Company

History

The history of KAMAZ

Geographically, the city of Naberezhnye Chelny is located in the very heart of former USSR, where Kama and Volga rivers merge together. This, and also proximity of railroad, helped to solve the problem of delivery at first of construction materials to construction sites of the plant and the city, and later – of components to the plants for truck assembly, and then - finished products to customers.

The major building entity of the area was KamGESEnergostroi (Kama River Hydraulic Power Station Building Company). It built a dam and hydraulic power station of 1,5 million kWh capacity o Kama River, thus supplying power to KamAZ plants and to the city housings.

Young people of 70 nationalities from all over the USSR came to build KAMAZ and Naberezhnye Chelny.

On December 13, 1969 the first bucket of soil was excavated from the construction site of Kama Rive Heavy-Duty Truck Production Complex of Plants. The complex was designed to assemble 150,000 vehicles and 250,000 engines per year. The total complex area on the Kama River occupied a vast territory of 22 square miles.

In May 1974 there was assembled the first KAMAZ engine at the test assembly bench next to the office of the Chief Designer of KAMAZ.

December 1975 – the first power unit was assembled at a pilot assembly line of the Engine Plant.

December 16, 1975 – the first KAMAZ truck was assembled on the conveyer of the Assembly Plant. The Government has authorized General Production Schedule. In accordance with this Schedule, the Kama River Complex of Plants for Heavy-Duty Truck production was granted a status of an industrial complex under Ministry of Automobile Industry of USSR.

December 29, 1976 – The State Committee of the Ministry of Automobile Industry of USSR headed by its Minister, Mr. Polyakov V.N., has signed the official launch into operation of Kama River Complex of Plants for Heavy-Duty Truck production. This was the official start of the Complex.

In 1987 there was launched production of a small-size “OKA” car. The first OKA –VAZ-111 car was line assembled in December 21. In 1994 there was launched a new plant for output of 75, 000 cars annually.

In 1988, statistics body of the country reported, that within that year the USSR gained profit of about 8 billion rubles, saved on transportation costs since KAMAZ plant was put into operation. Capital investments, assigned for KAMAZ construction, were successfully returned to the country within the first 10 years of its operation.

June 25th,1990 – the Government has made a decision to establish “KAMAZ Incorporated” on the basis of the existing industrial complex property. The Article of Kamaz Inc. was ratified by the General Meeting in August 1990. KAMAZ, Inc. was established in August 23,1990 throuhg transformation of KAMAZ Industrial Complex under the USSR Ministry of Automobile and Agricultural Machine Building into a Joint Stock Company in accordance with Resolution ¹616 from 25.06 90 of USSR Council of Ministers. KAMAZ became the first incorporated company in USSR.

April 4th, 1993 - Engine plant fire almost destroyed not only building itself, but also sophisticated technological equipment. After the fire there were considered two possibilities of Engine Plant restoration. One way was to restore Engine Plant in full, as it was before, with the same output program of 100 thousand engines/year. The second way was to generate efforts and to set new production with application of the latest technological equipment and machinery. Thanks to support of Governments of Russia and Tatarstan, KAMAZ personnel managed to rebuilt the plant within less than a year period. In December 1993 Engine Plant produced the first parts and engines after the fire.

By August 30,1999 KAMAZ has assembled 1,600,000 trucks and more than 2 million diesel engines.

KAMAZ, Inc. today is a joint industrial complex, situated in the city of Naberezhnye Chelny. It includes 9 large specialized plants and the whole technological scope of advanced machine building facilities. Within KAMAZ Inc.’ complex there are the Foundries, Forge plant, Frame & Stamping plant. Each of them is an independent legal entity, turned into a Joint-Stock Company. They can trade on the market independent from the Parent Company.

Machine processing and assembly plants include such facilities, as: KAMAZ-Diesel, Assembly plant, Automotive plant, Tool plant, Engine Repair Plant. Each of them is also a legal entity. There are 6 more other plants outside of Naberezhnye Chelny, they are located in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan.