Kia's European plant ready to roll
Production is about to begin at Kia's new plant in EuropeThe plant, which is Kia's first manufacturing facility in Europe and cost one million Euro to build, is scheduled to go into mass production by the end of this year.
The company says it has finalized the installation of the production lines and equipment, with a view to testing and synchronizing the various technologies during the trial phase. The plant is designed to correspond with Kia's headquarters and design centre in Germany.
The plant is located at Zilina, Slovakia and Kia expects to run three-shift days by 2009 and employ up to 3000 workers. Kia says the ultimate capacity of the plant will be 300,000 units annually. A new C-segment model (codenamed 'ED') will be produced at the Zilina plant and will be the first of Kia's models to be produced in Europe specifically in line with the requirements of European customers.
Output will be divided between C-Segment cars and small SUVs. Kia will be the only global automotive manufacturer to manufacture engines in Slovakia, producing gasoline and diesel engines.
Kia says new cars are scheduled to roll off the assembly lines by late 2006.
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