Moskvich: Russia needs cars, so it’s restarting this Soviet-era brand

Renault also had a controlling stake in Avtovaz, the parent company of the famous Russian car brand Lada. Renault said in its statement this week That the controlling stake was sold to the government of Russia, while its controlling stake in the Moscow plant, where Renault cars were manufactured, was sold to the city of Moscow. Renault left the door open to the possibility of returning to the Russian market later.

“In 2022, we will turn a new page in the history of Moskvich,” Sobyanin added.

The mayor wrote that the company will try to keep all current factory employees working there. The plant will also try to source most of the auto parts from Russian companies. The plant will start producing conventional gasoline cars, but, at some point, it will switch to electric cars, according to Sobyanin’s blog.

Sobyanin did not specify which models of cars would be built under the Moskvich name at the former Renault plant in the near future.

Moskvich traces its roots to what are considered some of the first Soviet-style cars from the 1920s and 1930s. After World War II, the company began producing cars under the name Moskvich, which means “Muscovite”, or Born in Moscow.

In general, cars produced in the centrally controlled economies of the Soviet Union and its satellite states were not known for their quality.

Some cars made in the communist bloc countries, such as the East German Trabant, found a cult following in the West. The Trabant’s body is made of a material called Duroplast that looks like plastic but is made from a mixture of wood pulp, cotton fibers, and resin.

However, transformations are possible. Škoda, which was made in then-communist-controlled Czechoslovakia, was taken over by the Volkswagen Group after the fall of the Soviet Union. Now headquartered in the Czech Republic, it has become one of the most famous and profitable brands of the VW Group.