Industry Automotive industry Founded 1986 | Headquarters Ingersoll, Canada Parent organizations General Motors, GM Canada | |
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Number of locations Ingersoll, Ontario, Canada Products crossover utility vehicles Services Automotive manufacturing Owner General Motors of Canada | ||
CAMI Automotive, originally known as Canadian Automotive Manufacturing Inc., was an independently incorporated joint venture of automobile manufacturing in Ingersoll, Ontario, Canada and formed the third step of GM's three-pronged initiative of the mid-1980s to capture and practice the Japanese mystique of automotive management. The other two were United Australian Automobile Industries between Toyota and Holden in Australia, and NUMMI in California with Toyota and GM, the latter a wholly owned alternative to apply its learnings into practice. CAMI was the least successful of the trio for decades, but is now the sole survivor.
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CAMI is completely owned by General Motors of Canada. Prior to December 2009, ownership of CAMI was split 49-51% between Suzuki and General Motors of Canada Ltd., the former of which withdrew from the venture after poor sales of its later CAMI-manufactured models. From 2013 the plant has produced vehicles based on GM's Theta platform for crossover SUVs; production of the second generation Chevrolet Equinox will continue as of 7 January 2017 because of strong fleet sales demand even as production of the third generation model started on 8 January 2017.
CAMI Automotive has 2,600 hourly and 300 salaried employees as of 24 January 2016. It occupies 570 acres (230 ha) and has 1,700,000 square feet (157,900 m2) of floor space to which 400,000 square feet (37,161 m2) was added in 2016 as part of a $560 million investment. CAMI uses the CAMI Production System (CPS), a set of operating philosophies that guide team members in manufacturing vehicles. The basis of the system is working in teams performing standardized work.
In the 2005 Harbour Report, CAMI was ranked No. 3 in truck assembly in the Small SUV category of the 45 auto assembly plants in North America.
Current Products
As of 7 January 2017, CAMI manufactures the Chevrolet Equinox crossover utility vehicle for General Motors.