Pre-production of the Fiat Punto has resumed at the Zastava factory in Serbia with high expectations as the Ministry of the Economy has reported that 17,800 applications for loans to buy the model have been received from Serbian citizens.

At Zastava's factory in Kragujevac, Serbia the trial production of components for the Fiat Punto began last week, the general manager of Zastava Automobiles Group, Zoran Radojevic, told Serbia's BETA news agency.

Radojevic said that the autobody Plant had produced the first Punto body, bearing the number 7,000,001, adding that five bodies were made last Thursday, and around ten will now be produced daily.

Radojevic stated that the trial production is being monitored by the Fiat Turin directors and ten experts who are exploring the possibility of increasing the production capacity of the existing equipment, considering the great demand for Punto.

"We are working on adapting the equipment, in order to harmonise the production quality with Fiat standards, and are considering the possibility of producing in the most economical way even more vehicles than originally envisaged," he said. Radojevic added that around 100 Zastava employees are engaged in that task. He refused to say how big the increase in Punto production might be, but he reminded that the minimum envisaged production for 2009 is 15,000 vehicles. According to the Ministry of Economy, 17,880 applications for loans for the purchase of Puntos were submitted by March 11.

The management teams of Zastava Kragujevac and Italy's Fiat are negotiating the possibility of expanding production of Fiat's model Punto in Kragujevac. Buyers in Kragujevac and the rest of Serbia are interested in Zastava's Punto, and that is the main reason why production of the Punto will be enlarged. Technical teams at Zastava and Fiat are finishing the final preparations and if they plan to respond to current orders, they must produce 150 Puntos per day.

Report courtesy of EM Portal