European automotive supplier body, CLEPA, is highlighting the potential opportunity in the Iranian market for its component producers, should current punitive sanctions be lifted.
Recent talks in Geneva between the so-called P5+1, namely the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China as well as the European Union and Iran, garnered a possible breakthrough in relations that were welcomed by domestic automaker, IKCO, Renault and PSA Peugeot Citroen.
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“Iran is a very interesting automotive market because in terms of production, it is one of the top 15 countries,” CLEPA CEO, Jean-Marc Gales told just-auto in Brussels.
“It has a middle class and if this country opens up more than it has now, it will be a substantial market and suppliers need to make sure they get their fair share and not leave [it] to the already well-implanted Japanese and Korean companies.
“We need to overcome the political issues right now with Iran, but nonetheless it is a very interesting market.”
Western powers have imposed a series of crippling sanctions on Iran in an attempt to dissuade Tehran from what they see is its ambition to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, but any dilution of the trade barriers have led some to speculate the auto industry could benefit to the tune of up to US$500m.
Tehran now has six months to comply with initial Western nuclear requirements, but domestic automaker, IKCO, has hailed the developments as heralding “a new atmosphere in Iran, we are very hopeful.”
Renault is involved in the country through its Logan and Megane models, while PSA sells almost 500,000 knock-down kits, with French President, Francois Hollande, highlighting: “A step towards the end of the Iranian military programme and thus to a normalisation of our relations.”
A sign of the thawing climate in Iran can be gauged by an automotive conference in Tehran last weekend, featuring French suppliers association, FIEV, vice president, Arnaud de David de Beauregard, Iranian first vice president, Eshaq Jahangiri Kouhshahi and the CEOs of IKCO and fellow-Iranian automaker, SAIPA, among others.
