Borderlands is a weekly rundown of developments in the world of United States-Mexico cross-border trucking and trade. This week: Mexico’s commercial truck makers finish the year on a high note; a German automotive company is opening a $59 million plant in Querétaro; Nissan is laying off more than 500 workers at a Mexican plant; and LGT Transport is opening a trucking facility in Texas.
Mexico’s commercial truck makers finish year on high note
In December, Mexico’s commercial truck industry produced 19,739 tractor-trailers and exported 16,845 total units, both monthly record figures.
The increase in production and exports was driven by demand for tractor-trucks in the United States and Canada, said Miguel Elizalde, president of Mexico’s National Association of Bus, Truck and Tractor Producers.
The United States accounted for 94%, or 15,971 units, of Mexico’s tractor-truck exports in December, while Canada accounted for 3%. Mexican truck makers also exported tractors to 16 other countries, including Colombia, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Panama and El Salvador.
During 2021, Mexico exported a total of 141,002 tractors, a 22% increase compared to 115,747 in 2020.
“The United States continues to be our main export destination by far; the year-over-year export growth from [2021] compared to 2020 was 21.4%,” Elizalde said during a recent press conference. “Canada, our second-largest export destination, grew 7.5% [from 2020 to 2021].”
In December, Daimler/Freightliner, which has a factory in Saltillo, Mexico, led the way in both production and exports at 14,178 units assembled and 13,037 tractors shipped abroad.
Other top heavy-duty truck producers/exporters in Mexico were International Trucks Inc., which has a factory in General Escobedo and shipped 3,174 units, and Kenworth, which exported 624 from its plant in Mexicali.
Elizalde cautioned that 2022 production and sales of Mexican-made tractors could continue to be hampered by a global semiconductor shortage.
“The year 2022 represents a challenge but above all an opportunity for [Mexico’s] heavy vehicle production industry due to its solidity, its high level of technology, its efficiency and its ability to export to the most competitive markets in the world within the framework of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement,” Elizalde said.
The global economy is still being affected by the pandemic, said Guillermo Rosales, deputy director general of the Mexican Association of Automobile Dealers.
“We cannot ignore that in economic terms, the effect on jobs, COVID restrictions, the effect of mobility of all those people who are in the middle of the contagion, may have a negative effect within the plant, both in production at a global level and in the demand of vehicles,” Rosales said during the same press conference as Elizalde.
Watch: FreightWaves’ Alan Adler discusses sales trends for Class 8 trucks.
German automotive company to open $59M plant in Querétaro
BCS Automotive Interface Solutions announced plans to build a plant in the Mexican city of Querétaro by the end of the year.
The new factory will create 836 direct jobs for the production of automotive cellphone chargers, steering control modules and other high-tech components for customers such as Tesla, GM, Stellantis and Toyota.
Querétaro is located in central Mexico and is one of the biggest automotive manufacturing clusters in the country.
Parts will be manufactured to supply both the Mexican and U.S. automotive markets. The new plant in Querétaro will be BCS Automotive’s second facility in Mexico. The other facility is located in the city of Reynosa, just across the U.S.-Mexico border from Brownsville, Texas.
BCS Automotive is based in Bodensee, Germany. The company has nine manufacturing plants around the world.
Nissan to lay off more than 500 workers at Mexican plant
Nissan Mexicana will lay off 562 workers at its production plant in Cuernavaca, Mexico, due to the closure of the Versa model production line at the facility.
Production of the Versa will be transferred to Nissan’s other plant in Mexico, in the city of Aguascalientes. The automaker said it was affected by the shortage of semiconductors that has impacted the global automotive industry.
Cuernavaca is located about 54 miles south of Mexico City.
The layoffs in Cuernavaca will begin Thursday at the facility and will continue through Feb. 11. Nissan will continue to produce its NP300 and Frontier pickup models in Cuernavaca.
LGT Transport to open trucking facility in Texas
Omaha, Nebraska-based tanker carrier LGT Transport will open a facility in Baytown, Texas, during the first half of the year.
The facility will include a 4,100-square-foot office and 20,000-square-foot maintenance area, as well as showers, laundry, lounge, meal preparation and storage areas for drivers.
Baytown is located about 31 miles east of Houston.
Pam Spaccarotella, CEO and founder of LGT Transport, said the Baytown facility will be the company’s largest in the country.
“We wanted a facility that our drivers could call home, one that conveys to them how important they are to the overall success of the company,” Spaccarotella said in a statement.
LGT Transport, founded in 2012, specializes in transporting tanker materials such as cryogenic liquids, specialty gases, carbon dioxide, ammonia and liquid propane. The company operates six facilities across the country and operates 178 power units with 194 drivers, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
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