3M slates aerospace products plant for Poland

3M’s aerospace and aircraft maintenance offshoot intends to locate the new facility on an existing 3M site. The new unit is scheduled to open in late 2009.

3M in St Paul, Minnesota, said the addition will complement a sister factory in Springfield, Missouri, and significantly increase the firm’s overall capacity for surface-protection products and structural bonding adhesives.

Many of 3M’s aerospace customers are in Europe and Asia, which brought about the Poland project.

“This factory will effectively double our capacity to support our customers where they do business and supply better service around the world,” said Brian Young, general manager of the aerospace unit, said in a news release.

In a consolidation move, the new Wroclaw plant will be set up near two existing facilities. One is the Scotchcast medical cast padding plant established in 2005 and the other is a 3M unit making optical films for LCD screens, launched a year later.

3M has not revealed how much it is investing or how many jobs the new unit will create, but the Polish business news service Puls Biznesu estimates 3M is likely to spend around $33 million on the plant.

* Richard Higgs is a European correspondent for Plastics News, a sister title of PRW and EPN.

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