By Stephen Downer, Special to Tire Business
MEXICO CITY — Group Michelin will lay the cornerstone of the $510 million light vehicle tire plant it plans to build in central Mexico on Aug. 22, it has announced.
Group Michelin CEO Jean Dominique Senard, Pete Selleck, who is president of Michelin North America Inc., and Mike Boggs, managing director of Michelin México, will be at the event, the company said in an emailed invitation to interested parties.
The French tire maker said it expects production at the 1.58 million-sq.-ft. factory in León – which is 250 miles northwest of Mexico City – to begin in late 2018.
The facility will be Michelin's second plant in Mexico. It has another in Querétaro, 150 miles northwest of the Mexican capital.
Michelin confirmed in early July an earlier Reuters News Agency report that the tire maker planned to build the plant, which is expected to produce up to 5 million tires a year initially.
Stephen Downer is a Mexico-based freelance writer who covers that country and Latin America for Tire Business and its Latin America e-newsletter.