OREANDA-NEWS. March 01, 2011.  Mitsui & Co., Ltd. ("Mitsu", head office: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, President and CEO: Masami Iijima) established a 50/50 joint venture ("JV") with major Russian car manufacturer OJSC Sollers ("Sollers", head office: Moscow, Russia) in Vladivostok, Russian Federation, last summer and has been engaged in preparing the launch of a project to assemble automobiles for Toyota Motor Corporation ("Toyota", head office: Toyota, Aichi, President and CEO: Akio Toyoda). Recently, Mitsui, Sollers and Toyota have reached a basic agreement on this project, and also, necessary procedure on agreement for the project between the JV and the Russian government has been completed. The JV will construct a new plant in Vladivostok and start assembling automobiles with technical assistance from Toyota in the spring of 2012.

The Russian automobile market is now in a recovery trend after the global financial crisis and is expected to become a three million vehicle market, which will be the 2nd largest in Europe after Germany, in 2016. Meanwhile, the Russian government is encouraging local production and localization by foreign manufacturers and has a clear intention to cultivate and strengthen local manufacturers through alliances with foreign companies as a long-term strategy for the development of the domestic automobile industry.

By starting production in the Far East of Russia, this project will provide customers in the growing Russian market with more efficient and prompt supply of Toyota vehicles.

This project enables Mitsui to strengthen its partnerships with both Toyota and Sollers and also enter the upstream of the automobile value chain in Russia. Mitsui, positioning Russia as one of the strategic regions in the automobile sector, aims to contribute to the development of the Russian automobile industry through this project and to expand our business activities in this country.