End of an era
Minis last rolled off the production line at VDL Nedcar in Born. The question remains whether or when passenger cars will ever be built again.
At VDL Nedcar the curtain has fallen on Mini production. The last cars were already built on Thursday, and today the last cars will leave the production hall, according to reports 1Limburg. The work is not quite over yet for the factory’s remaining employees. The last cars built still have to be tested before delivery.
A production employee explains 1Limburg that the question remains what needs to be done in the next two weeks. Formally, the employees’ employment contract does not expire until the end of this month, but there is not much left to do. The deal with Mini parent company BMW Group is over as of March 1. After that, about 400 employees will remain in Born.
At the beginning of this month, the CNV trade union stated that it was afraid that the complete end for VDL Nedcar was looming, because a possible investor from Abu Dhabi had dropped out. A VDL Nedcar spokesperson emphasized on Friday ANP that it is not completely over for VDL Nedcar. “The door is not locked. We continue to produce special vehicles, for example army cars for defense or surveillance vehicles and riot vans for the police. But the production of large numbers of passenger cars is coming to an end.” According to the spokesperson, there are still discussions with ‘various parties’ for car production.
Rich history
Cars have been built in Born since 1967. It all started when it was still a Daf factory and Daf built the 33 and 44 there. Later, the Dafs 55, 66 and 46 would also roll off the production line. In the mid-1970s, Volvo took over and the Daf 66 came off the production line as the Volvo 66, followed by the Volvos 340/360, 480, 440/460 and S40/V40. The latter was built side by side with the related Mitsubishi Carisma and eventually the Mitsubishi’s Space Star, Colt and Outlander would also come from Born. The Colt-related Smart ForFour was also built there.
In 2014, after a production-free 2013, a new client arrived: BMW Group. It all started with the Mini hatchback and shortly afterwards the Convertible was added. The Countryman followed in 2016 and in 2017 VDL Nedcar was allowed to build the BMW X1. When the generation change of the X1, X1 production disappeared from our country. It was previously announced that BMW Group would end the entire production deal with VDL Nedcar after 2023.
The new Mini Countryman rolls off the production line in Leipzig, Germany, as you read last week. You can read about the impact of this relocation of production on the Limburg region in this article from AD.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl