The automotive supplier Eberspächer has begun construction of a new production plant for electric vehicle heaters in the Bulgarian city of Ruse. The new site is to supply car manufacturers with electric vehicle heaters from the beginning of 2024.
According to the supplier’s announcement, these will be used, for example, in electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid models for the European market. The 17,000-square-metre building is to be completed in autumn, and the interior work with the production facilities is to take place over the winter – so that, according to the schedule, production can start at the beginning of 2024.
In order to meet the high market demand until the new building is available, an interim production facility in Ruse was already put into operation in January 2023. The German automotive supplier will create around 180 jobs this year, with plans to expand to up to 500 employees and an annual production capacity of around 2.4 million heaters beyond 2025.
The building will include production and logistics areas as well as an office and canteen complex. It will be built on a plot of land of around 53,000 square metres in the Slatina industrial area in the east of the city of Ruse. Due to its size, the site offers space for future expansion, Eberspächer said. With a “photovoltaic system on the roof surface and a state-of-the-art air conditioning and heating system for the production and office areas”, the focus of the new building is on a sustainable energy supply, he said.
“We are growing with e-mobility,” says Ruslan Papazyan, General Manager of Eberspaecher Bulgaria. “With the new site, Eberspaecher is purposefully expanding its manufacturing operations as the growing market for battery-electric passenger cars also rises the demand for electrical heaters sharply in the coming years. We are pleased to realize this in Ruse.”
Ruse is the fifth largest city in Bulgaria and is located in the north of the country directly on the Danube. The river forms the border between Bulgaria and Romania in this region and the Romanian capital Bucharest lies around 75 kilometres north of Ruse.
Keyword: Eberspächer to build EV heater factory in Bulgaria