Car-making and motorsport to begin resuming this month

Green shoots are beginning to emerge in the automotive world amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with a swathe of car-makers restarting their plants this month and the first major motorsport category confirming it will resume in less than two weeks.

Mercedes-Benz confirmed that plants in Unterturkheim, Berlin, Hamburg, Sindelfingen and Bremen have successfully restarted production, while Volkswagen also reopened its huge Wolfsburg manufacturing facility last week – initially building 1400 cars and then 6000 cars this week (about 40 per cent of capacity).

Meantime, Porsche will reopen its plants at Zuffenhausen and Leipzig on today, subject to special hygiene precautions, as will Ferrari at its Maranello facility and Lamborghini at its Sant-Agata Bolognese factory in Italy.

Jaguar Land Rover plans to resume its UK production on May 18, along with other facilities in Slovakia and Austria.

Bentley’s UK-based production will resume on May 11, seven weeks after closing.

In the COVID-19 epicentre, Jaguar Land Rover says it has recovered up to 75 per cent of production in China as domestic demand slowly returns.

In the US, BMW will resume production at its South Carolina facility – home to much of the Bavarian marque’s global SUV production – at 50 per cent capacity. It says it wants to gauge customer demand and the capacity of the supply chain before going full tilt again.

Still in the US, Mercedes-Benz plans to reopen its Tuscaloosa facility on a step-by-step basis contingent on protecting employees and with respect to “ongoing developments”. Toyota has pushed its production resumption back a week to May 11.

The news is not all good, however. Nissan has confirmed it is extending its UK factory shutdown to June and Fiat Chrysler and Volkswagen have both postponed the re-openings of their US plants indefinitely amid concerns for worker safety.

"Before setting a new start date, Volkswagen will weigh the readiness of the supplier base, as well as market demand and the status of the Covid-19 outbreak," Volkswagen said in a statement.

In Thailand, the manufacturing base for the dual-cab utility brigade, Toyota will be the first pick-up maker to restart production, on May 7, followed by Mitsubishi in mid-May and Nissan on May 31. Ford is yet to advise when it will resume Ranger production.

Nissan has announced it plans to cut the number of cars it produces in Japan by 78 per cent during the month of May, reportedly operating on a single-shift basis.

For those plants that are resuming productions, manufacturers say they will slowly ramp up capacity, ensuring adequate social distancing and hygiene measures are adhered to.

For motorsport fans, NASCAR has declared itself first cab off the rank for resumption of track activity – albeit without the presence of fans. The American tin-top category will resume with seven races in 10 days starting on May 17 at Darlington Raceway in South Carolina.

“NASCAR and its teams are eager and excited to return to racing, and have great respect for the responsibility that comes with a return to competition,” said Steve O’Donnell, NASCAR executive vice president and chief racing development officer.

“NASCAR will return in an environment that will ensure the safety of our competitors, officials and all those in the local community.”

The immediate future is less clear for Formula 1 and MotoGP. The former is pushing to start its 2020 season at the Red Bull Ring on July 3-5 without crowds, while the latter is now reportedly aiming for a similar back-to-back Austrian round on July 26-August 2, following the cancellation of Sachsenring, Assen and Finland rounds.

Formula 1 and MotoGP officials say they will concentrate on running European events for 2020 before considering races away from the continent. The strategy all-but confirms Australian events are cancelled for 2020.

Closer to home, Supercars still has the Winton Super400 slated as its first round of 2020 – scheduled to run over June 5-7 – while the next TCR round is due to take place at The Bend Motorsport Park over June 12-14.

However, with the situation still so fluid, neither category has definitively confirmed racing will go ahead on those dates.

In the broader scheme of things, car-makers say the development of next-generation vehicles is still happening despite the coronavirus outbreak. This week, Mercedes-Benz reaffirmed its full commitment to “future plans and strategic positions”, joining the likes of Maserati and many others.