Mercedes-Benz is planning a $5 million expansion project in Ann Arbor, with its site just a few miles away from the Detroit-area headquarters of the Big Three. Currently, the German automaker has an emissions laboratory in the city that is also home to the main campus of the University of Michigan. But Mercedes-Benz wants to add product development capabilities to the laboratory and spend millions of dollars to expand it.
If the plans go through, the Ann Arbor facility will be only the second Mercedes lab of its kind in the United States. The other plant is in Long Beach. The company would send four engineers from its main headquarters in Germany to the new lab to get things started.
Although it doesn’t seem like a big deal, the expansion plans are just one more signal that southeastern Michigan is slowly becoming one of the more popular places for research and design in the entire nation. With manufacturing work quickly leaving the area and thousands of jobs on the line, switching the focus to R&D could be one thing that boosts the slumping economy in the area.
The expansion would entail nearly quadrupling the space at 3953 Research Park Drive in Ann Arbor from 6,663 to 27,484 square feet. The added space would make room for both offices and stored vehicles. MB chose the site because of its proximity to the Environmental Protection Agency’s testing lab.
James Gartin, Managing Director of Business Development, had this to say about the plans scheduled to be implemented later this year: “It’s exciting to see some new activity at Research Park, and we’re very excited about Mercedes’ continued commitment to the market.”
With these plans and others in the works, you’re likely to see exciting changes when you visit your local Mercedes-Benz dealer. Stop in today and see what the automaker has been working on lately.
