Škoda Auto
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| Private company | |
| Industry | Automotive |
| Predecessor | Laurin & Klement |
| Founded | 18 December 1895 (as Laurin & Klement) |
| Founder | Václav Laurin and Václav Klement |
| Headquarters | Mladá Boleslav, Czech Republic |
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Area served
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Worldwide (except North America and Brazil) |
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Key people
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Bernhard Maier (Chairman of the Board of Directors) Christian Klingler (Chairman of the Supervisory Board) |
| Products | Automobiles |
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Production output
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 1,127,700 units (2016) |
| Revenue |
CZK 299.318 billion (2014) (USD 12.37 billion) |
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CZK 21.598 billion (2014) (USD 892 million) |
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CZK 18.421 billion (2014) (USD 761 million) |
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Number of employees
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over 25,889 (2015) |
| Parent | Volkswagen Group |
| Divisions | Škoda Motorsport |
| Subsidiaries | Škoda Auto Deutschland GmbH Skoda Auto India Private Ltd. Škoda Auto Slovensko s.r.o. |
| Website | skoda-auto |
Škoda Auto (Czech pronunciation: [ˈʃkoda]), more commonly known as Škoda, is a Czech automobile manufacturer founded in 1895 as Laurin & Klement. It is headquartered in Mladá Boleslav, Czech Republic.
In 1925 Laurin & Klement was acquired by Škoda Works which itself became state owned during the days of the communist government. After 1991 it was gradually privatized and in 2000 Škoda became a wholly owned subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group.
Initially, the company was meant to serve the role of the VW Group’s entry brand. Over time, however, the Škoda brand has shifted progressively more upmarket, with most models overlapping with their Volkswagen counterparts on price and features, while eclipsing them on space. Its total global sales reached 1.13 million cars in 2016 and had risen annually by 6.8 percent, profit had risen by 6,5% in 2015. In 2015, a corporate strategy was launched to produce an all-electric car by 2020 or 2021 with a range of over 500 kilometres (310 mi), 15-minute charging time, and a cost below comparative combustion-engine vehicles.
The Škoda Works were established as an arms manufacturing plant in 1859. Škoda Auto (and its predecessors) is one of the five oldest companies producing cars and has an unbroken history alongside Daimler, Opel, Peugeot and Tatra.
The origins of what became Škoda Auto go back to the early 1890s when, like many long-established car manufacturers, a company started manufacturing bicycles. Škoda (then Laurin & Klement) factories were founded in 1896 as a velocipede manufacturer.
In 1894, 26-year-old Václav Klement, who was a bookseller in Mladá 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 Václav Laurin opened in 1896 in Mladá Boleslav. Before going into partnership with Klement, Laurin was an established bicycle manufacturer in the nearby town of Turnov.
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Wikipedia