“This is just another example of Fuyao’s commitment to Moraine,” said Mike Davis, Moraine development director. “We continue to work closely with Fuyao on this major project in our city. We have been with them since the beginning and will continue to support them.”
Dave Hicks, Moraine city manager, said he expects employment at the plant to only grow. Today, the plant has some 1,600 employees.
“They need space for both storage and production,” Hicks said.
“I may be overly optimistic, but they continue to be pretty aggressive in their plans and thoughts,” he added. “I think they will be limited (in employment) only by the market.”
In an interview, Gauthier and Dave Burrows, Fuyao vice president, operations, reiterated what company leaders have said in the past, that Fuyao Glass America expects to have about 2,000 employees in Moraine by year’s end and perhaps 2,500 after that.
The additional leased space is 241,338 square feet, Fuyao said.
The space will be occupied in three phases. Fuyao said it has signed a 15-year lease agreement with IRG.
“We are very excited to lease this additional space to Fuyao,” Dean Miller, vice president of IRG, said in Fuyao’s statement. “We have now sold or leased over 2 million square feet of buildings and 167 acres of land in Moraine. This lease and our partnership with Fuyao helps us continue to fulfill our vision of an industrial park in Moraine.”
Once production hits full capacity Fuyao will ship out approximately 150 trucks daily, the company said.
Fuyao makes automotive, safety and industrial glass in what it says is the world’s largest single-site auto glass production facility.
“Logistically Fuyao is perfectly positioned,” Jeff Hoagland, president and chief executive of the Dayton Development Coalition, said in Fuyao’s release. “This project showcases how well this region is positioned.”
In May 2014, Fuyao global Chairman Cho Tak Wong paid $15 million for 1.4 million square feet of the plant owned by Industrial Realty Group, overseen by California-based investor Stu Lichter. The plant once housed a General Motors SUV assembly operation, which the automaker closed in 2008.
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