Advertising posters of Soviet cars in different countries

At the beginning of the 1960s, when MZMA, GAZ and ZAZ were offering a variety of cars and the popularity of having a personal automobile in the Soviet Union was on the rise, the Soviet government opted to build an even larger car manufacturing plant that would produce a people's car and help to meet the demand for personal transport. For reasons of cost-efficiency, it was decided to sign a licence agreement with a foreign company and produce the car on the basis of an existing, modern model.