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Poor Chrysler 200 sales blamed for 1,420 layoffs in Sterling Heights

FCA will indefinitely lay off a total of 1,420 workers from its Sterling Heights Assembly and Stamping plants on July 5, according to The Detroit News. This decision will cut a 1,300-person shift that builds the Chrysler 200, and it will also affect 120 people who stamp the sedan's components. The company's statement said the decision would "better align production with demand." FCA plans to give these folks open full-time positions as they become available. Chrysler 200 sales are down 63 percent to just under 18,000 units so far in 2016. After the cuts, there will still be one shift to build the 200, but even then the model won't have much of a future. In January, CEO Sergio Marchionne announced that FCA would discontinue production of the 200 and Dodge Dart because customers were no longer interested in small sedans. All of the roughly 3,000 hourly workers at Sterling Heights have been on a temporary layoff since February 1, according to The Detroit News. They don't go back to work until next week. United Auto Workers Vice President Norwood Jewell released a statement saying that while the "shift reduction at Sterling Heights Assembly is unfortunate, it is not unexpected." However, he was fairly upbeat about the cuts because FCA plans to increase production capacity for trucks and SUVs. "I believe that in the long term this move will be a positive one for our members and the company," he said. During last year's labor negotiations, the UAW's deal reportedly included an agreement for FCA to move 200 and Dodge Dart production to Toluca, Mexico, but the company promised to build the Ram 1500 at Sterling Heights Assembly. FCA spokesperson Jodi Tinson gave no comment about future vehicles at the factory when asked by Autoblog. Related Video: Statement Regarding Indefinite Layoffs at SHAP In order to better align production with demand at its Sterling Heights Assembly Plant, FCA US notified the State of Michigan, the City of Sterling Heights and the UAW today that it intends to return the plant to a one shift operation, beginning July 5. The Company will place indefinitely laid off employees in open full-time positions as they become available within the Detroit labor market based on seniority. A Statement from UAW Vice President Norwood Jewell on FCA Announcement about Sterling Heights Assembly: While today's announcement of a shift reduction at Sterling Heights Assembly is unfortunate, it is not unexpected.

Aurora lands Fiat Chrysler as a client of its self-driving technology

SAN FRANCISCO — Self-driving car software startup Aurora said on Sunday it would partner with Fiat Chrysler to build autonomous platforms for commercial vehicles, the latest collaboration with an automaker for the fast-growing Silicon Valley company. The deal with one of the Detroit Three will expand Aurora's scope, "allowing us to offer a variety of solutions to strategic customers in logistics, transit and other use cases," the Palo Alto, California-based company said in a brief statement. Besides for ride-hailing fleets, automakers and others are interested in self-driving technology for commercial applications, such as delivery vans. Financial terms were not disclosed. Aurora already has partnerships with Volkswagen AG, Hyundai and China's Byton to develop and test self-driving systems for a range of applications for automakers, fleet owners and others. The company is among dozens of startups, automakers and large technology companies working on self-driving car systems, eager to capitalize on a sea change in the transportation industry brought by developments in machine learning. Fiat Chrysler has an existing partnership with Waymo, Alphabet's self-driving unit, in which it supplies Chrysler Pacifica hybrid minivans for Waymo's driverless fleet, which is currently in operation in Arizona. In February, Aurora said it had raised $530 million in new funding.

Detroit 3 and UAW set for showdown over tiered wages

This week, thousands of United Auto Workers will converge on Cobo Center in Detroit for the Special Convention on Collective Bargaining, an every-four-year event that lets members tell UAW leaders what the negotiating priorities should be during contract negotiations. This is where a lot of sand and a lot of lines start coming together in preparation for contract negotiations between the UAW and the Detroit 3 automakers, which will happen later this year. Number one on the UAW agenda is the end of the two-tier wage system created in 2007 to help the automakers get through bankruptcy; veteran workers are paid the Tier 1 rate of around $29.00 per hour, new hires are paid the Tier 2 rate of between $15 and $20 and get about half the benefits of Tier 1. Tier 2 hiring has been an undoubted success for the automakers, allowing them to keep factories in the US and hire more workers. By agreement, it is capped at a certain percentage of each automaker's workforce, and while the union's ultimate position is to get rid of the dual-scale system entirely; one leader said Ford could easily afford the $335 million it would take to convert all its workers to Tier 1 out of its $6.9 billion in 2014 North American profit, and General Motors could do the same out of the $5 billion it is handing to investors through the (admittedly forced) share buyback. Other delegates say that at the very least they'd be happy with enforcement of the current caps in the new contract. The automakers, conversely, would welcome expansion of the Tier 2 ranks. Including benefits, import automakers pay workers "in the high $40 range" per hour, according to an analyst, while Ford and GM pay about $59 in wages and benefits per hour. More Tier 2 workers on the rolls would let those two companies get labor cost parity with the competition. Fiat-Chrysler pays wages closer to the imports because of special exceptions in its UAW contract that allow unlimited Tier 2 hiring; those exceptions will end on September 14 and bring FCA into line with the other domestics, unless the new contract maintains them. FCA CEO Sergio Marchionne is opposed to the two-tier system, having called it "almost offensive." One analyst says the UAW might win a sizable pay raise for Tier 2 and a small increase for Tier 1, but the keystone issue will be how the hiring matrix can help the automakers keep overall wages in line with the imports.