Avia, národní podnik

Founded in Prague in 1919, the company's first line of business was aircraft building, which also gave it its name. The plant's first motor vehicle (a prototype of the Škoda 706 truck) was not completed until 1946; a little later the plant began building buses and assembling Tatra 805 light military trucks. Aircraft were assembled until 1963, the last being the Soviet Il-14 airliner under the name Avia 14.

In 1961 the plant began building the Praga V3S and Praga S5T trucks. The legendary three-axle Praga V3S military truck remained in series production until 1991.

In 1968 a licence was bought from Renault to build the Saviem SG2 and Saviem SG4 light trucks, which received the Czech model names Avia A15 and Avia A30. The former was later replaced by the improved Avia A20 light truck; after modernisation in the early 1980s the Avia A21 and Avia A31, outwardly similar to their predecessors, went into production. The range included many different body types (van, flatbed, insulated van, tipper and so on). The Soviet Union also bought Avias in large numbers; the Avia A21F van and the insulated vans, flatbeds and sound amplification vehicles based on the Avia A31 were the most widely used.

In the early 1990s the plant was privatised, and the South Korean carmaker Daewoo became its new owner. The Avia A series was modernised and designated Avia A70. At the beginning of this century the A series was replaced by an entirely new range, the D60/75/90. Since 2006 the plant has been owned by the Indian truck maker Ashok Leyland.