The Lada brand has been dominant in Russia for decades, and manufacturer AvtoVAZ is aiming to use its Renault-Nissan ties to shore up its position and products in the years ahead.
Here Igor Burenkov, director of external relations, talks about AVTOVAZ’s new SUV concept unveiled at the recent Moscow Automotive Salon.
The automakers forged a $750-million joint venture deal for control of AvtoVAZ in May, and are sharing capacity at its Togliatti factory, building cars for all the brands, including Nissan’s Almera and soon for Datsun.
The aim is for all the brands to control 40% of what will soon be Europe’s biggest market.
Lada, which began in the 1960s with help from Fiat, is shaking up its line up, using its concept XRay to add a futuristic design wrinkle that it looks to bring to the market in a few years.
The Global Media Center spoke with Igor Burenkov, director of external relations at AvtoVAZ, at the Moscow Automotive Salon last month for background on what’s happening in Russia:
“The market has opened and it makes us respect new standards that have appeared in our markets and it makes us work harder in order to respect these standards and to be competitive in our domestic market, ” said Burenkov, director of external relations at AvtoVAZ.
“Today you have seen our new car, the Xray. At the moment it’s a product concept but its what we expect to have after 2015, it’s the new traces, the new style of AvtoVAZ models.”
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