The Nizhny Novgorod Automobile Plant (NAZ) is an automotive manufacturing enterprise founded near Nizhny Novgorod in 1929–1932 that became one of the largest auto plants in the USSR. In 1932, after the renaming of the city, the enterprise was renamed the Gorky Automobile Plant (GAZ), the name under which it is known to this day. The plant played a key role in the country's industrialization and remains the flagship industrial enterprise of Nizhny Novgorod Region.
Foundation and Construction
On March 4, 1929, the Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh) of the USSR made a decision and signed an order to build an automobile plant.[1] On April 6 of that year, an area near Nizhny Novgorod was approved as the site of the future enterprise.[1] On May 31, 1929, the VSNKh of the USSR and the American company Ford Motor Company concluded an agreement on technical assistance in organizing the mass production of Ford-A passenger cars and Ford-AA trucks. The design of the plant was entrusted to the Detroit firm Albert Kahn Inc.[1] The plant's first director was Stepan Semyonovich Dybets, who held the post from 1929 to 1932.[1]
On May 2, 1930, the first stone was laid in the plant's foundation. Construction took 18 months.[1] NAZ entered service on January 1, 1932, and on January 29 the first 1.5-ton NAZ-AA truck (from 1933, the GAZ-AA) rolled off its assembly line. In December 1932, assembly began on the mid-size passenger car GAZ-A.[1] Although the first models were built to Ford's drawings, they differed from the American prototypes from the very start: the clutch housings and steering mechanisms were reinforced, the shape of the radiators was changed, and inch-sized nuts were replaced with metric ones.[1]
Prewar Production and the First Records
On April 17, 1935, the plant's one-hundred-thousandth vehicle, a GAZ-A passenger car, came off the assembly line. GAZ became the first automobile manufacturer in the country to produce 100,000 vehicles.[1] Under the agreement between the parties, Ford Motor's technical support continued for another five years after the plant's launch.[1]
A new milestone was the creation of the M-1 passenger car (GAZ-M1). The plant's design The Team refused to copy the American model: instead of a V-8 engine, it used the GAZ-A engine, boosted from 40 to 50 hp, created a reinforced frame and a new suspension design with four leaf springs, and replaced the spoked wheels with stamped disc wheels.[1] Before the start of the Great Patriotic War, the plant developed the GAZ-64, an all-wheel-drive army vehicle that was put into series production in record time.[1]
The War Years
During the Great Patriotic War, the enterprise was completely reoriented toward the production of military equipment. In the initial period of the war, the plant mastered the production of GAZ-64 jeeps and T-60 light tanks in the shortest possible time. In the spring of 1942, the light BA-64 armored car based on the GAZ-64 entered production. In 1943, the plant mastered the BA-64B armored car with a widened track and the GAZ-67 jeep, which shared its chassis with it, as well as the T-60 light tank. In early 1944, production of T-80 tanks began, later curtailed in favor of SU-76 self-propelled guns and the SU-76M. In parallel, the plant mass-produced engines, mortars, and other military products.[1]
Postwar Development and the Present Day
In the postwar years, the plant's model range was renewed: from January 1946, mass production of the GAZ-51 truck began.[1] Over the following decades, GAZ established itself as a leader in the Russian commercial vehicle market, offering functional, economical, and environmentally friendly vehicles for business, industry, passenger transport, educational and medical institutions, municipal and fire services, and agriculture.[2]
In the 2020s, the enterprise carried out a large-scale digital transformation project that received a grant of 380 million rubles. The project included the introduction of a unified PLM platform for managing design and technological production preparation, the creation of about 2,500 digital workstations at sites of the GAZ Group, and the organization of production equipment monitoring. According to the results of the project, completed in 2025, the effective utilization of production equipment increased by 20%.[2]
In November 2026, the "Passenger Car Production" company announced plans to launch press production of body parts under the Volga brand at the Nizhny Novgorod plant in the second quarter of 2027, as the next step in localizing production after the start of serial vehicle output in 2026.[1]
In addition to the main enterprise, Nizhny Novgorod is home to the registered company LLC "Nizhegorodsky Avtomobilny Zavod" (OGRN 1125261001744, INN 5261080560), an independent legal entity founded on April 5, 2012, engaged in the production of motor vehicles; as of 2021, its revenue was 321.9 million rubles and it had a staff of 75 people.[3]
Sources
- modeli-gaz.ru — GAZ Automobiles. Copying and use of the site's information without permission is prohibited
- rfrit.ru — "NIZHNY NOVGOROD AUTOMOBILE PLANT"
- checko.ru — LLC "NIZHNY NOVGOROD AUTOMOBILE PLANT" — Nizhny Novgorod — INN 5261080560 — Director General S. V. Khromov
Materials from articles used (2)
Dybets Stepan Semyonovich, Launch of Volga Body Panel Press Production in Nizhny Novgorod (2027)