IF SUCCESSFUL, a formal bid by the Lochaber smelter’s parent company, GFG Alliance, to take over France’s solitary manufacturer of aluminium wheels, would prove a bonus to the company’s planned new Fort William wheels plant, writes Mark Entwistle.
GFG Alliance subsidiary, Liberty Group, has submitted an official bid to the court administrators for AR Industries (ARI) at Châteauroux in the Centre-Val de Loire region. Apart from saving 400 French jobs, the deal will give Liberty access to specialist engineering expertise to help set up its wheels factory at Fort William, which will employ more than 400 people directly – with a similar number in the supply chain – and make up to two million car wheels a year.
GFG, which has a worldwide turnover of more than US$12billion, has put forward a comprehensive three-year plan for the recovery of the struggling ARI business, including investment in equipment, safety and quality improvements, and enlargement of its customer base.