German carmaker BMW has ordered its factories in Europe and South Africa to close for a month because of the coronavirus pandemic, the company's CEO, Oliver Zipse, said on Wednesday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 18th March, 2020) German carmaker BMW has ordered its factories in Europe and South Africa to close for a month because of the coronavirus pandemic, the company's CEO, Oliver Zipse, said on Wednesday.
"From today, we will shut down our European car factories and the Rosslyn factory in South Africa," Zipse said, as quoted by The Guardian, adding that the suspension of operations would be in place until April 19.
The affected plants account for about half of the company's production.
BMW expects the coronavirus to have a negative effect on its financial results this year, with CFO Nicolas Peter saying that the company's pretax profit this year would be significantly lower than the last year's 7.1 billion Euros ($7.74 billion).
"The measures regarding the Corona virus will significantly impact our business in the current year. Short-term, we are especially focusing on stabilizing liquidity and our result," Peter said in a statement.
The company's net profit in 2019 decreased year-on-year by 28.9 percent to 5.02 billion euros, while revenue grew by 7.6 percent to 104.21 billion euros.
Earlier in the day, Japanese carmaker Toyota announced it was suspending production at seven of its facilities in five European countries -- France, the United Kingdom, Poland, Czech Republic and Turkey.
