Freudenberg has opened a new production site in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China. With a total invest of CNY 36 million, the group will serve the growing demand for automotive filters in Western China and is expanding its global filter production network. Following its Guiding Principles the company and its joint-venture partner Japan Vilene Company Ltd. are getting closer to its customers.

“This is an important step. Together we will deliver state-of-the-art filtration technology to the growing automotive industry in Chengdu with companies like Volkswagen and Geely Volvo,” says Dr. Jörg Sievert, member of the management board of Freudenberg Filtration Technologies and chairman of the Freudenberg board filter China. Freudenberg Filtration Technologies already has plants in Changchun and Suzhou and started its first production site in China in 1998.

“The project from the ground breaking to start of production took only seven months and I am very pleased to inform that we had no accidents during the construction phase”, says Jianmin Lion Li, general manager of Freudenberg Vilene Filter (Chengdu) Co. Ltd. Li, who together with Dr. Li Hua forms the general management team for the Chinese filter activities, welcomed Toshio Yoshida, president and representative director of Japan Vilene Company Ltd., Guangshui Li, director of Xindu industry park, Dr. Gerold Amelung, consulate general of the Federal Republic of Germany in Chengdu, as well as other local authorities and customers.

With a total space of 12,000 square meters, the new manufacturing site is situated at Xindu Industrial Park, Chengdu, in the Province of Sichuan. Sixty employees will work in the new site by the end of 2013. The product portfolio includes both engine air intake filters and cabin air filters. In March 2012, Freudenberg Filtration Technologies and Japan Vilene Company Ltd., founded this new joint venture to produce micronAir filters for the Chinese automotive industry and to serve as a logistics and service centre for industrial filtration components and systems. By establishing the new production site in Xindu, Freudenberg scales up domestic production capacity substantially in line with the demand from the increasing automotive production, and serves the Chinese market, especially the Central Western part of China.

Major automobile manufacturers such as First Automotive Works Volkswagen and Geely Volvo have settled their manufacturing plants in the Chengdu area. The automobile production in this region is expected to increase significantly in the following years, from 1.8 million units in 2011 to 3 million units in 2015. As other industries are also expanding their production plants to the Central Western part of China, the new site in Chengdu offers additional business opportunities.