The company has already mastered the assembly of 10 of them; by the end of 2023, Avtotor will have to put five more on the assembly line, and 10 more in 2024. As reported by Avtostat, citing the main shareholder of the plant, Vladimir Shcherbakov, cars assembled in Kaliningrad will be present in almost all segments of the Russian market, and the company has plans to expand the portfolio to 30 models.
Before Western companies left Russia, including Avtotor’s former production partner, BMW, and Korean brands, Hyundai and Kia, paused business in the country, 40 different models were produced at the Kaliningrad site, from budget to the most expensive. “The market never declines in parallel across all segments; if it declines in the budget segment, it persists in the more expensive ones, or vice versa,” Shcherbakov explained. “Therefore, we again set ourselves the task of reaching at least 30 models and starting to work on them.” He added that the localization of these cars will be different.
“In order to be sustainable in the market, we must first restore the business model that has been in place for 25 years,” Avtostat quotes Shcherbakov. “We must be in all sectors of the market as before.”
As of today, Avtotor has launched the production of cars of three Chinese brands, BAIC (U5 Plus sedan, X35 and X55 crossovers and BJ40 frame all-wheel drive SUV), Kaiyi (E5 sedan, X3 and X3 Pro crossovers) and SWM (G01 crossovers, G01F and G05 Pro).
Earlier, information appeared about a fourth production partner, the Chinese brand JMC – its line will be represented by the Vigus Work pickup truck and two commercial models, Carrying and Conquer. According to rumors, these cars will be sold on the Russian market under a different brand.
New Russians: premieres of our automobile industry
