Kurgan Bus Plant

The plant was founded by decision of the USSR Council of Ministers on 14 January 1958 to build 20,000 small buses (up to 30 seats) a year. As its first model, the plant began building the KAvZ-651 the same year, a bus based on GAZ-51 units that had until then been built at the Pavlovo bus plant. This model was built until 1973.

In 1971 the KAvZ-685 (later -3270), based on GAZ-53 units, went into production and remained the plant's main model until 1989. In the best years up to 20,000 a year were built. In the early 1980s, together with the Likino bus plant, larger city buses were also worked on: small trial batches were built of the KAvZ-3100 (a LiAZ-677M shortened by one section) and the KAvZ-52561 (an analogue of the LiAZ-52561). Production plans for these models were cut short by the USSR Council of Ministers' wish that the Kurgan plant should stay in its existing market niche.

In 1989 the KAvZ-3270 was replaced by the KAvZ-3976, based on the GAZ-3307; in the 1990s the GAZ-based models were joined by the KAvZ-3244 bus based on a ZiL light truck. In the mid-1990s small numbers of Ikarus 260, 280 and 283 buses were also assembled.

In the second half of the 1990s the plant ran into serious financial difficulties but kept working. Since 2005 the plant has been part of the GAZ Group. It builds the KAvZ-3976 (on the GAZ-3307) and the KAvZ-3244 (on the ZiL-5301 chassis); new products in the programme are the PAZ "Aurora" (designated KAvZ-4238) and a bus based on the GAZ-3310 "Valdai".