Luxembourg-based Faymonville Group announced Tuesday (Oct. 29) it will build a manufacturing facility on a 54-acre site at the Port of Little Rock. The facility is expected to employ 500 people when fully operational.

Members of the seven-generation, family-owned company announced the plant’s opening Tuesday at an event that included Gov. Sarah Sanders and U.S. Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark.

A press release from the Arkansas Economic Development Commission said the company plans to invest more than $100 million in the 54-acre site. It will build a 409,000-square-foot facility in Phase 1 that will expand to 624,000 square feet in Phase 2.

In addition to the plant’s 500 employees, the press release said the project is expected to create another 389 indirect and induced jobs in the Little Rock area, generating a $329 million economic impact.

The company produces semi-trailers, low-loaders, modular vehicles and self-propelled trailers for very heavy, long, wide or tall payloads ranging from 16.5 to 27.5 tons. It produces 3,000 units of three vehicle brands for heavy load and special transport: MAX Trailer, Faymonville and Cometto.

It had revenues of about $500 million in 2023 and delivers to 125 countries. It currently employs 1,400 people at its four locations in Belgium, Luxembourg, Poland and Italy.

The press release said a team in Luxembourg is working on products for the U.S. market. Individual components will be manufactured in Little Rock in the first phase. By early 2026, production will be operational, the release said.

The company, which was founded in 1843, delivered its first product to the United States in 2016.

“We are proud to be the only manufacturer in our field bold enough to bring production right here to America, and we are all in, 100%,” said Anne Faymonville, marketing team leader.

Human Resources Manager Lisa Faymonville said the company would start hiring at the start of January 2026 and will hire specialists in steel construction, surface treatment, and final assembly. The company is looking for welders, machine operators, painters, mechanics and other professionals. It also will be looking for a production manager and a human resources specialist.

The courtship between Faymonville and the Port of Little Rock was a relatively brief one. Anne Faymonville toured potential locations and met Sanders and business stakeholders in June after the company had explored other states. Sanders said she hosted her at the Capitol at the time legislators were meeting for a special session to reduce Arkansas’ income taxes.

“There’s not a better way to sell Arkansas than by walking a prospective investor around the Capitol and showing them our legislators hard at work cutting taxes in real time,” she said.

Sanders, Secretary of Commerce Hugh McDonald, and Little Rock Regional Chamber President and CEO Jay Chesshir met with CEO Alain Faymonville at the Farnborough International Airshow in London in July. He and brother Yves Faymonville returned to Arkansas in August to look again at properties and then selected the site in late September.

Chesshir noted that this is the eighth international company to locate at the Port of Little Rock.

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