Peugeot
Peugeot is a French car manufacturer. It has its headquarters in the city of Paris and its roots go back to the start of the 19th century when it was involved in bicycle production. It is Europes second most popular car manufacturer, being beaten to the post by Volkswagen.
Peugeot has been in production from the 1700's. Armand Peugeot introduced the Penny-fathering in 1882 as well as a range of bicycles. Peugeot separated the parts of the company that made bicycles and cars in 1926 and up until very recently Peugeot continued to make bicycles.
In the post war period of 1946 Peugeot began to produce its vehicles with renewed vigour and the 202 was introduced to the consumer market. This was quickly followed by the 203. This model featured hydraulic brakes, coil springs and rack and pinion steering and proved to be a huge success. Peugeot's place was set as a leader in the field of car manufacture. In 1958 the company expanded its sales to the United States and launched another model, the 404. This car was even competed in the East African Safari Rally. After this, many other stylishly designed models were introduced to the market and Peugeot worked in collaboration with some other European car manufacturers including Renault and Volvo towards the latter part of the 20th Century.
Coming up to the present day, in April 2006 it was announced that Peugeot would be closing its Ryton manufacturing plant that was situated in Coventry, UK. The plant produced its last car on the 12th December 2006 and was fully closed down in January 2007. This closure meant the loss of more than 2,000 jobs and another 3,000 jobs indirectly involved in the manufacture of the cars.
However, Peugeot remains a forward thinking company and have designed a 'car for the future' - the 307 model. With the need to produce a much 'greener' type of vehicle this car is a hybrid of diesel-electric powering and is capable of 80mpg. At the moment it is only in conceptual stages of development, but if it reaches the open market it will be one of the most efficient cars in the world.