Schaeffler has opened a new production facility at its Szombathely site in Hungary, creating 150 new jobs in e-mobility. The facility is the supplier’s first production plant fully dedicated to electromobility and gives the group a new center of excellence for the production of components and systems for electrified powertrains.
“Our new facility in Szombathely is a milestone in the transformation of our company and embodies our strategic priorities of innovation, agility and efficiency,” said Klaus Rosenfeld, CEO of Schaeffler AG. “The goal is sustainable mobility, and we are determined to make real progress in that direction as a key technology partner for our customers by leveraging our global network of production facilities. The new plant also highlights our ambitions to continue our strong growth in e-mobility.”
Szombathely provides around 15,000m2 of space for powertrain component production, such as electric motors and hybrid drives. The facility also offers a high degree of automation, modular production buildings and end-to-end digitization.
Automated production lines and extensive use of industrial robots ensure a clean, dust-free environment for stator and rotor assembly as well as the integration of magnets for synchronous and asynchronous motors.
Schaeffler expects to increase the site’s output capacity to 800,000 products a year by 2023 and has further plans to expand its annual output of finished products for premium partners in the auto industry to 1.8 million between 2026 and 2029.
“The Schaeffler Group expects to be generating new orders of between €2bn [US$2.4bn] and €3bn [US$3.5bn] annually from its e-mobility business from 2022 on,” explained Dr Jochen Schröder, president of Schaeffler’s e-mobility division. Szombathely will make a major contribution toward this growth as a center of excellence operating in close alignment with our main electromobility plant in Bühl, Germany.”