Faurecia celebrates new Belvidere plant with a flag-raising ceremony in honor of the Dodge Dart

AUBURN HILLS, MI--June 7, 2012: To celebrate its new role in the community and in support of the next-generation Dodge Dart, Faurecia (http://www.faurecia.com) today raised the official company flag over its Belvidere, Ill., Faurecia Automotive Exteriors (FAE) plant, which supplies Chrysler with front-end modules for the Dart.

The flag-raising ceremony was held in front of the plant at 3925 Morreim Dr. in Belvidere. Mayor Frederic Brereton officially welcomed Faurecia to the community, and FAE North America President Pat Szaroletta announced an extension of a Faurecia community service program to support the Belvidere-Boone County Food Pantry.

Faurecia's Belvidere facility manufactures front-end modules that combine bumper, cooling components, impact sensors and other elements into a single module to ease vehicle assembly. The 45,000 square-foot facility is capable of supplying over 78 modules per hour to Chrysler's Belvidere assembly plant at full production. The 14 integrated work stations on the Faurecia production line assemble one complete front-end module, which comprises 75 components and fasteners, every 600 seconds. From the time a module is ordered until it is delivered to the Chrysler line is just 300 minutes.

The Faurecia plant employs a state-of-the-art assembly line with vision inspection and computer control. Chrysler originally requested six different combinations of elements for front-end modules at the plant. That number since has been extended to 20 varieties and in 2013 will reach 32 different versions.

"Faurecia's attention to detail, cross-functional team approach to engineering and implementation, and responsiveness to a demanding timetable for launch have been important factors enabling a highly productive collaboration with Chrysler in Belvidere," said Szaroletta. "We view the flag-raising ceremony as a celebration of this partnership and a rededication of our commitment to our customer, and to the Belvidere community."

Faurecia will expand its FUELS (Faurecia Unites with Employees for Local Service) food-collection program to support the Belvidere/Boone County Food Pantry. To officially welcome the organization into the program, Faurecia presented a $2,000 donation during the flag-raising ceremony. In September, the plant employees will join Faurecia's 41 other facilities across North America for its annual FUELS challenge, in which each of the sites competes by employees donating non-perishable food to their local food bank. Each site that meets its goal will receive an additional $500 donation from Faurecia, and the winning site receives an additional $5,000 donation for its food bank.

"We are grateful for the jobs, technology and manufacturing excellence that Faurecia brings to Belvidere and to the future of the automotive industry here," said Belvidere Mayor Fred Brereton. "I know that Faurecia and the people of Belvidere will be great partners in growing our community's reputation and economy, as evidenced by the FUELS program and Faurecia's passion for excellence."