Man-sized investments

This year Man will invest EUR 75 (zł.286.5) million in Poland. The same amount is to be invested in the country next year. "Poland is the second-most important production market for the company after Germany," Man Nutzfahrzeuge's president, Anton Weinmann, declared.

The company's biggest investment is its truck plant in Niepołomice, which is currently under construction at a cost of EUR 92 (zł.351.1) million. Weinmann hopes that the plant will begin operations in the middle of 2007. Production capacity is expected to reach 15,000 trucks per year in a one-shift system. Up to 650 people are to be employed in the plant by 2008.

The company also plans further investment in its bus production plants near Poznań. In Starachowice, components and vehicle bodies will be produced, which will then be assembled into buses in Sady. "In 2007 we will invest EUR 24 (zł.91.6) million in Starachowice," Weinmann said. In the first nine months of the year the company produced 1,157 buses in Poland, nearly as many as in all of 2005 when 1,220 vehicles left the plants. This year the number is expected to increase to 1,410.

Thanks to the investment, the number of jobs in the plants will jump from the current 2,900 to over 4,400 in 2008. Turnover is also expected to grow - from the current level of EUR 600 (zł.2,291) million to EUR 700 (zł.2,673) million next year and EUR 1 (zł.3.82) billion in 2008.

Man is the market leader in the heavy-truck (over six tonnes) segment and holds fourth spot in the bus market.