company industry automotive founded 18 december 1895 ; 120 years ago 1895 12 18 as laurin & klement founder v clav laurin and v clav klement headquarters mlad boleslav czech republic number of locations manufacturing facilities in czech republic india china russia and slovakia . contract partners in kazakhstan and ukraine . 2013 area served worldwide except north america key people bernhard maier chairman of the board of directors christian klingler chairman of the supervisory board products automobiles production output 1 055 500 units 2015 1 revenue czk 299.318 billion 2014 2 usd 12.37 billion operating income czk 21.598 billion 2014 2 usd 892 million profit czk 18.421 billion 2014 2 usd 761 million number of employees over 25 889 2015 parent volkswagen group divisions koda motorsport subsidiaries koda auto deutschland gmbh skoda auto india private ltd. koda auto slovensko s.r.o. website skoda auto.com koda auto czech pronunciation koda listen more commonly known as koda is a czech automobile manufacturer founded in 1895 as laurin & klement . it is headquartered in mlad boleslav czech republic . in 1925 laurin & klement was acquired by koda works 3 which itself became state owned during the communist regime . after 1991 it was gradually privatized and in 2000 koda became a wholly owned subsidiary of the volkswagen group . 4 initially the company was meant to serve the role of the vw group s entry brand . over time however the koda brand has shifted progressively more upmarket with most models overlapping with their volkswagen counterparts on price and features while eclipsing them on space . 5 its total global sales reached 1.06 million cars in 2015 and had risen annually by 1.8 percent profit had risen by 6 5 % . 1 6 in 2015 a corporate strategy was launched to produce an all electric car by 2020 or 2021 with a range of over 300 miles 480 km 15 minute charging time and a cost below comparative combustion engine vehicles . 7 contents 1 history 1.1 laurin & klement 1.2 koda 1.3 world war ii 1.4 post world war ii 1.5 volkswagen group subsidiary 1.6 growth strategy 2 electrification strategy 3 financial results 3.1 sales figures 4 production 5 motorsport 5.1 world rally championship 5.2 world rally championship 2 5.3 bonneville speedway 6 models 6.1 current models 6.2 historic models 6.2.1 1900s 6.2.2 1910s 6.2.3 1920s 6.2.4 1930s 6.2.5 1940s 6.2.6 1950s 6.2.7 1960s 6.2.8 1970s 6.2.9 1980s 6.2.10 1990s 6.2.11 2000s 6.3 concept cars 7 logo 8 see also 9 bibliography 10 notes 11 references 12 external links history edit the koda works were established as an arms manufacturing plant in 1859 . koda auto and its predecessors is one of the five oldest companies producing cars and has an unbroken history alongside daimler opel peugeot and tatra . 8 laurin & klement edit founders v clav klement left and v clav laurin 1895 laurin & klement type a 1905 the origins of what became koda auto go back to the early 1890s when like many long established car manufacturers a company started manufacturing bicycles . 9 koda then laurin & klement factories were founded in 1896 as a velocipede manufacturer . 10 in 1894 26 year old v clav klement who was a bookseller in mlad boleslav kingdom of bohemia today s czech republic then part of austria hungary was unable to obtain spare parts to repair his german bicycle . klement returned his bicycle to the manufacturers seidel and naumann with a letter in czech asking them to carry out repairs only to receive a reply in german stating if you would like an answer to your inquiry you should try writing in a language we can understand . not satisfied with the reply and realising the business potential klement despite having no technical experience decided to start a bicycle repair shop which he and v clav laurin opened in 1896 in mlad boleslav . before going into partnership with klement laurin was an established bicycle manufacturer in the nearby town of turnov . in 1898 after moving to their newly built factory the pair bought a werner motocyclette . nb 1 laurin & klement s first motorcyclette powered by an engine mounted on the handlebars driving the front wheels proved dangerous and unreliable an early accident on it cost laurin a front tooth . to design a safer machine with its structure around the engine the pair wrote to german ignition specialist robert bosch for advice on a different electromagnetic system . their new slavia motorcycle made its debut in 1899 and the company became the first motorcycle factory in the central europe . 10 in 1900 with a company workforce of 32 slavia exports began and 150 machines were shipped to london for the hewtson firm . shortly afterwards the press credited them as makers of the first motorcycle . 11 12 by 1905 the firm was manufacturing automobiles making it the second oldest car manufacturer in the czech lands after tatra . the company with an area of 7800 m2 had a workforce of 320 and used 170 special machine tools power driven by 100 hp of steam power . 10 the first model voiturette a was a success and the company was established both within austria hungary and internationally . koda edit koda 422 1929 after world war i the laurin & klement company began producing trucks but in 1924 after running into problems and being affected by a fire on their premises the company sought a new partner . meanwhile akciov spole nost d ve kodovy z vody limited company formerly the koda works an arms manufacturer and multi sector concern which had become one of the largest industrial enterprises in europe and the largest in czechoslovakia sought to enlarge its non arms manufacturing base and acquired laurin & klement in 1925 . it also started manufacturing cars in cooperation with hispano suiza . most of the later production took place under koda s name . engineer and industrialist emil koda koda logo in 1930s an assembly line was used for production from 1930 onwards . in the same year a formal spin off of the car manufacture into a new company akciov spole nost pro automobilov pr mysl or abbreviated asap took place . asap remained a wholly owned subsidiary of the koda works and continued to sell cars under the koda marque . apart from the factory in mlad boleslav it included also the firm s representation sales offices and services as well as a central workshop in prague . at the time the car factory in mlad boleslav covered an area of 215 000 m2 and employed 3 750 blue collar and 500 white collar workers . after a decline caused by the economic depression koda introduced a new line of cars in the 1930s which significantly differed from its previous products . a new design of chassis with backbone tube and all around independent suspension was developed under the leadership of chief engineer vladim r matou and modelled on the one first introduced by hans ledwinka in tatra . first used on model koda 420 standard in 1933 it aimed at solving insufficient torsional stiffness of the ladder frame . 13 the new design of chassis became the basis for models popular 845 1 089 cc rapid 1165 1766 cc favorit 1802 2091 cc and the superb 2.5 4 l . 13 while in 1933 koda had a 14 % share of the czechoslovak car market and occupied third place behind praga and tatra the new line made it a market leader by 1936 with a 39 % share in 1938 . 13 world war ii edit during the occupation of czechoslovakia in world war ii the koda works were turned into part of the reichswerke hermann g ring serving the german war effort by producing components for military terrain vehicles military planes other weapon components and cartridge cases . vehicle output decreased from 7 052 in 1939 to 683 in 1944 of which only 35 were passenger cars . a total of 316 trucks were produced between january and may 1945 . 14 the uk and us air forces bombed the koda works repeatedly between 1940 and 1945 . the final massive air raid took place on 25 april 1945 and resulted in almost the complete destruction of the koda armament works and approximately 1 000 dead and injured . 15 post world war ii edit koda 1101 tudor roadster 1949 when by july 1945 the mlad boleslav factory had been reconstructed production of koda s first post world war ii car the 1101 series began . it was essentially an updated version of the pre world war ii koda popular . in the autumn of 1948 koda along with all other large manufacturers became part of the communist planned economy which meant it was separated from the parent company koda works . in spite of unfavourable political conditions and losing contact with technical development in non communist countries koda retained a good reputation until the 1960s producing models such as the koda 440 spartak 445 octavia felicia and koda 1000 mb . koda octavia super 1960 in late 1959 the koda felicia a compact four cylinder convertible coupe was imported into the united states for model year 1960 . its retail price was around us 2 700 for which one could purchase a nicely equipped v8 domestic car that was larger more comfortable and had more luxury and convenience features gasoline retailed for less than 30 cents per gallon so fuel economy was not of primary importance in america at that time . those felicias that made it to american ownership soon experienced a number of reliability problems further damaging the car s reputation . the felicia was therefore a poor seller in the states and leftover cars ended up being hied off at a fraction of the original retail list . since that time koda automobiles have not been imported into the u.s. for retail sale . koda mb 1000 1966 in the late 1980s koda then named automobilov z vody n rodn podnik or abbreviated aznp was still manufacturing cars that conceptually dated back to the 1960s . rear engined models such as the koda 105 120 estelle and rapid sold steadily and performed well against more modern makes in races such as the rac rally in the 1970s and 1980s . they won their class in the rac rally for 17 years running . they were powered by a 130 brake horsepower 97 kw 1 289 cubic centimetres 78.7 cu in engine . in spite of its dated image and becoming the subject of negative jokes kodas remained a common sight on the roads of uk and western europe throughout the 1970s and 1980s . sport versions of the estelle and earlier models were produced using the name rapid . soft top versions were also available . the rapid was once described as the poor man s porsche 16 and had significant sales success in the uk during the 1980s . 17 of course that the koda became such a figure of fun was in part due to its ubiquity on britain s roads . the company must have been doing something right . from a bbc report on koda sales in 1980s in 1987 the favorit was introduced and was one of a triumvirate of compact western influenced front wheel drive hatchbacks from the three main eastern bloc manufacturers around that time the others being vaz s lada samara and zastava s yugo sana . the favorit s appearance was the work of the italian design company bertone . with some motor technology licensed from western europe but still using the koda designed 1289 cc engine koda engineers designed a car comparable to western production . the technological gap was still there but began closing rapidly . the favorit was very