The talks that led Volkswagen to choose southwestern Ontario for the location of its first battery plant outside Europe all started with a whim
“We have never really had strong relationships with the European automakers,” said Champagne. “So when I saw that there was this big generational shift toward electric vehicles … I said, ‘There must be a fit.”‘
“He was a bit flabbergasted,” Champagne said, chuckling that the man couldn’t believe someone had recognized him. In August, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz looking over their shoulders, Champagne and Herbert Diess, who was then the CEO of Volkswagen AG, signed an agreement in Toronto to co-operate on making electric-vehicle batteries and their components.
Amid that uncertainty, the Canadian ministers had a big question to answer: If Volkswagen was going to build a plant in Canada, where would it go?The city of fewer than 40,000 people, located about a 30-minute drive south of London, is in the heartland of Ontario’s auto belt. More than eight million vehicles rolled off the assembly line of a Ford plant in St. Thomas between 1967 and its closure in 2011.
When talks began, he wasn’t even told which company he was dealing with. Scouts swanned into town but declined to say who their client was. The most intense work came in January and February, as Volkswagen’s team and officials from all levels of government pored over the details. The decision was made public later that same day, and the formal announcement came on April 21 in St. Thomas.Just 11 days before Volkswagen publicly announced that St. Thomas was its choice, the province passed legislation to annex part of the site from the Municipality of Central Elgin, so that the entire 1,500 acres would be located in St. Thomas alone.
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