Auto manufacturer Fiat (Turin / Italy; www.fiat.com) has obviously had enough of some of its less dependable suppliers. For several weeks, the OEM has been pursuing a strategy that may not always be cheap but is a very simple way to get a grip on shaky, unreliable suppliers: It buys them. It has already taken over a rubber processor – CF Gomma – and is currently discussing the acquisition of an aluminium specialist that once belonged to Fiat. Now, a famous name from the plastics segment has also been added to the list.

For the symbolic price of EUR 1, Ergom Holding (Borgaro / Italy) has been brought into the Fiat fold. A strike at the plastics processing group (which, according to press reports, is in a very poor financial state anyway) apparently cost the OEM around EUR 33m in Q2, and was enough to prompt its acquisition to avoid production losses. Ergom is one of the ten largest injection moulding companies in Europe with annual sales of around EUR 540m – 80% of which reportedly comes from supplies to Fiat. The company also has activities in mould manufacturing, polyurethane foams and blow moulding. In addition to the main site of Ergom Plastiche Materie, the Group has 10 other plants in Italy, France, Poland, Turkey and Brazil. Ergom has a total workforce of 4,000.