VON plans To Churn-out Hyundai, Proton and Volkswagen brands in Lagos.

True to its promise, the Volkswagen Automobiles Nigeria Limited has secured franchise for local production of brands of light trucks.
The good new s comes barely four months after the company manufactured its first set of  Ashok  brand  buses for mass transit
The Managing Director of the new company which was formerly known as Volkswagen of Nigeria (VON), Mr. Tokunbo Aromolaran, disclosed that the assembly plant had the capacity to churn out 15,000 pickups and light trucks on annual basis.

True to its promise, the Volkswagen Automobiles Nigeria Limited has secured franchise for local production of brands of light trucks.
The good new s comes barely four months after the company manufactured its first set of  Ashok  brand  buses for mass transit
The Managing Director of the new company which was formerly known as Volkswagen of Nigeria (VON), Mr. Tokunbo Aromolaran, disclosed that the assembly plant had the capacity to churn out 15,000 pickups and light trucks on annual basis.
The VON was privatised by the Federal Government a few years ago. It is now owned  jointly by the Stallion Group which controls  78 per cent shares, Barbados;  17 per cent and  Lagos State Government,; three per cent.
According to the managing director, the owners have jointly invested N1Billion  in infrastructure and installation of modern equipment at the Lagos- Badagry expressway complex.
He said the light truck project would commence in the last quarter of the year, adding that the manufacturers of Hyundai, Proton and Volkswagen had given firm commitment to support the local assembly plant in the new task.
He said the bus production plant, had stabilised, and that it enabled the firm to contribute (local supply) to the Federal mass transit scheme recently introduced as part of palliative measures for the partial removal of fuel subsidy.
 “In the first phase, the company is producing city buses of the Ashok Leyland brand. Three models are in production: the Falcon – a 42-seater, 100 capacity city bus that has been tried and tested on Lagos roads as part of the BRT project; the Hawk- a 31-seater 85 capacity bus attracting attention of bus operators on narrow Lagos roads; and the Eagle – a 28-seater bus.
“The company has put up a versatile assembly plant with current capacity of 2,000 buses per annum.”
Aromolaran said the third phase of the whole project would involve the production of passenger vehicles, stressing that this and the second phase would be more technically driven and challenging.
The firm, he said, had employed over 200 people since it resumed vehicle production last year.
On the possibility of manufacturing a truly  a made-in-Nigeria vehicle, Aromolaran said it was not the company’s priority, noting that there was no need to reinvent the wheel, he hinted that VON was considering the project as a final phase of its project.
He said the firm had set up a prototype section for developing the new vehicle model, which could take about three years to actualised.
He also spoke on the gradual infusion of local content in the products coming from the company.
According to him, the company is also thinking of infusing local content into its production. “The company is taking great pains to increase local value added and has plans to increase the production of locally sourced components year on year, reaching over 50 per cent local value added by the third year of production.”