Renault-Nissan Alliance (“Alliance”) and UniCredit have agreed to establish a dedicated automotive bank offering a wide range of financial services to Renault, Nissan and Infiniti brand customers and dealers in Russia.
The joint venture will be controlled by the Alliance which will have a 60% stake. UniCredit will participate as a qualified minority investor with a 40% stake.
The establishment of a directly controlled financing platform is aimed at further strengthening the Alliance’s competitive positioning in the Russian car market which is forecast to continue to grow rapidly over the next decade.
Russia is a key market for the Alliance. In 2012, more than a record 2.9 million new vehicles were sold in Russia. Over the same period, the Alliance posted record sales of 352,808 units (189,852 units for Renault, 153,747 units for Nissan and 9,209 units for Infiniti) corresponding to a market share of 12%.
Russia is also a core market for UniCredit where it operates through a fully owned subsidiary present on the market since 1989. Leveraging its participation in the joint venture, UniCredit plans to foster the growth of its retail banking activities in Russia.
The joint venture will further develop the successful and long standing cooperation between the Alliance and UniCredit which, in the Russian market, has been in place since 2007 in the form of a commercial agreement. The Alliance and UniCredit are partners also in other Central and Eastern European countries such as Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia and Hungary.
This project requires approvals from regulatory authorities for which filing is in process. The joint venture is expected to be operational by the end of 2013.
ABOUT THE RENAULT-NISSAN ALLIANCE
The Renault-Nissan Alliance is a strategic partnership between Paris, France-based Renault and Yokohama, Japan-based Nissan, which together sell one in 10 cars worldwide. The companies, which have been strategic partners since 1999, sold 8.1 million cars in nearly 200 countries in 2012. In addition to AVTOVAZ in Russia, the Alliance operates strategic collaborations with automakers including Germany’s Daimler, China’s Dong Feng, and India’s Ashok Leyland.
ABOUT UNICREDIT
UniCredit is one of Europe's leading commercial bank with strong roots in 22 European countries. Our network, which is present in roughly 50 markets, includes about 9,400 branches and more than 157,000 employees as of 30 September 2012. In the CEE region, UniCredit operates the largest international banking network with nearly 3,800 branches.
The Group operates in the following countries: Austria, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Turkey, Ukraine and Hungary.
