IzhAvto to Resume Kia Assembly in May

Russian carmaker IzhAvto is reportedly preparing to resume assembly of Kia vehicles at its Izhevsk facility. A total of 2,480 assembly kits will be supplied by South-Korean Kia Motors Corp. to Udmurtia by the end of April. Assembly of this batch of Kia Spectra and Sorento cars will be completed by August, after which IzhAvto will shift to production of Renault and Nissan-branded models.

The company started Kia assembly in August 2005, but halted operation in March 2009. In the last six years it produced 123 thousand Kia vehicles, most of which was Kia Spectra sedans (106 thousand units).