Mercedes wants to produce more cars in Hungary

Capacities are first reduced

Future music, because Iron saves beforehand and manufacturing capacities are removed or shifted. Chief of finance Harald Wilhelm promised not to close a work in Germany, but to reduce the capacities by 100,000 vehicles. For this purpose, staff will be reduced, but this should be done via fluctuation and a handling program. The annual production capacity in all Mercedes factories worldwide is cut from currently 2.5 million to two to 2.2 million units.

According to the motto “Go East”, the proportion of production in countries with a low wage structure today is to be doubled from 15 to 30 percent by 2027. Specifically, the manager called the Mercedes factory in the Central Hungarian Kecskemét, where the costs are 70 percent lower than in Germany. Wilhelm announced that he would like to build an “additional model” in Hungary in the future. It is speculated that in addition to models of the small compact segment, the MittelklassElimousine C-Class could run off the assembly line in Kecskemét.

Mercedes in Hungary has already produced two million vehicles in Hungary since 2021.

“In China for China”

Mercedes, like all German carmakers, recently had a sales problem in China, where eight percent fewer cars were sold in the previous year. The competition here is more intense than anywhere else, said Källenius. Mercedes must therefore also press the costs there and meet the expectations of the technology -savvy customers even better. More models are therefore to be produced “in China for China”.

The bottom line was that the Stuttgart -based company earned 28 percent less than a year before with 10.4 billion euros. The dividend is therefore to be reduced by one euro to 4.30 euros. Sales decreased by 4.5 to 145.6 billion euros, the car sales shrank by three percent to 1.98 million vehicles.

The prospects for the current year are again bleak. Sales and sales should be slightly below the previous year, also because capacities are reduced. The Swabians stick to their e-car strategy, although their luxury sedan EQs sells poorly. As Källenius explained, the apprenticeship is to reconcile the design of the electric cars with the usual manual.