STOCKHOLM – Autoliv Inc., a global leader in automotive safety systems, has announced it will invest approximately $50 million in a textile center in China. The new center is needed to meet the strong demand for airbags in China and other Asian markets. The center also will make Autoliv even more competitive by reducing supplier costs through vertical integration.
The textile center will consist of a weaving plant, an airbag cushion plant and a development center for airbag cushions and textiles.
The weaving plant will focus on manufacturing textiles for airbags using Autoliv’s patented “one-piece-woven” (OPW) technology. By using this technology, the airbag cushions can be almost ready-made on the weaving loom, the company states.
This new plant will have a floor space of more than 8,000 square meters (nearly 100,000 square feet) and will house roughly 150 employees.
In addition, Autoliv says a separate building of similar size will be constructed at the same site for airbag cushion manufacturing. This is a relocation from an existing site in the Shanghai area, allowing the current site to expand its airbag module manufacturing capacity. This airbag cushion operation will have around 1,000 employees.
In line with its strategy of globalizing products and processes Autoliv will, when the project is completed, have in house manufacturing of OPW in all of its three regions – Europe, the Americas and Asia – produced according to the same process.
A co-located development center for airbag cushion and textile also will be created. It will focus on standardized designs for the Asia region.
Globally, in 2012, Autoliv produced 70 million airbag cushions in-house and purchased 40 million from external suppliers for its total production of 110 million complete airbags.
