Vladimir Shlyomin

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efore the start of the 1990s KamAZ supplied its heavy-duty trucks to practically all countries of Eastern Europe. However, following changes that took place in this market Russian automakers lost a considerable part of their customers. And now they decided to take revenge.

KamAZ JSC, Russia’s most famous producer of heavy-duty trucks, announced its intent to enter Europe’s markets with its new products as early as next year.

The main products of KamAZ JSC are trucks with the carrying capacity from 4 to 20 tons and diesel engines. These are the most reliable and popular trucks in Russia, which account for 45 % of its market. Trucks of this trademark are used in over 60 countries on all continents, and proved themselves quite well. They operate in any road and climatic conditions: in the artic regions, tropics, deserts and mountainous areas. KamAZ is a permanent participant of international marathon rallies, such as Paris-Dakar, Paris-Moscow-Beijing, Dakar-Cairo. The automaker’s sports team won the world’s championship in truck races more than once.
In 2003 KamAZ JSC plans to export no less than 4,500 trucks. Besides, the company has an agreement with the foreign economic association TyazhPromExport on joint supplies of the automaker’s products to markets of Europe, Asia and Africa. However, it should be recognized that, despite the vast geography of sales, volumes of supplying common and dump trucks to Africa and Latin America are not that big yet reaching just dozens of motor vehicles. These supplies could rather be regarded as part of the market research program that the company has been conducting in those regions.
In the opinion of the automaker’s dealers, the decision to develop the East European market seems to be the most justified one. "Precisely in Eastern Europe dump trucks made by the Russian plant will have the competitive price", says Alexey Labzin, the director of the company KamAZ-Leasing. Why to transport sand by Mercedes that costs about 100,000 euros, when it is possible to purchase a motor vehicle with the similar productivity but costing twice as cheap?"
According to the data provided by Vladimir Kuznetsov, the director of the spare parts department at KamAZ JSC, only about 20 to 30 motor vehicles a year are being sold in the East European market. They are bought in Poland, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Yugoslavia. The bigger sales are hampered by strict ecological standards of the European Union. Motor truck transport should now meet the Euro-3 requirements. Such an engine has just been developed in the city of Naberezhye Chelny but it has not been put on the production line as yet.
Using a European engine turned out to be the simplest solution of the problem. The diesel engine RABA D10TLL-255 well known in Russia was taken as a basis. This engine is often used for the Hungarian buses Ikarus that are imported to the Russian market. KamAZ JSC and the Hungarian company RABA-Motor jointly adapted the diesel engine RABA, which meets the Euro-3 ecological standards, to the dump truck KamAZ-6520.

KamAz participating in the Paris-Dakar rally

This dump truck with the carrying capacity of 20 tons and fully loaded mass of 33,100 tons is a basic model in the category of heavy trucks. It was developed on the basis of the original chassis KamAZ-53229 for carrying load by roads designed for motor vehicles with the axial load of 10 to 13 tons. This truck is equipped with a dump platform for rear unloading, which has the volume of 12 cubic meters. Disk wheels and the wheel differential blockage secure its ability to operate in hard road conditions.
The dump truck KamAZ-6520 (6õ4) was recognized as "The best Russian truck of the year" at the contest arranged by the company Media Globe jointly with the Russian Ministries of Transport and Industry. Its jury includes independent experts and journalists, who cover motor vehicle subjects for specialized publications. The main criterion for nominees was their contribution to increasing the efficiency of freight traffic activity. Models’ novelty, ergonomics, maneuverability, fuel efficiency, length of between-services intervals as well as expenses on spare parts were also taken into account.
As specialists believe, products of KamAZ JSC, particularly heavy dump trucks, do not yield by their design to the counterparts made by other producers, and by their economic efficiency they even surpass them. Estimates show that the recoupment period for the dump truck KamAZ-6520 is twice as short as the one for its foreign counterpart. For example, the Czech Tatra-163 (6õ4) with the carrying capacity lower by 780 kg has a bigger fully loaded mass than KamAZ-6520 (by 830 kg).
According to experts’ estimates, this Russian dump truck may cost in Hungary about 50,000 euros. With a price like this it will become one of the most advantageous options in the Hungarian market. Tatra, its closest rival, is being sold for prices starting at 90,000 euros. And trucks from Western Europe are costing local buyers at least 100,000 euros. Regular supplies of KamAZ-6520 may begin in the not-so-far-off future. In any case Hungarians want to buy 20 KamAZ-6520 with the diesel engine RABA before the end of 2003.

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The decision to set up the enterprise KamAZ (Kama River Heavy-Duty Truck Production Complex of Plants) was taken in 1969, when the economy of the USSR started to experience the acute shortage of trucks. There was a need for a new truck that would be comfortable, powerful, universal and capable of sharply increasing the productivity of the motor vehicle transport. Among the country’s existing automotive plants not a single one could accomplish this task. Then, in the very center of Russia, at the junction of the Kama and Volga rivers, the construction of a new plant started. The first truck was off the production line in seven years.

"This shipment of trucks is not very big. But in order to consolidate one’s positions in the local market, it is very important to get the first orders. When they make a good showing, sales will start growing", believes Elena Sakhnova, the analyst with the investment company UFG. "Of course, rates of sales will be determined not only by the advantages of the truck itself but also by the availability of the efficient service and dealer network", she says.
"If we could ship 100 trucks to the Hungarian market ( for about 5 million euros), this would be a very good result for us", points out Vladimir Kuznetsov. The leadership of KamAZ JSC thinks that successful sales of dump trucks in Hungary will make them popular in other countries of Europe as well. Already today orders for them are coming from Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia.
The search for partners in Eastern Europe is facilitated by the fact that since COMECON many still remember Russian trucks. But it is important to find partners, who are able to arrange sales of KamAZ-6520 trucks by leasing or on credit as is being practiced in Europe.
Lately KamAZ JSC has been seeking to solve the problem to certify its trucks by bringing their technical parameters and consumer properties closer to requirements of the European Union. If buyers in Eastern Europe agree to pay for the plant’s efforts to modernize trucks, then, as soon as in a few years European sales of KamAZ JSC will make up for losses from missed contracts in Iraq and allow to stop one-time supplies of trucks to Africa and Latin America.