Volvo

AB Volvo (or Aktiebolaget Volvo) is a world-leading Swedish manufacturer of commercial vehicles, buses and construction equipment, drive systems for marine and industrial applications, aerospace components and services. more...

The automaker was founded in August 10, 1926 in the city of Gothenburg, as a spin-off from roller ball bearing maker SKF (Svenska Kullagerfabriken AB). Volvo Cars, the automobile manufacturer, has since 1999 been owned by the Ford Motor Company.

Volvo is Latin for "I roll or I turn". The name Volvo was originally registrated in May 1911 as a separate company within SKF AB and as a reg. trademark with the intention to be used for a special series of ball bearing, but this idea was only used for a short period of time and SKF decided to use 'SKF' as the trademark for all it's bearing products. The company Volvo AB had no activities until the 10th of August 1926 when the Sales Manager at SKF, Assar Gabrielsson and Engineer Gustav Larson after one year of preparations, including the production of 10 prototypes, sets up the car-manufacturing business Volvo AB within SKF company group. Volvo AB was introduced at the Stockholm stock exchange in 1935 and SKF then decided to sell it´s shares in the company.

The first series produced Volvo automobile, called 'ÖV4' (Öppen vagn (Open wagon)-4 cylinders) left the factory on a sunny day 10am, the 14th of April 1927. The sales did not turn out so well however. A total of just 996 cars was produced between 1927-1929. 'OV4' was replaced by model PV651 in april 1929. Volvo's first success in the automobile production came with the PV444 that was introduced in september 1944.

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