WARRENVILLE, Ill. — Navistar International announced today it intends to close its Chatham, Ontario, truck manufacturing operation, which has been idle since June 2009. The company also announced plans to "rationalize and better integrate" its RV and chassis businesses.
The Chatham facility has been idled and employees have been on layoff status for the past two years, due to the company’s inability to reach a collective bargaining agreement with the Canadian Auto Workers. As a result, Chatham production has already been absorbed by other Navistar truck plants.
“From a capacity standpoint, we are well-positioned to meet demand expected in the last half of 2011 and further increases in 2012,” said Dee Kapur, president, Navistar Truck Group. “We’re seeing tremendous benefit from our flexible manufacturing strategy, which allows us to build more trucks — and a wider variety of them — at various plants.”
Navistar also announced plans to significantly scale back operations at its Monaco headquarters and motor coach manufacturing plant in Coburg, Ore., which will impact approximately 450 people. All motor coach production will be consolidated at Monaco’s Wakarusa, Ind., manufacturing facility, and certain Monaco headquarters functions will be consolidated at Navistar’s new corporate campus in Lisle, Ill. The company plans to continue producing towables and retain certain finance and information systems operations in Oregon, as well as maintain a RV service center there.
The company’s Workhorse Custom Chassis subsidiary plans to close its Union City, Ind., chassis plant, impacting about 225 employees. These operations will be consolidated into other existing Navistar facilities for greater efficiency and productivity.
Meanwhile, combining all motor coach production in Wakarusa will add about 400 jobs at that facility, the company noted.
“We understand the impact these decisions have on our employees,” Kapur said. “We will treat people with respect and provide support to help them with their transitions.”
The planned restructuring and asset impairment activities related to the Chatham closure is expected to result in charges of $100 million to $130 million, of which the majority is related to pension and retiree healthcare costs. The actions related to the Monaco/Workhorse consolidation may result in charges of approximately $100 million, which are predominantly related to expected asset impairments. Most of the restructuring charges are expected to occur in the third and fourth quarters 2011, with the remainder taking place in 2012.
The company said it expects ongoing savings of $20 million to $30 million annually once all of the actions are implemented.
