Auto Parts Firm to Open Manufacturing Facility in Huntington, W.Va.

Oct. 22, 2004
Thirty more West Virginians will work in the state's growing auto-parts manufacturing industry

Thirty more West Virginians will work in the state's growing auto-parts manufacturing industry after a Spanish auto-parts maker opens a facility in Huntington next month.

With a capital investment of more than $2 million, Barcelona-based Grup Capresa will operate Caprewest at 501 Eighth Ave., according to the Huntington Area Development Council. The company signed a 15-year lease for 42,500 square feet in HADCO's shell building.

Capresa makes cold-drawn and hot-rolled bar steel used in shock absorbers, coiled springs, stabilizing bars, hinges, starter motors, clutches and steering columns, according to HADCO. From facilities in Spain and Mexico, the family-owned business exports to more than 15 countries.

The West Virginia facility will be Capresa's first in the United States. Although there are no plans to do so, the company has enough space in the shell building to double the size of Caprewest's operation, said Gerald McDonald, HADCO president.

Another four European automotive companies are considering opening West Virginia facilities, McDonald said.

"We, meaning West Virginia, are not the location of an automotive assembly plant. But we are close to assembly plants that we can serve in other states," McDonald said.

European companies are also drawn to the United States because of exchange rates that value the dollar at about 20 percent lower than the euro, McDonald said.

Caprewest is not the first overseas auto-parts maker to open facilities in West Virginia. Several Japanese companies opened plants in the state in the past decade -- including the 1,000-worker Toyota plant in Putnam County.

And Sogefi S.P.A. of Italy opened a facility in a business park in Prichard, Wayne County. That operation will buy supplies from Caprewest, according to HADCO.

To close the Sogefi deal, Gov. Bob Wise used nearly $1 million from the Governor's Civil Contingency Fund. That was about three years after Wise said the fund's priorities were "floods, fires [and] paying for National Guard efforts."

Officials in Wise's administration, when asked about the practice earlier this year, defended Wise's actions, saying Sogefi was important in paving the way for other European auto-parts makers.