SOUTHFIELD, Mich., Sept. 9 /PRNewswire - AsiaNet/ -- Lear Corporation (NYSE: LEA) today announced a joint venture with NHK Spring Co., Ltd. to supply seats to Auto Alliance Thailand (AAT), a joint venture between Ford Motor Co. and Mazda. The new company, General Seating of Thailand, will provide seats for the 1998 Auto Alliance small-truck platform which has an estimated production of 135,000 trucks per year. Lear and NHK each will hold identical percentage shares in General Seating of Thailand, with Lear being the operating company. The new 70,000 square- foot facility will be in Thailand's Rayoung Province. "This joint venture is an excellent example of teamwork on all levels -- Lear and NHK supplying the automotive team of Ford and Mazda," said Lear Chairman and CEO Ken Way. "We look forward to supplying the rapidly expanding Thailand market with high-quality seat systems for a fast-growing vehicle segment." This is the third joint venture for seat assemblies between Lear and NHK. The others are General Seating of America, in Frankfort, Ind., which supplies Subaru, Isuzu and Honda, and General Seating of Canada, in Woodstock, Ontario, which supplies Cami, a joint venture between General Motors and Suzuki. "We are pleased to establish another joint venture with our partner of nine years -- Lear Corporation," said Tsuguhiro Maeda, President and CEO of NHK. "Through combined efforts and the support of a new facility, we have the capabilities to support our customers on a worldwide basis." Excluding Japan and South Korea, Thailand has emerged as the region's leading producer of light vehicles, manufacturing 580,000 vehicles last year. Automakers in Thailand produced 330,000 pickup trucks in 1995, making it the second-largest producer of pickups behind the United States. According to the Thai Board of Investment, Thailand aims to produce 1 million vehicles a year by the end of the century. Thailand also is a member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) which facilitates trade, investment and industrial activities in the region. In 1992, the organization established the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) to develop the region as a competitive production base to service global markets by the turn of the century. NHK Spring was founded more than 50 years ago as Japan's first domestic producer of industrial springs. Now the world's largest spring manufacturer, the company's worldwide production facilities enable it to supply customers on a global basis. NHK has five divisions, including Suspension Spring, Seating, Precision Spring & Components, Industrial Machinery & Equipment and Information & Security. A Fortune 500 Company, Lear Corporation is the world's largest independent supplier of automotive interior systems, with 1995 sales of $4.7 billion. In 1995, Lear was the third largest independent automotive supplier in North America and one of the ten largest in the world. The company's world-class products are manufactured by more than 40,000 employees in 135 facilities located in 19 countries. Information about Lear and its products is available on the Internet at http://www.lear.com. CONTACT: Leslie Touma, Director, Corporate Communications, 810-746-1678, or Jonathan Peisner, Director, Investor Relations, 810-746-1624, both of Lear