Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk told CBS 60 Minutes that he might consider buying some of the five plants that General Motors Co. is announced to be closed next year.
The largest US automaker General Motors Co. (GM) plans to close the plant in the Canadian city of Oshawa, near Toronto.
The five factories will be closed in North America, four in the US and one in Canada, also 14,700 workers will be laid off. The plant in Oshawa currently it employs about 3,000 people.
The workers were informed that after 12 months, the plant would no longer produce, despite the commitments made during the 2006 labor negotiations between General Motors Canada and Unifor, the union representing hourly factory workers.
According to The Wall Street Journal, by the end of 2019 about 2.8 thousand employees will lose their jobs. Of these, about 2,500 union members and about 300 other employees. It is unclear whether these actions will affect the Technical Center in Oshawa.
The plant in Oshawa has existed for 65 years. He is currently responsible for the final assembly and painting of the Silverado and Sierra models, which are shipped here from Fort Wayne, Indiana, along with co-production of the Chevrolet Impala with Hamtramck and the production of all Cadillac XTS models in North America.
The closure of Oshawa is part of a global restructuring aimed at moving towards auto-driven cars with lower emissions and fully electric models. Also, GM announced 6 models that will be completely discontinued within 12 months. GM plans to kill off a couple of great and a few not so great cars as part of its restructuring. None of the vehicles GM axed were SUVs or crossovers.
Elon Musk was born in South Africa, but grew up in Canada, in Toronto.