AKG Group builds its first Brazilian plant in Lorena

With a five-year investment plan, the German company relies on the support from Investe São Paulo to produce heat exchangers and cooling systems Investe SP

The German group AKG announced on Wednesday, July 15, the construction of its first plant in Latin America, in the city of Lorena, 190 km away from São Paulo, for the production of heat exchangers and cooling systems.

“We are pleased to announce that, with the acquisition of an area covering 50,000 square meters in Lorena, the construction project of our 14th plant was initiated,” said the president of AKG, Hartwig Pietzcker.

The project, which includes the creation of 150 new jobs over the next five years, is being assisted by Investe São Paulo, an investment promotion agency associated with the Department of Economic Development, Science, Technology and Innovation.

“We have been providing assistance to AKG through the municipality of Lorena, who is an excellent partner. We have been supporting the company in terms of environmental issues and in the relationship with Desenvolve SP," said the President of Investe SP, Luciano Almeida.

The project of the new plant includes the construction of a plant with approximately 5,000 square meters and an administrative building. Currently, an industrial shed covering approximately 600 square meters will be used as the basis for the initial settlement of the company, which will meet the customer needs in the short term.

The decision to invest in Brazil is part of the project to expand the global presence of AKG Group and its strategy of producing in the region for the region. According to Pietzcker, Brazil, being economically and politically stable, is the main market and the ideal location for the first plant of AKG in the Southern Hemisphere. The need for local content to cheapen products also influenced this decision.

“Lorena is located in the state with the best infrastructure, besides being next to a large number of our customers. We also received economic incentives and a great support from the municipality," said the director of AKG Brazil, Tobias Schaefer.

The company will produce and sell heat exchangers made of aluminum and cooling systems with additional parts such as deflectors/carcasses, guardrails, fans/propellers and engines.

According to the mayor Fábio Marcondes, the arrival of AKG represents another important step in the recovery of industrialization in Lorena. "We have worked tirelessly for months so that we could announce this important undertaking to the city. On behalf of the entire community of Lorena, we would like to welcome the entire AKG family and thank for the tremendous support provided by the Government of the State of São Paulo, through Investe São Paulo," he said.

The idea is that the Brazilian plant operates as an autonomous production unit to meet the Brazilian and South American markets.

About AKG

The German group AKG is owned by the holding Verwaltungsgesellschaft, and employs 2,500 people. There are 13 business units, five in Germany, two in the U.S. and one in China, France, Great Britain, India, Latvia and Turkey, which operate 24 hours a day.

The company also has nine distribution centers located in Germany, Brazil, South Korea, China, USA, India, Japan, Great Britain and Turkey. The plants produce 2.5 million heat exchangers per year with 2,500 different variants. The products are used in the automotive industry, compressors, mechanical engineering items and for processing facilities, rail vehicles, construction machinery, agricultural and forestry machinery, engines, electronics, appliances, among other products.

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