Increasing payload performance

Fabrika Automobila Priboj is a leading European manufacturer of commercial and heavy-duty vehicles. Philip Yorke spoke to Mirko Stojovic, the company’s general manager, and Nikola Grabovcic, its expert for selling abroad, about the development of buses with gas-powered engines and its move into new markets.

Fabrika Automobila Priboj (FAP) was founded in Priboj on the river Lim in Serbia in 1953 and began by manufacturing a composite range of heavy-duty vehicles. By the early 1970s, thanks to its manufacturing licence with Daimler Benz, the company achieved the production of more than 7,000 vehicles per year. However, in the 1990s, as a result of the civil war in Yugoslavia and heavy economic sanctions, production was significantly curtailed for many years. After the war, a new investment and restructuring programme was implemented and FAP is now beginning to reclaim the ground that it lost in the commercial vehicle marketplace.

FAP has three main manufacturing plants in Priboj, including a mechanical processing plant that is responsible for machining, as well as for the toothing of gears, assembly

works, thermal treatment and the manufacturing of tools and spare parts. The second facility is an assembly plant that has a number of dedicated machine rooms.

These include workshops for pipe processing, frame-making, cargo boxes, cabin equipment and electrical systems and pneumatics. The third plant is focused on the company’s bus production and pressing lines as well as housing a surface protection workshop and a rim wheels production line. The company works to strict EU quality standards and produces over 5000 vehicles per year. It has over 1500 employees and in 2011 recorded sales of more than €25 million. To date FAP has manufactured over 150,000 vehicles and more than 1,000,000 spare parts. Diversified range of vehicles and components

With its three modern production facilities, the company produces a wide variety of vehicles that include trucks ranging from 10 to 32 tonnes with two, three or four axles and with engines rated from 180 to 420 horsepower. These vehicles are manufactured to EU3 and EU5 standards utilising power sources from Mercedes Benz, MAN and Cummins. The vehicle’s gearboxes are supplied by ZF, Voith and Allisson. In addition, FAP produces dump trucks, tractors, cargo trucks, refrigerated trucks and those designed for road maintenance and for forestry applications.

When it comes to commercial transportation vehicles such as buses, FAP manufactures these for use in cities and for intercity transport as well as producing buses for tourism. Trailers also form a major part of the company’s portfolio and include single and semitrailers with different types of loading capacity. These are all manufactured in accordance with FAP’s truck manufacturing programme.

Mr Stojovic said, “We are now in a position to move forward and are open for negotiating new contracts. We are very flexible and can work on different levels. For example, for the low-cost markets in the emerging countries we can send disassembled vehicles that they can assemble themselves locally, thereby saving significant sums of money. This arrangement then provides them with the opportunity to make good

profits when they sell on the reassembled vehicles. Furthermore, we have our own after-sales and service department and can supply any spare parts required from our own stocks to anywhere in the world.”

New markets creating new partnerships

Whilst over 80 per cent of all vehicles manufactured by FAP are destined for the domestic market, the company is now looking to broaden its horizons and move into new markets such as the Middle East, South Africa, eastern Europe and Asia. Its main customers for its domestic market vehicles are public utility companies and those engaged in the building and maintenance of roads and overall infrastructure, as well as companies focused on the exploitation of forests and mines, passenger vehicles and the military police.

Mr Stojovic commented, “We need to maintain our momentum and therefore we have established agents in other countries to sell and service our vehicles. In addition, we are currently looking to enter into exclusivity deals with a number of key overseas distributors. In fact, we are open to anyone in the industry who wants to work with us and we are also happy to enter into new investment opportunities from outside Serbia. As a state-owned company, once we have finished our restructuring we will be investing around €45 million in new plant and facilities. In September this year we will be attending the international Auto Trade Fair in Hanover, Germany and we will be showcasing three of our latest trucks. These will feature two, three and four axles. We will also be presenting our latest multi-functional vehicles which in turn can be customised to suit any application.”

Mr Grabovcic also added, “We believe that the globalisation process will result in a faster correlation with strategic partners and that we will become part of the production chain of some of the world’s leading OEM manufacturers of commercial road vehicles.”

Today FAP is well placed to maintain its position as a leading manufacturer of heavy-duty, commercial and passenger vehicles in the Balkan region and to increase its potential through the appointment of new partners and agents, particularly in the developing markets. n

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