PSA Group is the latest automaker helping to build ventilators as countries around the world continue to struggle to cope with the coronavirus pandemic.
Auto News reports that the French automotive conglomerate will work with ventilator maker Air Liquide Medical Systems, Schneider Electric, and Valeo to produce 10,000 ventilators by the middle of May.
PSA has established a specific workshop at its Poissy factory with more than fifty volunteer employees that will start building mechanical components for the ventilators. Final assembly of the systems will be handled in Air Liquide’s nearby factory in Antony, France.
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Additionally, a further fifty volunteer employees at PSA’s research and development site in Velizy will be offered the opportunity to join the Air Liquide factory just a few kilometers away.
A plethora of other car manufacturers around the world are doing their part in the fight against the coronavirus. For example, BYD, FCA, McLaren, Tesla, and Volkswagen have all announced plans to build medical equipment. Even Lamborghini is making face masks and face shields at its Italian headquarters in Sant’Agata Bolognese, Italy.
Perhaps most notably, Ford announced on Monday that it will produce 50,000 ventilators over the next 100 days at a plant in Michigan in cooperation with General Electric’s healthcare unit. The simplified ventilators being produced by Ford have been cleared by the United States Food and Drug Administration and meet the needs of most COVID-19 patients and rely on air pressure as opposed to electricity like traditional ventilators.
