The most important project the French Renault Group undertook to see through upon takeover of domestic carmaker Dacia, the 5,000 euro model, is about to be completed.
The design is ready and the production is due to start next summer, so that we should see it launched on the market a year from now, i.e. next fall.
Moreover, the trade name for the model known by its code name X90 within the French Group so far has been chosen, as well.
“The name of the five-thousand euro Dacia has already been set. It is only natural for a trade name to be set quite a while before the actual start of the production. We have to place the order for nameplates with our suppliers in the time we have left before June or July next year when the production of the model is due to begin. Anyway, we will maintain the Dacia by Renault phrase at least for the moment,” said Luc Alexandre Menard, Renault’s international operations manager and Automobile Dacia’s chairman as of last fall.
Menard did not care to disclose the trade name of the new model. “I can only say it will keep within the price limit initially set. In other words, the basic model will cost 5,000 euros in Romania, all taxes included,” Menard says.
He added the new model would be made only in Romania at first.
“The model will later be assembled in countries like Russia, Columbia or Morocco, where Renault holds productive facilities. Dacia will cease to be a national brand and will turn into an international one, ” Menard added.
The X90 project will entail hundreds of millions of euros in investments and will allow the Romanian carmaker to turn a profit for the first time in the last few years.
The model will be sold on both the Romanian market, as well as on other emerging markets such as Turkey, the Central and Eastern European countries, China, India and a number of countries in the north of South America. Renault officials estimate sales of this model to reach more than 200,000 units a year.
ionut.bonoiu@zf.ro