MWM to provide engines for Turkish buses
Valor Econômico
MWM Motores, a subsidiary of the American group Navistar, will provide, from the plant installed in the neighborhood of Santo Amaro, in the capital of São Paulo, between 2 thousand and 5 thousand engines a year to equip buses produced by the Turkish company Otokar. According to the Director of the Global Business unit of Navistar, Elcio Reginato, the international contract represents additional earnings from € 25 million to € 30 million a year and it opens the doors to the European market for the company. "Turkey is currently an important exporting center of cars to Europe. More than looking at the batch of engines that will be sold to Otokar during the effectiveness of the contract, we are focusing on the long-term supply", said the Executive. The agreement to be announced today is the first of the company in Turkey, and it is valid for six years.
The first four-cylinder engines of MWM for Otokar, leader in the Turkish bus market, will be delivered as of March 2011. Those 3.2 MaxxForce model engines, which meet the Euro 3 emission standards, are already part of the production of the company and they will equip the busses sold on the Turkish domestic market. As for the 3.2 MaxxForce model that meets the Euro 5 standards, it will begin being produced in March 2012 and it may be exported to other countries of the continent. In the first years of the contract, said the Executive, the company should ship 2 thousand engines a year. As of the fourth year, the expectation is that 5 thousand units are exported annually.
According to Reginato, the progress in Turkey is in line with the long-term global strategy of Navistar to expand its business outside the Americas. "We have recently executed a contract in Korea and we are not looking only at China and India when it comes to potential markets", he explained. In 2009, MWM had net sales of US$ 850 million, above the expected, but below the earnings of US$ 1.1 billion registered a year earlier. Besides the São Paulo plant, the company operates a unit in Canoas (RS) and another one in Córdoba, in Argentina.