Bianchi Turkey Opens New Factory

MANISA, Turkey (4 December) - At the end of November Bianchi Turkey opened a new bicycle factory 40 kilometers outside of Izmir in the city of Manisa. The new facility boasts a wet electrostatic painting facility, two modern assembly lines and ISO 9001 certification by SGS Yarsley of London. All in all, the new factory can support 400,000 models a year in one shift. If all goes as planned, 50% of these will be heading towards Europe. It took just 11 months to build the new factory completely from scratch. Total investment came to US$6 million, a large portion of the machinery and tools were brought over from the old factory. Built on a 37,000 square meter plot of land, the new site has a warehouse and shipping facilities in its 16,500 square meters buildings. They can be expanded if necessary. While the new site offers facilities for the production of Hi-ten and CrMo steels frames and forks, aluminum frames are imported from Taiwan and China.(GE)