Imports of Iranian-made cars into the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will begin within three months, the Iran Khodro Company (IKCO) announced. The 1.8 liter Samand, the first car to be wholly designed and built in Iran, will be sold directly through IKCO's new showroom in Dubai.
"We hope to sell up to 1,000 Samands in the first year. The cars are aimed at Iranian expats and will sell for around 37,000 Emirati dirhams ($10,000). The initial models will be manual drive. More models will be introduced into the market later," said A R Ghane, manager of Automotive Components Technology General Trading, the spare parts division of IKCO which already has offices in Dubai.
"We know the car will be a best seller with Iranians living in the Emirates who will want to take it back to Iran and take advantage of the exemption from import duties which can be very high on international car brands,” he added. "We will sell the cars through our own showroom that will include a workshop and service area.”
IKCO, which has a 62 percent market share in Iran, according to a company press release, produced over 200,000 vehicles in the 11 months up to the end of January 2002. Output of various Peugeot models, assembled by IKCO under license, increased by more than 60 percent to 70,000 vehicles. The company also produced 131,449 Paykans, a family car based on the obsolete 60s British Hillman Hunter. The company plans to raise production to 400,000 vehicles a year by 2005. — (menareport.com)
© 2002 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
