12.12.2025 09:49

When Aurus turned out not to be fully russian: sanctions disrupted european supplies, intermediaries disappeared, and NAMI faces million-ruble losses

This summer, Vladimir Putin praised Aurus cars to journalists (he drives one himself) and emphasized that they are 100% "a product of Russian manufacture." However journalists discovered that Aurus manufacturer FSUE NAMI is currently desperately suing because it has stopped receiving components from Italy and the UK needed for the Aurus, causing it serious problems.

For example, the Italian company AUTOPART s.r.l., due to sanctions, disrupted deliveries to the Russian reseller Autoforma, who in turn let FSUE NAMI down. The contracts were signed during the war, but Autoforma managed to smuggle only a few components across the border, and with horrific delays. NAMI demanded the return of the advance payment and a fine—a total of approximately 9 million rubles, almost the entire amount stipulated in the contract.

And then miracles began to happen – Autoforma stopped responding to inquiries, and then disappeared entirely: the Federal Tax Service recently decided to liquidate the now-defunct legal entity. The company’s accounts at Raiffeisenbank and Banca Intesa have been frozen. The Samara-based United Legal Company, which was officially managing it (its contact information is listed in the registry of personal data operators maintained by Roskomnadzor), claimed it had no connection to the actual management. So, FSUE NAMI can put an end to its 9 million-ruble claim.

The founders of the Samara company were the Swiss KWS Engineering SA and its president, Mr. Merlo Mauro, an Italian citizen. Deliveries from Autopart Srl began in 2016, the same year Merlo became president of KWS Engineering SA. In 2022, Autoforma actually posted a net profit of 33 million rubles, but then something went wrong, and the company ended last year with a 2.2 million ruble deficit. Meanwhile, the advance payment from NAMI was on schedule.

Adding to the piquancy of the situation is the fact that the Swiss company KWS Engineering SA has been in bankruptcy proceedings since 2023, and during the trial, it was revealed that the company’s accounts were completely empty. Where the money went is unknown.

Among the suppliers of components for Aurus was the British company BEE Lighting LTD, which, according to the contract, was supposed to deliver "Style Lighting" kits for Aurus interiors back in late 2021. The British company decided not to fulfill the contract with NAMI and quietly disappeared from the radar. The Federal State Unitary Enterprise assessed them 79,000 pounds in fines, but the British ignore Russian courts, and have a cast-iron justification for their own jurisdiction: sanctions.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. It’s no coincidence that the Federal State Unitary Enterprise recently forcibly handed over part of its Aurus stake to Gazprom—the gas monopoly is no stranger to counting losses.