Harness production slowed down
War forces German automakers to cut production
03/02/2022 8:26 p.m
The Ukraine is a central building block in the broadly structured car production. Harnesses are made in the country in peacetime. Because of the war, the first manufacturers are now stopping the tapes.
The war in Ukraine is slowing down vehicle production in Germany. VW, Porsche, BMW, Mercedes-Benz and the truck manufacturer MAN have to reduce their production due to a lack of parts from suppliers in the war zone. The main focus here is on cable harnesses, for which western Ukraine has developed into an important production location.
At Porsche, the production lines in Leipzig will initially be idle until the end of next week, as a spokesman said. Production will continue in Zuffenhausen. “In the coming days and weeks we will drive on sight and continuously assess the situation.” Volkswagen had already announced yesterday that it would have to reduce production at the main plant in Wolfsburg due to the lack of parts. According to MAN, production at the plant in St. Petersburg, Russia, which employs 70 people, has stopped entirely. In addition, there are supply bottlenecks and, as a result, production failures, said a spokesman. Shifts would be eliminated in the Munich and Krakow plants.
Production is also interrupted at BMW due to delivery bottlenecks, as the company announced. Because parts from the Ukraine are missing, production in Dingolfing will be stopped in the coming week. “We are in intensive talks with our suppliers,” said BMW. Mercedes-Benz is also dependent on suppliers in the country, which has been attacked by Russia. Efforts are being made to avoid breakdowns. From next week, however, the shift planning will have to be adjusted. “Our plants are currently running worldwide,” added the Stuttgart carmaker.
22 suppliers, 38 plants
In recent years, the Ukraine has developed into an important country of origin for cable harnesses. According to industry sources, it may take months before plants in other locations can take over the work of the Ukrainian factories. Space, tools, employees and financing would be required. Especially when special machines are required, longer waiting times are often unavoidable.
According to the government in Kyiv, 22 international auto parts suppliers have invested more than $600 million in 38 plants – many of which make wiring harnesses. The larger companies in the industry include the Nuremberg wiring system specialist Leoni, Fujijura, SEBN from Japan and the French company Nexans. A total of around 60,000 people are employed in the industry. Before the war, the Ukraine was considered an attractive location: Industry insiders point to the good education of the people in the Ukraine and the comparatively low wage level. In addition, western Ukraine is not far from the car plants in Hungary, the Czech Republic or Slovakia.
“We are working – in close cooperation with our customers and suppliers – at full speed to manage the consequences of the current production interruptions in our two plants in Stryi and Kolomyja, triggered by the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, for everyone involved,” said Leoni with. It is obvious that the production outages in Ukraine would also have consequences for the availability of parts in the European automotive industry. “We are currently examining all options to absorb the production losses.”
Wiring harnesses are one of the components needed at the very beginning when building a car. If they are missing, the entire production comes to a standstill because they cannot be retrofitted – unlike semiconductors, for example, which can often only be installed at a later point in time.