Kia Motors has announced the completion of construction on its first manufacturing plant in Latin America located in the municipality of Pesquería in the state of Nuevo León, Mexico.

With an initial investment of approximately $3 billion into the project by Kia Motors and suppliers, the state-of-the-art plant was constructed in 13 months after breaking ground on the site last October, marking the fastest construction of any manufacturing facility in the company’s history, said a statement from the company.

Meanwhile, Kia Motors commenced full-fledged retail sales operations in Mexico this past July and has opened 46 dealerships across the country in the last five months, it added.

Intensive quality assurance testing and pilot production will be conducted over the next six months with mass production of the Forte (also known as ‘Cerato’ in some markets) compact sedan scheduled to commence in mid-2016, said the statement.

The 300,000-unit annual capacity plant will represent approximately 10 per cent of Kia Motors’ total global manufacturing output, it stated.

Located on land spanning around 500 hectares, the plant is comprised of four main shops: stamping, body welding, paint and assembly, it said.

The manufacturing complex features sophisticated production equipment such as a $75 million stamping press that measures 18 m high and weighs 3,862 tonnes, making it the largest of any Kia plant in the world.

A total of 60 per cent of output from the plant will be exported to North America while 20 per cent will supply the Mexican domestic market, and the remaining 20 per cent will be exported to neighboring countries in Latin America, said the statement.

Kia Motors together with its suppliers have hired around 4,000 Mexican employees, and over the longer term Kia’s presence in Mexico is expected to generate approximately 14,000 direct jobs and 56,000 indirect jobs, it added.

Seong-Bae Kim, president of Kia Motors Mexico, said: “We are very proud of this great achievement, not only because we have built one of Kia’s largest plants in the world, but also because we did it in record time.”

“With the state-of-the-art technology and manufacturing processes being introduced to the plant, we expect our facility to be one of the most environmentally-friendly automotive manufacturing plants in the region,” he added. – TradeArabia News Service