AwtoWAS

AwtoWAS
legal form	Corporation
ISIN	RU0009071187
founding	1966
Seat	Tolyatti , Russia
management	Nicolas Maure (CEO) Carlos Ghosn ( Chairman )
Number of employees	44,000
sales	176.5 billion rubles (2 billion euros )
Branch	Automaker
Website	www.lada.ru
Status: 2015

Company headquarters in Tolyatti

Vehicle production in Tolyatti, 1969

AwtoWAS ( Russian АвтоВАЗ , AvtoVAZ ; initially Russian Волжский автомобильный завод , Wolschski awtomobilny zavod , "Volga Automobile Plant") is the largest manufacturer of passenger cars in Russia .

AwtoWAS vehicles are sold under the brand name “Lada” ( Russian Лада , Lada ). For a long time this name was only used for export to Western Europe. In the Comecon area, the name Schiguli ( Russian Жигули , in the GDR Shiguli , named after a landscape on the Volga) was used for limousines and station wagons , the off-road vehicle was given the brand name Niwa .

The main plant is located in Tolyatti in Samara Oblast on the central reaches of the Volga . Ladas are manufactured under license in Ukraine , Kazakhstan , Egypt , Ecuador and Uruguay .

Renault-Nissan acquired a 25 percent share and thus a blocking minority in AwtoWAS with effect from February 25, 2008 . Other major shareholders with 25 percent each are the Russian state company Rostec and the Troika Dialog group . The employees hold additional shares; only eight percent of the shares are broadly diversified.

history

In the mid-1960s, the leadership of the Soviet Union decided to source advanced technology from abroad to build a “vehicle for everyone”. The decision was made in favor of the Italian Fiat group. Palmiro Togliatti , the chairman of the Communist Party of Italy who died in 1964 , played a key role in the business deal between Fiat and the Soviet government , so the city of Stavropol-Wolschski was renamed " Tolyatti " in his honor .

Start of production in the "Wolschski awtomobilny sawod" (WAS) automobile plant

From 1966 to 1969, the Italian car manufacturer Fiat built the Wolschski awtomobilny sawod (abbreviated WAS) automobile plant in Samara Oblast , which from 1971 produced a variant of the Fiat 124 for the Soviet market, initially with the help of Italian specialists who worked in the plant. Fiat itself built the Type 124, which had been voted Car of the Year in Europe in 1967 , from 1966 to 1975. The Soviet Union paid for the plant in part with very rust-prone recycled steel (because of the high copper content), the Fiat and also Alfa Romeo used to build their own vehicles. The Italian vehicles from this period were accordingly prone to rust; some had to be welded after just a few years to get through the main inspection .

Model development

The first vehicle type from AwtoWAS, the WAS-2101 , was given the brand name Shiguli (after the mountains of the same name near Tolyatti) in the Soviet Union and some Eastern Bloc countries . In 1974 the name Lada (Slavic for, inter alia, "Liebchen", "Beliebte") was introduced for the export models . Lada sounds similar to the word Ladja; the Ladja is the sailing boat depicted on the company logo. A total of seven types of Schiguli were built (WAS-2101, WAS-2102 , WAS-2103 , WAS-2104 , WAS-2105 , WAS-2106 and WAS-2107 ), of which there were again different types. Based on the Schiguli with the type designation WAS-2106, the off-road vehicle WAS-2121 with the brand name Niwa was created.

In 1984 the first new development was presented, the Samara . The vehicle is named after the metropolis of Samara and the administrative district of the same name to which Togliatti belongs. In contrast to the Fiat 124 successor models (front engine with rear wheel drive) the Samara has a transversely installed engine and front wheel drive. The engine was developed together with Porsche . There was initially a three-door compact class car (type WAS-2108), which was followed in 1987 by a five-door (type WAS-2109) and in 1990 by a sedan (type WAS-21099). The second generation of the Samara appeared in 1997 (types WAS-2113, WAS-2114, WAS-2115).

In 1995 the Lada 110 was presented as the successor to the Schigulis, which was later offered as the Lada 111 and Lada 112. It received the type designations WAS-2110, WAS-2111 and WAS-2112. It was replaced in 2007 by the Lada Priora, which was built in the types WAS-2170, WAS-2171 and WAS-2172. From 1992 to 1995 the Moskvich-2141 was sold in Germany as Lada Aleko, at times also the small car Lada Oka (type WAS-1111), which was produced from 1988 to 1991 in Izhevsk and since then has been in the automobile factories SeAS (Serpuchov) and KAMAZ ( Miass) until production finally ended in 2008. In addition, the company also built its own small car, the Lada Kalina with the types WAS-1117, WAS-1118 and WAS-1119, which was offered from 2005. The Van Nadeschda (type WAS-2120) was not found in Western Europe ; (since 1998). The Niwa was to be replaced by a type developed jointly with General Motors, the WAS-2123 . This project failed. Instead, the WAS-2123 was offered as the Chevrolet Niva from 2003, while the original Niwa continued to be in production.

In November 2015, the Lada Vesta was introduced in Russia as the successor to the Prioras , and the SUV X-Ray in January 2016 . The Vesta has also been available in Germany since 2017. From September 2017, the Lada Vesta SW combination models and the raised and plastic-clad Vesta Cross were available in Russia. The Lada Largus , the Russian version of the Dacia Logan , is not available in Germany.

AwtoWAS since the 1990s

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, corruption degenerated into the sales system; each manager availed himself of “collective property” with his own sales company. In 1996 AwtoWAS received less than the production costs from the sellers, including Boris Berezovsky , also through hyperinflation; until the cars were paid for, the agreed price was no longer of the same value. In 1997 a special operation of the Ministry of the Interior was supposed to contain the criminal machinations; 3000 employees of the public prosecutor's office, the tax authorities and the Ministry of the Interior carried out a raid and found evidence of 65 contract killings among traders at AwtoWAS.

The public limited company OAO AwtoWAS, founded in 1993, became a company again in 2005, predominantly owned by state-owned companies; The main shareholders were the state arms export agency Rosoboronexport, the state industrial holding Rosprom and the state Wneschtorgbank. In 2007 the private Russian investment bank Troika Dialog got involved in AwtoWAS and in 2008 Renault-Nissan took a 25 percent stake in the company. The state holding company Rostechnologii , founded in 2007, holds a further 25 percent .

The financial crisis from 2007 onwards led to great difficulties at AwtoWAS in 2009. The company had sold 378,000 cars in the first half of 2008, but in the first half of 2009 it was only 169,000 with a workforce of 100,000. Company boss Igor Komarow then announced a reduction in staff by 22,000 employees.

In May 2012, Renault-Nissan announced in Paris that the company wanted to invest around 750 million US dollars (around 607 million euros) in AwtoWAS by 2014 and in return would receive a 74.5 percent stake in AwtoWAS. In 2013 there was talk of a further downsizing, which comprised up to 13,000 people, mainly in administration. The CEO cited the example of managers who managed a single employee. Before 2014, AutoWAS had to accept a number of annual financial statements with losses. According to Vedomosti , the manager Bo Andersson transformed the company from a “state giant factory into a normal factory that builds normal vehicles”. Nevertheless, Andersson was ousted from office by the Russian side in 2016.

Brand logo

The brand logo shows a sailing boat Ladja , which was widespread in the Middle Ages in Russia and among Vikings , which naturally sailed the Volga not far from today's plant.

Market share

The market share on the Russian market recently fell significantly from 27% (2010) to 19% (2016).

In 2008, 2,248 Lada vehicles were newly registered in Germany, in 2015 it was 825. In 2017 there were again 2,653 newly registered Lada vehicles.

Models

• 

  WAS-2101 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2102 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2103 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2104 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2105 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2106 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2107 "Schiguli"

• 

  WAS-2108 "Samara"

• 

  WAS-2109 "Samara"

• 

  WAS-2110 "110"

• 

  WAS-2115 "Samara"

• 

  WAS-2170 "Priora"

• 

  WAS-2180 "Vesta"

Motorsport

Lada logo on the Renault R30

Lada Priora in the 2009 World Touring Car Championship

As early as 2006, Lada planned to enter the World Touring Car Championship with the Lada 110 . However, the plans were initially rejected. The private team Russian Bears Motorsport later acquired the fully developed vehicles and started them in the 2008 World Touring Car Championship. Before the subsequent World Touring Car Championship in 2009 , Lada decided to go back to the factory and from then on supported the Russian team, which now officially started under the name Lada Sport . Initially, the factory engagement was crowned with little success, as the vehicles were still lacking in competitiveness. In the course of the season a new, more powerful engine followed and a few weeks later a new body with the Lada Priora . At the same time, an experienced racing driver was signed with the former British touring car champion James Thompson . Subsequently, Lada was able to establish itself in midfield and Thompson scored the first world championship points for Lada in the last third of the season in Imola.

At the beginning of 2010 there was initially a lack of clarity about a continuation of Lada's works involvement in the World Touring Car Championship. Although Lada committed itself to a three-year program in the World Touring Car Championship in 2009 and contracts with drivers had already been negotiated, Lada unexpectedly did not enroll in the 2010 World Touring Car Championship. Instead, Lada decided at short notice to sponsor the Renault F1 team, whose Renault R30 now carried the Lada logo in front of the side pods.

Since 2012, Lada has again been involved with a works team in the World Touring Car Championship (WTCC), first with the Lada Granta 1.6T, and from 2016 with the Lada Vesta WTCC. On April 17, 2016 Nicky Catsburg achieved a podium place for the first time with the Vesta as third at the Slovakiaring . As of April 2016, Lada is in third place in the manufacturer's ranking.

Web links

Commons : AwtoWAS  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Page from Lada Germany
• Page from Lada Switzerland
• Site from AwtoWAS (Russian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jason Chow: Renault, Nissan Name Nicolas Maure as New CEO at Russia's AvtoVAZ. In: Wall Street Journal . March 15, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016 . 
2. ↑ AVTOVAZ Board of Director Will Run through Changes ( Memento from July 25, 2016 in the Internet Archive ), April 18, 2016
3. ^ Profiles ( memento of October 26, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
4. ↑ AV reports 176.5 B-RUR of revenue in 2015 ( Memento from July 25, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
5. ↑ Russians Edge. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , December 8, 2010.
6. ↑ ^{a b} The Lada: Cult Mobile of the Soviet Union , RBTH, August 4, 2017
7. ↑ http://www.porscheengineering.com/peg/de/about/history/about-milestones/81/ ( Memento from April 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) 1976 to today - Milestones - History - Porsche Engineering
8. ↑ Gerald Czajka: Full hut in the Lada. In: Auto Bild , February 21, 2017.
9. ↑ Lada Vesta SW and Cross. In: Die Welt , September 19, 2017.
10. ↑ Excerpt from the book The Godfather of the Kremlin by Paul Klebnikow, in: Forbes Russia, November 29, 2017.
11. ↑ Lada manufacturer Avtovaz is suffering tremendously. on handelsblatt.de, October 12, 2009.
12. ↑ ^{a b} How Moscow wants to feed its carmakers. ( Memento from August 20, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) In: FAZ, August 30, 2014.
13. ↑ «АвтоВАЗ» намерен сократить более 20 тысяч сотрудников. In: Echo Moskwy , October 19, 2009 (Russian).
14. ↑ http://persona2015.vedomosti.ru/professional/#75
15. ↑ Putin's empty coffers. ARD, October 8, 2017; online on YouTube , minute 27
16. ↑ Lada designer died. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung of March 21, 2017, p. 20.
17. ↑ Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt : New registrations of motor vehicles and motor vehicle trailers by manufacturer and trade name in 2015 , p. 6.
18. ↑ https://www.kba.de/SharedDocs/Publikationen/DE/Statistik/Fahrzeuge/FZ/2017_monatlich/FZ10/fz10_2017_12_xls.xls?__blob=publicationFile&v=3
19. ↑ Lada confirms factory operation on Motorsport-Total.com , November 22, 2008
20. ↑ Lada update: "Now everything is ready" on Motorsport-Total.com , May 28, 2009
21. ↑ "Confirmed: Thompson is the new Lada driver!" On Motorsport-Total.com , June 26, 2009
22. ↑ "Lada celebrates the first points" on Motorsport-Total.com , September 20, 2009
23. ↑ Lotti on Lada-Aus: "We are surprised and disappointed" on Motorsport-Total.com , February 21, 2010
24. ^ "Renault confirms cooperation with Lada" , on Motorsport-Total.com , March 4, 2010
25. ↑ FUA WTCC: Lada on top of WTCC preparations ( Memento from April 17, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) from December 26, 2015, accessed on April 17, 2016

Coordinates: 53 ° 33 '22.06 "  N , 49 ° 15' 52.88"  E