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46 April 2018 | AutoData ASSEMBLERS » FACTORIES By Bruno de Oliveira FIVE HUNDRED TO GET TO FOUR The Mercedes-Benz factory at ABC, which opened in 1956, now has nothing less than the world’s most modern truck assembly line M ercedes-Benz has officially started new assembly line operations at the São Bernardo do Campo plant, São Paulo, fully designed under the precepts of Industry 4.0. The area is considered by Philipp Schie- mer, president of Mercedes-Benz Brazil and CEO of Latin America, as nothing less than the most modern company in the world. And it will help sustain 30% growth in projected production for the year, based on increased domestic demand and exports. For that, the company also hired 250 employees for the São Paulo unit and ei- ghty for the Juiz de Fora, MG unit. The investment required by the new line gives the tone of its importance: it con- sumed no less than half of the company’s last investment cycle in the country - or R$ 500 million of a total of R $ 1 billion applied from 2013 to 2017. For Schiemer “it is natural that every newest line in the Group is the most mo- dern. And this one of São Bernardo de Campo counted on the collaboration of teams of other units”. He also considered that the new ABC line is a “gigantic and historic step towards the implementation of the concept of Industry 4.0 in Brazil”. It was three years of construction of a totally new building, where the logistics area used to be. Therewere concentrated the assembly of all the trucks, from light to heavy, and the logistics of parts. Before the production occurred in two lines, divided by category. According to Mercedes-Benz, the new truck assembly line is 15% more efficient in terms of production than the previous one - the time needed to manufacture a vehicle fell fromone hundred to eighty-five hours - as well as offering another 20% of logistic efficiency gain: the warehouses of parts were reduced from 53 to six. The delivery rate of parts directly on the line increased from 20% to 45% and the com- ponent storage time fell from ten days to a maximum of three. Disclousure/MBB