US President Donald Trump on Friday ordered General Motors Co (GM) to manufacture critical care ventilators as the US grapples with the mounting number of coronavirus cases.
The pivot will be no easy feat for the auto giant, requiring the company to train employees, procure supplies and respect strict manufacturing guidelines.
GM, working with medical device company Ventec Life Systems Inc (Ventec), will produce the ventilators in a factory in Kokomo in the midwestern state of Indiana, the companies announced last week.
The 2.6 million square foot (24.15ha) facility normally produces electronics for cars, and like all GM factories in North America, has been shuttered since mid-March to limit the coronavirus’s spread.
Repurposing car factories for emergency production has been compared to World War II, when they were used to build tanks and fighter planes.
This situation, experts say, is somewhat different, as building ventilators will require different techniques and procedures from what the factory normally sees.
The Detroit auto giant will use a free space in the factory, which it has already begun refashioning for the new mission.
A GM spokesman said production on the ventilators, a critical tool for saving lives during the Covid-19 crisis, will begin this month after employees are trained.
But the initial runs will be prototypes whose manufacturing processes need to be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, the spokesman said.
Meanwhile, experts say the first ventilators will not be available until the end of this month, but that will probably be after the peak in New York City, home to the worst outbreak in the US.
There are also important differences in the approach of auto manufacturers and companies that make medical devices.
Automakers may be able to streamline some processes at a time when urgency is paramount, but air conditioning manufacturing, for example, has “far more in common with ventilators than cars do”, former Federation of American Scientists vice-president Ivan Oelrich said.
One of the biggest challenges GM will face is procuring some 700 individual components that will be needed for the ventilators at a time when Ventec’s supply chain has been disrupted.
GM began working with Ventec on March 20 to develop sourcing plans for the parts, the companies said.
They expect production to reach 10,000 per month after ramp-up – much more than the 250 per month normally produced by Ventec.
GM is recruiting 1,000 workers for the task.