Roland Vardanega, Member of the Managing Board and Executive Vice President, Manufacturing and Components, of PSA Peugeot Citroën and Osamu Masuko, President of Mitsubishi Motors Corporation (MMC) have officially laid the first foundation stone of their joint plant in Russia, located at Kaluga, 180 km south-west of Moscow.

The ceremony took place in the presence of Mr Anatoli Artamonov, Governor of the region of Kaluga, and several hundred guests.

The joint plant held 70% by PSA Peugeot Citroën and 30% by MMC will start producing mid-range (C segment) models, as of 2011, for Peugeot and Citroën and mid-range SUVs for the three brands. These models will be destined for the Russian automobile market.

The annual production capacity of the plant will be 160,000 units split 110,000 segment C vehicles and 50,000 SUV. Over time, its capacity may be increased to 300,000 units to meet the expected growth of the Russian market.

The plant will employ about 3,000 people and the joint initial investment for the two partners represents €470 million.

Didier Aleton of PSA Peugeot Citroën, former Director of the Russia project, has been appointed Managing Director of the new joint venture. He will oversee the operational management of the project.

For Roland Vardanega, this ceremony marks “the starting point of a tremendous long term manufacturing project on a highly-promising market, with a partnership based on sharing best practice to reinforce mutual efficiency”.

For his part, Osamu Masuko declared that “this project is the outcome of over a year’s intense discussions and will lead to even deeper technical exchanges, rich in high potentiality for the two automobile groups”.