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Fiat S.p.A. is an Italian vehicle manufacturer, since the late 1800s, with two main divisions: cars and industrial vehicles. It has manufacturing facilities in Italy, other European countries, notably Poland, Brazil, and now notably in India and China.
The company is now legally separating the two divisions.
The industrial vehicles division, which includes farm machines, construction machines, and trucks, is highly profitable and is expanding globally, selling its products on all continents, including Africa.
The car division, which is in the midst of integrating Chrysler, is struggling to survive amidst the recession: key to survival is achieving the selling of 6 million cars per year in such stagnant markets as Europe and the US, but also Latin America and Asia.
In Poland and Brazil, Fiat's manufacturing facilities produce around 80 cars per year per worker, in Italy around 30. A plan to bring Italian production up to global standards by 2014 requires union approval.
It appears that the strategic expectation is that the business of private cars, increasingly a luxury, may fail and possibly be sold off eventually to a more competitive producer with a wider and deeper global reach, while the business of farming, heavy transport and construction, ever a necessity, will continue profitably.
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