In March, MAN announced that it had stopped production to protect its employees and due to broken supply chains combined with the sharp drop in demand for commercial vehicles. After around six weeks at a standstill, its bus and truck plants are now being restarted with a increased safety measures in place. The factories will gradually resume production at reduced capacity, starting on April 27.
The manufacturer says that the protection of employees has been a top priority, with extensive measures implemented such as; ensuring a wider distance between employees, changing the routing and, where necessary, protective equipment as well as training and instruction of employees.
“In recent weeks, the crisis management team has been working intensively on the conditions under which our plants can be restarted. Among the key challenges here are the reliable supply of parts by our suppliers, as well as the organisation of our own work processes while protecting our colleagues, but also measures to stimulate demand for commercial vehicles,”said Joachim Drees, CEO of MAN Truck & Bus SE. “Our suppliers come from all EU countries – therefore we are asking politicians to support us with a coordinated approach at EU level to re-enter the market.”
Dr. Carsten Intra, Executive Board member for Human Resources and Human Resources Director, added: “The health and safety of our employees is of course our highest priority. Accordingly, together with our health management, we have taken many organisational measures to ensure that the necessary medical safety, hygiene and also the minimum distance between employees is fully guaranteed.”
“My respect goes out to those who have been or will remain on short-time work as well as those who have held and will continue to hold the positions in FlexWork or further afield. Many thanks also to all those who have volunteered in recent weeks,” said Saki Stimoniaris, Chairman of the Group Works Council. “Our MAN is a strong community with lived values. We stick together and will now tackle the task together again in order to emerge from this situation stronger.”
Some employees in both production and administration will continue to work on short time initially, or will make use of existing flexible working time arrangements and work from home wherever possible. The return to the office will also be staggered.
MAN Truck & Bus has said it will continue to fully maintain the service network for its MAN and NEOPLAN brands in order to keep emergency vehicles, supply chains and local public transport up and running. This applies both to MAN’s own service companies and to MAN Truck & Bus’s partner companies, as long as this is permitted by the authorities in the respective region.
