{"id":53986,"date":"2012-09-28T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2012-09-28T16:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=53986"},"modified":"2012-09-28T12:03:47","modified_gmt":"2012-09-28T16:03:47","slug":"mercedes-near-decision-on-sharing-mexican-plant-with-nissan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2012\/09\/mercedes-near-decision-on-sharing-mexican-plant-with-nissan\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercedes Near Decision on Sharing Mexican Plant with Nissan"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Zetsche is apparently leaning towards sharing a Mexican assembly plant with Nissan.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Daimler AG will \u201cprobably\u201d announce by year-end a decision on where it will build a new North American assembly plant, Chairman Dieter Zetsche tells TheDetroitBureau.com, and there is a strong possibility that the new factory will be part of a planned mega-complex alliance partner Nissan has already committed to in Mexico.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are investigating the potential of our plants operating together,\u201d said Zetsche, confirming a story first reported by TheDetroitBureau.com earlier this year.<\/p>\n

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All the Auto News!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Daimler needs more capacity to supply North America and other markets , having reached the limits of what it thinks can be done out of its existing Mercedes-Benz assembly plant near Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Until now, Zetsche had only confirmed that it was looking at various sites in the U.S., Canada and the U.S.<\/p>\n

But sources alerted TheDetroitBureau.com to discussions between Daimler and Nissan as part of a three-way alliance that also includes French-based Renault.\u00a0 The partners have steadily expanded a 30-month-old alliance that will now see them develop compact engines and share transmissions. Nissan previously agreed to produce small powertrains at a plant in Tennessee that will be used on the Mercedes line in Alabama.<\/p>\n

(For more on the latest expansion in the Daimler\/Renault\/Nissan alliance, <\/em>Click Here<\/span><\/a>.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The partners have operated under a principle that \u201cNothing is off limits,\u201d other than a full merger, explained Zetsche, during a Friday discussion with TheDetroitBureau.com. And one possibility that has been raised would be to let Mercedes find a spot at the new Aguascalientes, Mexico factory complex Nissan is now putting in place.\u00a0 That factory was already expected to produce some vehicles for the Infiniti brand that would use a compact luxury platform developed by Mercedes.<\/p>\n

Zetsche cautioned there are both \u201cpotential pros and cons\u201d to such a plan, but Daimler insiders say the benefits are likely to outweigh any drawbacks. For his part, Ghosn told TheDetroitBureau.com that a manufacturing alliance would allow the partners to \u201cshare fixed costs on the plant,\u201d and tap into the same supplier and distribution networks, among other things.<\/p>\n

But the Renault\/Nissan chief quickly cautioned that \u201cthis is his (Zetsche\u2019s) decision.\u201d<\/p>\n

The German exec, meanwhile, said he expects a decision \u201cwill probably come to conclusion this year.\u00a0 It is not yet locked into stone.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Daimler AG will \u201cprobably\u201d announce by year-end a decision on where it will build a new North American assembly plant — and company officials confirm a previous story by TheDetroitBureau.com revealing Mercedes may share a new Mexican factory with alliance partner Renault. Here’s more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53987,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"make":[],"post-state":[],"category_old":[151],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53986"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53986"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=53986"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=53986"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=53986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}