Russia to invest 12 bln rubles in cars for top officials - paper
MOSCOW. Oct 17 (Interfax) - Total government funding for a research and development project to make vehicles for top officials and commercially produce luxury cars will be 12 billion rubles, Kommersant newspaper reported Thursday, citing sources in the auto industry.
The newspaper said the models for top state officials will maintain the usual ZIL brand, sedans and SUVs will be launched under the Russo-Balt and Marussia brands. Production of from 5,000 to 20,000 cars is planned at Moscow's ZIL plant. "Production should get started in 2017," one source told the paper.
Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich held a meeting Wednesday with the Central Research and Development Automobile and Motor Industry Institute about the Cortege project, the paper said.
The institute will develop the vehicles with Nikolai Fomenko's sports car manufacturer Marussia Motors. The first samples should appear in 2014-2015. The government has allocated around 700 million rubles for the first phase of development.
"The budget draft contains around 6 billion rubles in government money for production but the volume of extra-budgetary financing has not been determined," a source told the newspaper. The main production plant for Cortege will be Moscow's Zil, he said. Other contenders in the project are Oleg Deripaska's GAZ , but the Moscow government is lobbying for production to be based in the capital, the source said.
The Finance Ministry and other departments are asking the project developers to give a clear account of future returns. That is why commercial production is planned for the sedan and SUV. "Production volume in the first phase will be 5,000 vehicles per year, afterwards it may increase to 15,000-20,000." The price of the cars will be rather high, the source said. For the sedan it will be around 2 million rubles and for the SUV about 3 million. "Work still needs to be done to bring the price down," the source said. There is a chance that Sollers capacity may be used for SUV production, including the Ulyanovsk plant. The group is not commenting on this.
The sources added that limousines for top officials will probably be manufactured under the ZIL brand. Branding for the commercial production cars is less clear. There are discussions about reviving the Russo-Balt make (produced in Riga at the beginning of the twentieth century), but it is now owned by businessman Viktor Taknov, while Marussia wants to produce cars under its own brand.