Renault, which hired 2,200 people at Romania's Renault research centre, needs another 300 employees to develop the Logan range from around 70 versions at present to over 200 in the following years.
Thus, in a car industry going through the most difficult period of the past 30 years, Logan is drawing further investments from the French group, considering the project achieved an operating margin of 6% in 2008, compared with Renault's 0,6% one.
The 70 Logan versions were calculated on the basis of the five bodies available at present, with four petrol engines, two diesel ones, which are compliant with the Euro 2, 3 and 4 pollution norms depending on the market.
"We aren't hurt by the crisis in the least. We're operating at full capacity. For the Logan project, we're working at a total of 200 versions, including the SUV model, as well as those with automatic transmission and Euro 5 engines," Philippe Prevel, CEO of Renault Technologie Roumanie (RTR), who also coordinates the activity of engineering teams of Russia, Slovenia and Turkey, told ZF.
This year, Renault, which has so far invested 1.5bn euros, will recruit further engineers particularly for the test centre of Titu, to be launched in late 2009 or early 2010.
"We're also hiring experienced personnel, not just students. At present, we have 1,300 more employees compared with 2007. At full capacity, we'll have 3,000 employees, of whom 150 will be foreigners," said Prevel, adding that the current economic situation only slowed down the pace of hiring, not halted it.
According to him, the automatic transmission version is about to enter production and will be initially destined to Western European markets.
RTR invests around 2m euros in employee training programmes every year, with a total duration ranging between 250,000 and 300,000 hours annually. The programmes are carried out both in Romania and in France.
At present, the development centre is collaborating with universities in Bucharest, Pitesti, Craiova, Iasi and will expand to Galati in the future.
Dacia sales are expected to shoot up in the following months owing to the car fleet replacement programmes in Romania, Germany, France, Austria and Belgium.
Pentru alte știri, analize, articole și informații din business în timp real urmărește Ziarul Financiar pe WhatsApp Channels
