Renault’s Sandouville plant, which this year celebrates its half-century, is producing commercial vehicles for the first time.
The redesigned Trafic medium van is now in production after a EUR230m (US$290.97m) spend and three years of preparation. The factory will continue to produce the current Laguna and Espace passenger models until they are replaced.
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With Trafic production at Sandouville, the Renault brand now manufactures all of its Europe-bound LCVs in France.
As part of an agreement signed between the two companies in July, Fiat-Chrysler has asked Renault to develop and build a van model based on Trafic platform, with a total estimated volume of 100,000 vehicles, from the second quarter of 2016. The styling of the Fiat vehicle will be developed by Fiat and will feature unique and distinctive elements on the model, branded Fiat Professional.
Some Vauxhall and Opel variants of the Trafic are built at General Motors Europe’s plant in Luton, England, where a second shift was added earlier this year.
