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Unipart to expand automotive fuel systems factory

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Multi-million investment in Midlands includes new Engineering and Manufacturing Institute

Manufacturing and logistics firm, Unipart, is to build an additional manufacturing facility at its Eberspächer site in Coventry.

The company is to build the new plant to make fuel system components for the European automotive market on a 25,000 sq ft brownfield site. The site will initially supply to Ford and is set to manufacture half a million parts per year. The factory will have the capacity to quadruple production, which would make it one of the largest manufacturers of high pressure gasoline direct injection fuel rails in the world, said Unipart.

Unipart opened a second facility at Kautex Unipart Ltd (KUL) factory in October last year to extend production of fuel tanks and fuel systems. KUL is a joint venture between Unipart and its German partner Kautex Textron. The site currently produces around 640,000 fuel tanks annually for UK automotive manufacturers.

According to Unipart, the new 7,500 sq. metre facility at KUL, which carries out assembly and sequencing operations, was made possible by technology which offers “greater levels of emission control”

Dave Pound, general manager at the KUL plant, said: “Our customer base has grown and the volumes of our major customers have grown. We’ve been able to increase our manufacturing capability to meet the needs of our customers today and to be ready for future growth, which could be as much as a million units by 2018.”

Unipart is also building an “Engineering and Manufacturing Institute” in partnership with Coventry University at its Coventry manufacturing site. The company is contributing £23.5 million to the £32 million project, with the remainder of the funding coming from the Higher Education Funding Council for England’s Catalyst Fund, a Government initiative designed to boost the economy.

The £32million project aims to create a “faculty on the factory floor” for undergraduate, postgraduate and low carbon R&D programmes. It will give students access to Unipart’s operations, allowing them to work on “live” issues in a real world manufacturing production environment.

Unipart manufactures a number of products in the UK, including exhaust systems and fuel systems for vehicles, heat exchange devices and parts for the rail and aerospace industry.
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