German supplier Gedia sells Detroit-area operations, to lay off 92

Gedia Automotive, a German automotive structural components supplier, has sold its North American headquarters and technical center in suburban Detroit.

As a result, the supplier to Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes-Benz, is laying off 92 at the 63,300-square-foot facility in Orion Township, Mich., no later than Jan. 31, the company said in a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1988 filed with the state of Michigan late last month.

Some of those employees, which include machine operators, technicians and office staff, have the potential to be hired by the buyer of the operations, the company said in the notice.

It’s unclear who the buyer of Gedia’s Michigan operations is, and representatives for the company and Orion Township’s supervisor’s office did not return emails or calls about the deal.

Gedia acquired the building and expanded into Michigan in 2017 with the help of a $500,000 performance-based grant from Michigan for the planned $21.9 million investment.

The funds were designated to create 78 jobs with an average annual salary of $58,637. The state had disbursed all the funding for those jobs by 2021, according to a legislative report by the Michigan Strategic Fund.

The German auto supplier operates a manufacturing plant in Dalton, Ga., as well as in Puebla, Mexico. Its European operations include Germany, Hungary and Spain. It also operates in India and China.

Gedia’s total revenue in 2022 topped $800 million.