Did a curse fall on Renault? After the existential crisis linked to the fall of Carlos Ghosn in 2018-2019, the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 and the shortages of semiconductors in 2021, it is now the war in Ukraine that is hitting the diamond company, recovering last year after two years of losses. Curse, the word is not too strong. Of all the major automobile manufacturers, Renault is the most affected by the collateral effects of the Russian invasion and the sanctions that followed it.
The Russian-Ukrainian conflict threatens one of the strongest assets of the French industrialist: its dominant position in Russia. The tricolor group controls 29% of the local automobile market there, thanks to its stake in the historic manufacturer AvtoVAZ (3 billion euros in assets, including 900 million in equity), better known under its Lada brand (21% of the market ). Renault sells almost 500,000 vehicles in Putin’s country, and one in six of the group’s cars is sold in Russia.
Strange adventure that this Russian saga of Renault. It was born in 2008 from the meeting between the economic ambitions of the master of the Kremlin and the dreams of expansion of the CEO of Renault at the time, Carlos Ghosn. While it brings out veterans of the KGB and the Red Army from the shadow of the ex-Soviet military-industrial complex, it also recounts a dazzling industrial transformation that will make a Combine old fashioned a modern and profitable automaker.
But first, the genesis. At the origin of this conquest of Russia, Carlos Ghosn, ex-big boss of the tricolor group and the Renault-Nissan Alliance, provides interesting details in his book The time of truth (Grasset editions, November 2020, 480 pages, 22 euros), co-written with journalist Philippe Riès: “AvtoVAZ, which was 100% in the hands of the Russian state, needed help. Vladimir Putin was unhappy with both the company’s performance and the quality of the products. Hence the search for a foreign partner, who would take a 20% stake. We were in competition with General Motors and Fiat. »
Strange hitch
“One day in 2008continues the fallen boss, I received an invitation to go to the Kremlin to meet Vladimir Putin. He said to me, “Mr. Ghosn, it is to you that we will attribute the 20% in AvtoVAZ. We believe that industrial projects are equal. The reason you won is that we personally trust you to respect the company’s Russian identity. You have already demonstrated this in France and Japan.” »
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