Chinese components supply disruption halts FCA Serbia production

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) has temporarily suspended production at its Kragujevac plant in Serbia due to reduced availability of certain components sourced in China, an FCA spokesperson tells Kallanish.

With the coronavirus outbreak hitting manufacturing activity in China, the supply chains of various industries stand to suffer from the knock-on effect. FCA becomes the first carmaker in Europe to halt production as a result of this situation.

The firm has rescheduled planned downtime in order to carry out the Serbian plant stoppage. “We are in the process of securing future supply of those affected parts and production will be restarted later this month,” the spokesperson says. “We do not expect this change in scheduling to impact the total production forecasted for the month.”

HBIS Serbia did not respond before deadline to requests for comment on whether the production stoppage would affect its supplies of automotive steel to FCA.

Italian trade unions, meanwhile, say difficulties in sourcing components from China could have an impact on FCA Europe’s entire supply chain, including in Italy.

Fiat Serbia produced an estimated 60,000 vehicles in 2018.