Area Development
Toyota Motor Manufacturing of West Virginia will invest $90 million in its Buffalo, West Virginia plant and creating about 80 jobs. TMMWV, which employs 1,300 workers, will increase 6-speed automatic transmission assembly and machining by 20,000 per month by early 2015. This investment makes the eighth expansion of the Putnam County facility since it opened back in 1996.

To support production at its West Virginia plant, the automaker said it will also invest about $12 million to expand its Bodine Aluminum casting facilities in Missouri and Tennessee. The company will invest $11 million to expand Bodine Aluminum, a Toyota casting part manufacturing facility, in Troy, Missouri and $1 million to manufacture additional transmission cases and housing parts at its Jackson, Tennessee plant for Toyota West Virginia.

“This expansion at Bodine Aluminum’s facility in Troy marks another important milestone for Bodine and Toyota, for this community, and for Missouri’s resurgent automotive manufacturing industry,” Missouri Governor Jay Nixon said. “As a state, we will keep pursuing proven, fiscally responsible policies and making smart, strategic investments to move this industry and our economy forward, so that auto industry jobs in Troy and throughout Missouri can continue to grow.”

“This capacity increase helps us meet growing North American demand and is a part of our localization strategy to ‘build where we sell,’” said Millie Marshall, TMMWV senior vice president of manufacturing and administration. “This latest investment helps us better serve our North American customers and prepares us for an even brighter future.”

" In just two years' time, TMMWV team members will increase production from half-a-million transmissions to 740,000 transmissions each year. It's a huge undertaking, but I know they will rise to the challenge," West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin said. "TMMWV team members' hard work, the quality product they produce, and our state's commitment to creating a business climate that encourages the private sector to create jobs, led to this latest job growth and investment decision. I'm thankful for Toyota's continued faith in our work force."