Although global sales made by ZF Friedrichshafen AG suffered a year-on-year fall of a third in the first eight months of 2009, Asia continues to be an area of growth for the German supplier.

In Shanghai, the company last week completed its move into a new facility; the ZF Shanghai Center. Covering 11,000 square meters in the Shanghai Songjiang Hi-Tech Park, the 150 million yuan ($22 million) complex employs around 300 staff and houses ZF (China) Investment and a new ZF Engineering Center.

According to company spokesperson Keren Jiang, the new engineering center will house testing benches for gasoline and diesel powered transmission systems, an extreme climate simulation room, full size chemical and physical laboratories and a full software testing lab.

ZF has added 500 new positions in Asia while cutting 800 jobs in North America, according to a company release. For the whole of 2009, ZF is predicting a sales fall by a quarter to 9.2 billion euros (93 billion yuan).