Stellantis has reached an agreement with the Italian government to increase annual production in the country to 1 million units. To reach this target, the car manufacturer will add a fifth model at its Melfi plant in the south of Italy.
The chief executive of Stellantis, Carlos Tavares, met with Italy’s Industry Minister Adolfo Urso in Rome earlier this week where an agreement was reached. This comes after Stellantis built fewer than 700,000 vehicles in Italy both last year and in 2021. It is not since 2017 that Fiat Chrysler produced over 1 million units in a single year in Italy and that came before its merger with the PSA Group in 2021.
Reuters understands that a deal will be signed between Stellantis and the Italian government by the end of July. The FIM-CISL union reports that Stellantis will likely produce as many as 800,000 vehicles in Italy this year.
“I’m confident that, together with Adolfo Urso, we will create the condition to first reverse the downward trend in production volumes in the two coming years and then build together the roadmap to produce one million vehicles in Italy,” Tavares said in a statement. “To achieve this common ambition, we need to create a winning team spirit to support the energy transition and maintain freedom of movement for Italian citizens, embarking all Italian stakeholders and focusing energy on solutions, not on dogmas.”
Tavares noted that the five models to be built at the company’s Melfi plant will include four high-value premium models for foreign brands as well as one Italian model based on the STLA M platform. Stellantis notes that the agreement with the Italian government takes into consideration the affordability of cars for Italian consumers, regulations like Euro 7 on the Fiat Panda, and incentives to maintain Italy’s competitiveness.
Stellantis has its Italian headquarters in Turin. It is investing millions of euros to establish a new Green Campus at the site and in the second half of this year, will open the doors to its new Battery Technology Center. The Turin site will also be the home of an advanced facility for the production and supply of dual-clutch transmissions for the company’s future range of hybrids and plug-in hybrids.
