Autoeuropa ups production of T-Roc SUVs

Portugal’s largest car plant and one of its most important companies, Volkswagen’s Autoeuropa is to increase output to 7.7% by September. The company, which has a plant in Palmela, outside Lisbon, will achieve the increase with nine shifts and an increase in capacity on its car body assembly lines.

 

Autoeuropa is to produce an additional two units of its T-Roc family SUV per hour by September thanks to an increase in car body assembly line capacity.  The announcement was made by its Director of Product & Planning, Markus Haupt, to “meet customer orders” across Europe.

The company is currently producing 26 to 27 T-Roc per hour (around 650 per day) in three shifts. It will now produce 28-29 vehicles or 7.7% more. The increased production also reflects exports and sales which rose 46% in January like-for-like, an equivalent of €680 million.

The latest production estimate from the company is around 183,000 T-Roc units for 2018 from a total of around 240,000 units (including the Sharan and Seat Alhambra), double the production of 2017.

The increase in production both in terms of vehicle units and hours arises after the introduction of two fixed shifts on Saturdays starting February this year.

A two-day strike was called off by unions in December after labour disputes over Saturday working. Last year the Workers’ Commission (CT) resigned after a pre-agreement negotiated with the directors was rejected by employees who called a strike.

Autoeuropa made concessions with a new agreement including two shifts on Saturdays (with extra payment) in addition to the three shifts on weekdays (which started in November). Production on Saturdays will increase output by 10%.