Daimler AG could move some production of the Mercedes-Benz C-class to the United States from Germany, a German newspaper reported Wednesday.

The Stuttgarter Zeitung said some C-class production could be transferred to the carmaker's plant in Vance, Ala., from Sindelfingen, near Stuttgart, as part of a wider production shakeup planned by Daimler to reduce costs.

In the future, the C-class sedan could be built in three locations: Bremen, Germany; Vance, Ala., and in China, the newspaper said.

Building about 80,000 C-class cars a year in Vance would save the automaker about $95 million (64 million euros) because the average hourly wage at the U.S. factory is about $44 (30 euros) compared with $74 (50 euros) in Germany, the newspaper said.

Moving some C-class production to the United States would allow Daimler to avoid swings in the value of the U.S. dollar against the euro, and save import duties and freight costs.

The Vance plant, which builds the M-, GL- and R-class models, has spare capacity. The plant built 66,710 units in the first eight months of this year, down from 136,138 the year before, according to the Automotive News Data Center.

The C-class is Mercedes' top-selling car in the United States with 34,432 units sold in the first eight months, down from 50,593 the year before, according to the data center.

Daimler told news wires that it had not made any decision on future C-class production.

Your prejudice is not supported by my experience. We had examples of both generations of ML, and had no issues related to assembly...some engineering/design issues, yes...but nothing related to the plant. Best I know, those engineers and designers worked in Stuttgart.

Biggest export shipment of Mercedes-Benz C-Class this year
East London / East London witnessed the loading a large consignment of 2 674 locally built Mercedes-Benz C-Class cars, destined for the East Coast of the United States of America on the Grand Orion vessel. The vehicles will reach the US shores of Jacksonville on 23 September and Baltimore on 26 September. This is the single largest shipping consignment from Mercedes-Benz South Africa (MBSA) since November 2008.

Rainer Ruess, manufacturing site leader at MBSA's local automotive plant said that this shipment reaffirms that US customers are very satisfied with the South African build quality. In July J. D. Power and Associates presented a Gold Award for Initial Quality to the MBSA plant, following a US survey conducted among over 80 000 new US car owners earlier this year. The local plant was placed fourth in the world, after three Asia-based plants, outperforming all European, American and African automaker plants.

Terry Taylor, East London-based corporate affairs manager of Transnet National Ports Authority was delighted with the smooth and quick loading of this consignment, the first to make full use of the R20-million car terminal expansion project that was completed earlier this year. Setting a new benchmark cars were loaded at a rate of 170 an hour, 15% faster than the norm.