SMW Expanding In Mississippi With $4 Million Investment
VW Stumbles From Dieselgate To Hail Cannon Controversy
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MW Manufacturing announced in August that it’s planning a $4 million investment in north Mississippi to strengthen and expand its facility in Oxford, creating 25 jobs. The company, a global supplier of cold-formed components, manufactures components for the heavy truck, automotive, mining, construction and industrial markets. The expansion will help support the company’s new business in Mississippi, according to the Mississippi Development Authority. SMW moved into Lafayette County in 2017, taking over a former Caterpillar facility. The expansion will relocate equipment from Minnesota to Mississippi. “SMW Manufacturing’s presence in Oxford, Mississippi just reached its first anniversary at the beginning of July. To say that we are pleasantly surprised by the successes we’ve achieved in this first year would be quite the understatement,” SMW General Manager & Vice President of Operations Rich DesCoteaux told Area Development magazine. “The team chosen to manage and operate the Mississippi location are all locally grown talent; SMW did not transplant a single employee. Because of the get-it-done attitude and ability to learn new concepts, the plans to populate new business into Oxford have been accelerated. We greatly appreciate the support provided by the state of Mississippi, Lafayette County and the city of Oxford.” Once the expansion is complete, through the next four years, SMW will employ 75 people in Oxford. “The productive workforce in North Mississippi was instrumental in SMW’s decision to expand its operations in Lafayette County. We are committed to ensuring companies such as SMW have access to a talented labor pool so they may enjoy years of growth and success in our great state,” Governor Phil Bryant said. n
CAREER TECH Southwest Tennessee Community College and Tennessee College of Applied Technology at Memphis recently announced a partnership to make advanced training in automotive technology more accessible and affordable. The plan allows TCAT-Memphis automotive technology graduates to transfer up to 28 TCAT-Memphis credits to Southwest, toward an Associate
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of Applied Science in automotive technology degree in as little as two semesters. FINALLY, FLYING CARS If you want flying cars, which many of us have since “The Jetsons,” maybe get some aerospace companies involved. Japan did that recently, enlisting Uber Technologies Inc. and Boeing Co. in a government-led effort that includes Airbus SE, NEC Corp. and a Toyota-backed
n the South, where folks hold close to their hearts a solid truck and the critical accessories to maximize work and tailgating, you have to wonder how long it will be before we see hail cannons mounted on the back of an F-350 Super Duty. Hail cannons, it turns out, are the latest high tech offerings for automotive plants wary of having their brand new, sparkling products being damaged by sudden meteorological disturbances. The cone-shaped mechanisms fire a charge of acetylene gas and air to generate a Mach 1 shockwave into the clouds where hailstorms are being formed. While only effective in a 300-to-600-foot area directly over the device, the shockwaves turn the potentially damaging hailstones into rain or slush. Best of all, the machines fire themselves when their computerized sensors detect incoming hail. What’s not to like? Sadly for Volkswagen, which installed the devices around their Puebla, Mexico plant, there is a downside, according to a recent report in Jalopnik. Farmers in the area believe the cannons have caused drought in a 5,000-acre area and are suing the German automaker for $3.71 million. VW has switched off the automatic firing mode and is experimenting with lower-tech ways of protecting cars, such as mesh. Compensation hasn’t been ruled out, though Jalopnik notes some farmers use to cannons in efforts to protect their crops. Nissan reportedly made locals unhappy with hail cannons as early as 2005. Meanwhile, football fans should be considering how hail cannons might be converted for parking lot use at football games, to hurl confetti or snacks at neighboring tailgaters. n
startup called Cartivator. TENNESSEE COLLEGES BOOST ANALYST UNDERLINES AUTO STRENGTH The auto industry is seeing good performance in 2018, exceeding the expectations of many experts who had glum predictions at the end of 2017, according to Michael Guckes, chief economist for Gardner Business Intelligence, a division of Gardner Business Media. Guckes
credited the strength of the industry to strong employment levels and wage gains. TOYOTA SPENDS ON UBER Toyota announced recently that it would invest $500 million in Uber and work with the ridesharing app to increase the pace of development and deployment on self-driving vehicles. Uber has chosen the Toyota Sienna minivan for autonomous tech testing, with a 2021 rollout.
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