USA – The Swedish OEM has begun construction of its new car manufacturing facility in Berkeley County, South Carolina. The company is investing $500m in the new facility which will produce the next-generation Volvo S60 sedan, based on the new Scalable Product Architecture (SPA) and will have an initial capacity of up to 100,000 cars per year.
Volvo chose the location in South Carolina due to its access to international ports and infrastructure, and a trained labour force. The company estimates that the factory will employ up to 2,000 people over the next decade and up to 4,000 people in the longer term.
The American built, SPA based S60s (currently under development in Gothenburg, Sweden) will be sold in the US market as well as overseas through exports from the Port of Charleston, along with another model yet to be determined. The first South Carolina-built Volvos are expected to roll off the assembly line in late 2018.
