The Ford Motor Company could soon be expanding its efforts in Russia after signing an agreement with Sollers OJSC for a new joint venture.
To be known as Ford Sollers, the company has signed a letter of intent with Vnesheconombank, a Russian development bank, for financing worth approximately $1.4billion. The venture will include the Ford Transit medium commercial vehicle among several other products.
Stephen O’Dell, the chairman and CEO of Ford Europe, highlighted that Russia is likely to become Europe’s largest market for new vehicles by the middle of the decade and so the company has a huge growth opportunity.
Its operations will include the manufacturing plant near St Petersburg that currently builds the Ford Focus and Ford Mondeo; and two Sollers production facilities in the Republic of Tatarstan.
Ford actually became the first foreign car maker to manufacture vehicles in Russia back in 2002; while Sollers is Russia’s second largest producer of passenger and light commercial vehicles.
