The alert is now clear: the Termolia symbol of the Italian automotive industry for decades, is about to be dismantled. Yes, a month ago, Stellantis was content with silence or vague formulas, the latest signals leave no room for doubt. "From June or July onwards, there will be nothing left to produce", warn the unions, between muted anger and resignation.
One month earlier, an already uncertain future...
Last month, we reported on growing concerns about the site These include the gradual decline in combustion engine volumes, the end of the Nettuno V6 for Maserati, the GME for Alfa Romeo, and the poor visibility of the future of the GSE 1.0L engines for the Fiat Panda and 500 hybrids. At the time, the project to transform the plant into a gigafactory via ACC (Automotive Cells Company) already seemed to have been put on hold, due to a lack of solid prospects in the electric car market.
Today, dismantling is under way
But over the past few days, images from Termoli have been unequivocal: according to the Italian media primonumero, trucks leave the plant carrying the last electric cabs from the gearbox line. Employees watch helplessly as a promised future is physically dismantled. "It's a piece-by-piece disinvestment," sums up Gianluca Falcone, secretary of FIOM Molise.
The message is blunt: the Fire line is at a standstill, 8-valve engines have ceased production, and 16-valve engines will be discontinued this summer. The GME engine? On the way out. The V6? Too expensive, too marginalized. As for battery production, which was supposed to embody the site's green transition, it has simply disappeared off the radar.
Is the Gigafactory a political mirage?
Promoted with great enthusiasm by local and national politicians, the Termoli gigafactory is now no more than a memory. John Elkann himself admitted at a parliamentary hearing that it would be "very difficult" to build, citing high energy costs. Behind the scenes, Spain takes the cake with 4 billion euros of investment and a partnership with China's CATL. Meanwhile, the 370 million euros earmarked by the Molise region have been withdrawn.
A complete strategic vacuum
What the workers at Termoli are going through is not restructuring. It's a silent agony. Fewer than 2,000 employees today, compared with over 3,500 in the glory days. A professional future hanging on unfulfilled promises, with no industrial plan or concrete alternative. And the famous eDCT production lineannounced as a lifeline, should only concern around 300 employees... from 2026. "And until then, what do we do?" ask the unions.
The last hope lies in the future Fiat 500 hybrid scheduled for November 2025, and in the hybridization of V6 and GME 4-cylinder engines for future Alfa Romeo and Maserati models, but for the moment nothing official has been announced on this subject.
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At a time when the Fiat and Alfa Romeo brands are materialized only by a logo at the end of a radiator grille on the 600, Grande Panda and Junior, closing the Italian factories sounds like the coup de grâce and the ultimate betrayal, when synergies have already saved billions of euros. Why should consumers be loyal when management isn't and lies compulsively? If people end up buying Chinese, we shouldn't be surprised.
Europe is screwing us up. It's Europe that's killing jobs and constantly introducing pollution standards that make no sense, because we're not the biggest polluters when you look at airplanes, big boats, etc...
The Carlos Tavares massacre won't stop.
What are you waiting for to put him in prison? It would be better to dismantle the factories manufacturing crap (puretech for those who haven't yet understood) than those where people were capable of making people dream.
È successo anche con Alfa Romeo di Arese gli incompetenti di Fiat hanno smantellato un pezzo alla volta la fabbrica e poi scappare. Una vergogna totale! Che schifo mi vergogno di essere Italiano . Ho lavorato in Alfa Romeo e Fiat per 40 anni e adesso mi vergogno di questi proprietari e politici che pensano solo al proprio tornaconto. Povera Italia!
What carnage all this... It hurts...
More engines for Maseratis?
For the moment, they're promoting the 4-cylinder GME in the Grecale, and trying to sell a few Granturismos and MC20s, but this remains marginal, so they must have stock of this engine. The future Maserati product plan will give more visibility on engine strategy.
Carlito put them through their paces...
In beauty even...
Instead of FireFly and GME engines, if we're going to put PureTech everywhere again, it's appalling. Production of Italian engines is stopped and Stellantis has nothing better to offer than electrics or PureTech?
Italian engines are totally out of line with European CO2 standards, and have been for years since FCA bought "pollution rights" from Tesla.
In my opinion, Stellantis should have kept the Firefly on the Italian and Jeep models: Avenger, 600, Ypsilon and Junior, which would have kept the Italian engine factories running. It's a big strategic error on the part of Tavares, who is responsible for this situation.
Especially since there were ways of adapting the hybrid system to the Firefly.
Wenn man den Menschen die E-mobilität aufzwingen will, muss man sich nicht wundern, wenn die Kaufbereitschaft zurück geht. Verbrennungsmotoren sind durch Emissionsgrenzen zu störanfälligen Monstern geworden. Wer möchte sich sowas zulegen und viel Lebenszeit in Werkstätten verbringen?
Kapitalismus! Bedarfs noch Erklärungen?
FCA has been in total perdition in Europe for years. Alfa Romeo's engine range is totally unsuited to the market, with huge maluses, and the same goes for fiat and abarth, which relied solely on the 500, but which no longer sells electrically. In short, the result is implacable logic. Fortunately, the marriage with PSA will enable FCA to relaunch its brands in Europe using PSA platforms, but this will necessarily take time.
Making dreams come true with an offer that was totally outdated technologically and therefore no longer sold?
Also wenn ein Stellantisgetriebe (9 Gang-Wandlerautomatik im Fiat Kastenwagen) bei 93.500 Kilometern kollabiert (Auto ist von 8/20), hält sich mein Bedauern in Grenzen. Das war kompletter Murks und hat mich ungeplante 16.000 Eueo gekostet. Nie wieder Fiat.
Das Herzstück aller italienischen Autos waren die leidenschaftlichen Motoren. Es ist bedauerlich, was für Motoren aktuell bei Alfa in den Hybriden verwendet wird. Auch im Tipo oder den neuen Modellen Panda und 500 kommt ein langweiliger Standardmotor zum Einsatz kommen. Stellantis nimmt sich hier die Zukunft. Es rächt sich bitterlich die lückenhafte Medellpolitik.
They make puretec crap and make people die with the EU, which allows the Chinese to invade us with polluting products, while people are screwed with their standards and laws Sorry, I'm being vulgar, but I can't take it anymore.
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I migliori motori in circolazione da quarant'anni, mai guasti, consumi ridotti, durata, costi contenuti, affidabilità e qualità dei prodotto. Come alternativa montiamo il Puretech che spacca. No grazie, provate a sentire cosa pensano i meccanici in giro. Rimango perplesso sui nuovi modelli con questa tipologia di motori, non mi interessano
Spero che gli Italiani non comprino più una vettura Stellantis.
E da mesi Montezemolo afferma che agli Elkan interessa solo la finanza.