aVIA tRUCK Factory - Prague
Just outside the main busy bustling streets of Prague is a large industrial area, sprawling over several acres, at one time it all belonged to a single car plant named after the former Czechoslovakian President Klement Gottwald; who today is quite a controversial figure as during the five years he was president, two hundred and thirty death sentences were handed out, and almost two hundred thousand people were sent to prison and forced labour camps.
The plant produced cars and trucks for Avia, a company that started out making biplanes, a little later in its history the factory produced planes for the German Luftwaffe. After WWII and the introduction of Communism into Czechoslovakia the plant was nationalised and used for the automotive industry primarily producing trucks called Avia.
Following the fall of communism the Avia brand was to be privatized, there were several interested parties came forward, primarily Renault and Mercedes Benz but in the end in 1995 the tender was won by Daewoo.
Despite Daewoo launching a new sales strategy for Avia which included a new 6-9 tonne truck the factory hemorrhaged money at a faster rate that it could earn it back, even selling off the former workers flat for redevelopment could not keep the factory afloat. By 2004 the only way Daewoo could see a way out was a takeover and the site was restructured by an investment company which took the manufacturing on the site from 120 buildings to just 4. In 2006 the investment company sold Avia to Ashok Leyland, the site closed for the last time in 2013 when Ashok Leyland took all production to India.
The plant produced cars and trucks for Avia, a company that started out making biplanes, a little later in its history the factory produced planes for the German Luftwaffe. After WWII and the introduction of Communism into Czechoslovakia the plant was nationalised and used for the automotive industry primarily producing trucks called Avia.
Following the fall of communism the Avia brand was to be privatized, there were several interested parties came forward, primarily Renault and Mercedes Benz but in the end in 1995 the tender was won by Daewoo.
Despite Daewoo launching a new sales strategy for Avia which included a new 6-9 tonne truck the factory hemorrhaged money at a faster rate that it could earn it back, even selling off the former workers flat for redevelopment could not keep the factory afloat. By 2004 the only way Daewoo could see a way out was a takeover and the site was restructured by an investment company which took the manufacturing on the site from 120 buildings to just 4. In 2006 the investment company sold Avia to Ashok Leyland, the site closed for the last time in 2013 when Ashok Leyland took all production to India.
