Tofaş has announced that it will spend 170 million euros designing and building a new 'compact' C-segment sedan in Turkey, which is scheduled to reach the market in 2007.

The announcement was made to the Turkish press by Tofaş' new CEO Alfredo Altavilla, who has only been in the job for just a week. "The company has agreed with Fiat to produce the car in its Bursa factory," Altavilla told reporters.

The Board of Directors of Tofaş AS. in fact only earlier this month appointed Altavilla to replace the incumbent Diego Avesani, who has returned to Turin where he will assume new responsibilities. Tofas AS is a joint-venture company with the shareholding split between Fiat Auto and the Turkish firm, Koç Holding, and which is listed on the Istanbul Stock Exchange. Koç Holding is Turkey's largest - and oldest car maker - having established the first car factory in the country, back in 1968.

The new model will be positioned firmly in the important C-segment - which at present accounts for 48 percent of the Turkish new car market. Codenamed D200, it will superceed the current Fiat Palio and Siena models from the ever-growing 'World Car' family. As with the current models, the new car will also be assembled in Brazil and China, although Tofaş will take a leading role in the new project and it will begin rolling out of the Bursa factory before production commences anywhere else globally.
 

Tofaş plans to manufacture around 60,000 units of this new model per year in Turkey, with almost a third of these being destined for export. Interestingly, Tofaş claims that this 20,000 per annum number will be headed for Western Europe - implying that the new model will be designed and built to the much higher all-rounds standards demanded by discering European consumers, rather than the 'cheap and cheerful' brief that the Palio and Siena models currently adhere to.

The D200 project is the second major announcement to be made by Tofaş so far this year. Back in March, Tofas announced a new joint venture between Fiat and the Peugeot-Citroen PSA Group will see a new light commercial vehicle manufactured at its Bursa plant. This project, codenamed 'MiniCargo' will see a 350 million euro investment made. The Fiat Doblo light panel van is also manufactured in Turkey by Tofaş.