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"And that is a minimum," chief executive Norbert Reithofertold journalists on the sidelines of the North American International Auto Show.
He said the group would also reduce its job numbers by several thousands "in coming years" but there would be no layoffs.
At the same time, he added the group would hire more staff in the United States to boost capacity at its Spartanburg, South Carolina, plant to 240,000 cars in 2010 from its current capacity of 140,000. Spartanburg made 170,000 cars in 2007, boosted by some special measures and temporary staff.
Reithofer said the group was "open to cooperation" with other companies on ventures.
BMW and Daimler have been in discussions to probe possible cooperation for small vehicles, mainly focused on engines.
Behind The Wheel Blog |
Reithofer said there were talks with other carmakers too. When asked specifically whether there were talks with Audi, Ford or Fiat, he said: "Not with Audi."
BMW already develops petrol engines with PSA Peugeot Citroen of France.
Earnings On Target
Reithofer confirmed that BMW expects to post a pre-tax group profit of at least 3.7 billion euros in 2007.
He said he expected the negative impact of foreign exchange fluctuations in 2007 to be less than the 660 million euros in 2006 while the impact of higher raw material prices was seen
equal to 2006 when it was 168 million euros.
BMW has a plan to boost productivity at its plants significantly and save around 6 billion euros by 2010 to help it catch up with other carmaker's margins.
Earlier this month, BMW kept its title as the world's largest premium carmaker in 2007 as sporty models like the 3 Series cabrio, X5 offroader and new Mini Clubman lifted group sales by 9.2 percent last year.
With 1.5 million vehicles delivered to customers it surpassed archrival Mercedes-Benz Cars for the fourth straight year.
At the end of September when he was just over a year into the job, Reithofer unveiled the results of his strategic review designed to place BMW on a course for profitable growth well
into the next decade.
It aims to sell significantly more than 2 million cars by 2020.
Detroit Auto Show |
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