Japanese automaker Toyota plans to expand its Ann Arbor area operations again, investing $126 million to build a 260,000-square-foot facility and relocating 85 workers from California.
The expansion adds to the automaker’s previously announced consolidation of about 250 positions from its procurement and supplier engineering operations in Kentucky, a move that was revealed in April.
“We are continuing to grow our operations here in southeast Michigan and pleased that it’s going in this direction,” Toyota spokesman Bruce Brownlee said in an interview. “This is all part of our efforts to consolidate our North American R&D operations here.”
The company plans to construct a new $50 million, 260,000-square-foot prototype development facility on its York Township campus and will expand a current building on its Ann Arbor Township campus by 50,000 square feet in a $76 million powertrain engineering investment.
Collectively, the facilities are called the Toyota Technical Center and currently employ about 1,200 people, Brownlee said.
After the company completes the relocation of 250 workers from Kentucky and 85 from California, it will have more than 1,500 employees at the Technical Center.
The California workers are expected to move to the Ann Arbor Township site by the end of 2016.
The moves come as Toyota is reshaping its U.S. footprint. The company announced in April that it would move its U.S. headquarters from Torrance, Calif., to the Dallas suburb of Plano.
Today Toyota assembles in North America 75% of the cars and trucks it sells in the U.S., with assembly plants in Kentucky, Indiana, Texas, Mississippi and Ontario, and engine plants in Alabama and West Virginia.
The larger headquarters move happened because maintaining three separate hubs in California, northern Kentucky and Michigan became unwieldy, the automaker said.
The Ann Arbor operation has been central to the development of several key Toyota vehicles, including the Avalon full-size sedan and the Sienna minivan.
“Toyota’s expansion in the Ann Arbor region is a clear indicator that we offer the perfect infrastructure, talented workforce and support for a growing business,” Ann Arbor Spark CEO Paul Krutko said in a interview. “Toyota could locate its North American powertrain operations anywhere but chose Ann Arbor; the company’s investment and the jobs it will create are a continuing win for our economy.”
