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Prior to the opening ceremony, the President of Russia was shown around the production line where multiple vehicle architectures can be produced simultaneously.

Construction began on June 20, 2017, under a special investment contract signed in February of the same year. The plant’s design capacity is 25,000 vehicles a year and, when it is operating at full capacity, the number of jobs will exceed 1,000.

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Speech at the opening ceremony

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Ladies and gentlemen, Mr Federal Minister of the Federal Republic of Germany,

We are attending a very pleasant event that is important for our automobile market – the opening of a new assembly plant of yet another major company that enjoys deep respect all over the world and in this country, Mercedes- Benz.

I know how long the dialogue lasted and what a long road the company traversed to the adoption of its investment decision. We would like to thank our colleagues from Mercedes-Benz for this decision that has been made and almost implemented.

It took a mere a year and a half to build this plant. I have just been told that it is expected to produce 25,000 vehicles of four different models. The plant will employ almost a thousand people. Between 500 and 700 are already working here and they are very active. Now they are dealing with the first assembly, as we can see. About four billion rubles are expected to be paid to all levels of the budget system in the next decade, and the total investment in the plant amounted to 19 billion.

Needless to say, we will continue to support such projects that are implemented by Russian companies and our foreign partners. Naturally, we believe this is upgrading the competence of the Russian vehicle making industry, expanding its opportunities and, of course, meeting the requirements of our consumers. The Russian market is one of the largest in Europe. Last year, the production of vehicles increased by 15 percent and sales went up by over 13 percent.

I am quite sure that Mercedes-Benz will not be disappointed doing business in Russia, and we will do everything for this; we will help our partners. This is all the more so since Mercedes-Benz is well experienced when it comes to working in the Russian Federation with the GAZ and KamAZ assembly plants, where it has long been producing its own vehicles.

I myself, your humble servant, as you well know, and many of my colleagues drove and are still using Mercedes cars that are highly appraised for their quality all over the world. It is absolutely certain that Mercedes will be popular with Russian consumers.

I would like to congratulate all of you on the occasion of this event once again and wish every success to all those who helped organised this project and will develop it, and also those who will be working at the plant.

Thank you.