Governor Robert Bentley announced that German automotive supplier MöllerTech will build a new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Bibb County, creating 222 jobs and investing $46.3 million.
“Attracting investment and new jobs to Alabama’s rural counties is a key priority in our overall economic development strategy, and MöllerTech’s manufacturing facility in Bibb County represents the kind of project that we have been targeting,” Governor Bentley said. “We now have new tools to help rural counties overcome the obstacles they face in economic development. We’re committed to using them.”
MöllerTech will construct a 150,000 square-foot facility in the Scott G. Davis Industrial Park, near Interstate 20/59 in northern Bibb County, near the Woodstock community. The plant will manufacture interior parts for the next generation Mercedes-Benz SUVs, which are part of the $1.3 billion expansion Mercedes announced in 2015. MöllerTech’s North American President and CEO Steve Jordan said the Bibb County facility will serve as the company’s flagship manufacturing facility, incorporating new ideas and best practices from other operations in the company’s manufacturing footprint.
“After many months visiting various states, as well as numerous counties in Alabama, we are pleased to settle in Bibb County,” said Jordan. “Our Möller Culture is very much centered on people and local communities and because of that we find that there is ‘a good fit’ between MöllerTech and Bibb County.
The help that we received both financially as well as personally from the State and the County helped us in making this decision. So we would like to thank the State of Alabama as well as Bibb County in being patient and supporting us in this new venture of ours.”
MöllerTech has two U.S. facilities in Elberton, Ga., and Detroit, Mich. It hopes to be at full production in Bibb County by the end of 2019.
The Birmingham region competed for the project with other sites in the Southeast. The Bibb County Commission, the Alabama Department of Commerce, the Economic Development Partnership of Alabama, Alabama Power Co. and the Birmingham Business Alliance worked together to bring the project to the Birmingham region. Bibb County provided the company with 20 acres of land in the Scott G. Davis Industrial Park for the facility, as well as an abatement of non-educational sales and use and property taxes, and the state provided jobs and investment credits and AIDT workforce training, all valued at $12.3 million.
“This will be a great boost for Bibb County and its workforce,” said Bibb County Commissioner Ricky Hubbard. “MöllerTech will be the second largest manufacturing employer in the county and the third largest overall. We are excited that their investment will impact the lives of so many people here.”
MöllerTech represents the 18th German corporate investment in the seven-county Birmingham metropolitan area. Those 18 companies will employ approximately 1,700 people when MöllerTech is operational.
“As excited as we are for MöllerTech, Bibb County, the state and all of the entities involved in this project, we are even more excited about MöllerTech’s future workforce and the impact the 222 job opportunities will have on them and their families,” said Brian Hilson, president and CEO of the Birmingham Business Alliance.
About MöllerTech
MöllerTech is the automotive arm of German-based MöllerGroup, which is a family-owned company with 2,300 employees worldwide and a history that goes back nearly 300 years. It develops and produces interior parts for the automotive industry including Audi, BMW, Daimler, GM, Honda, Porsche, Rolls-Royce, and Toyota.