff have been summarily recalled amid claims that they found working with the Chinese impossible and their patience 'just ran out'.
One source said: "They just became exasperated at the way the Chinese work and felt there was no hope of change."
The Mercury has been told that a top-level mission from Oklahoma will be jetting into Britain soon for talks with Nanjing executives, although the exact purpose is unclear. Wes Stucky, president and chief executive of the Ardmore Development Authority, which owns the land on which the Oklahoma plant is to be built, admitted: "There have been difficulties between the partners.
"There are changes in the way the partnership will go forward but I am confident that the Ardmore facility will proceed as proposed.
"I don't know what implications, if any, there will be for the future of the Long-bridge plant in the UK."
A source close to Nanjing Automobile said: "These international partnerships are very complex and can be subject to change.
"But the current difficulties won't have any effect on what happens at Longbridge.
"Nanjing in China will be selling cars to China and the Far East. Nanjing in the UK will be selling MGFs in the UK and Europe, and Oklahoma Global Motors will sell in North America."
A Nanjing Automobile spokesman in the UK said: "The original understanding with the Oklahoma team remains. There have been some amendments and considerable discussions and they are ongoing."
Marc Nuttle, chairman of Oklahoma Global Motors, could not be reached for comment last night.