Is next week to see the first buyer of Serbian Mercedes?

The contract on business and technical cooperation of the Belgrade-based bus plant, Ikarbus and German Mercedes will be signed in the next few weeks.

- Contract signing is formal because Ikarbus got from Mercedes a certificate for the authorized superstructure partner – director of Ikarbus, Aleksandar Vicentic, said to Beta agency.

As he explained, the certificate was issued after numerous checks and controls Mercedes carried out and during the development of city bus prototype, is why it is of essential importance for the cooperation of the two companies.

- The prototype of the vehicle IK 112 LE, which was done in Belgrade, is now at authorized labs for testing for getting essential homologation documentation. The testing should end this week and next week we expect signing of the contract for the sales of the vehicle with one of ours important and big carrier – Vicentic said but did not want to say which carrier it is.

Speaking about the halt in sales of the bus type, Vicentic said that it happened due to necessary testing so that serial production could start and after that sales as well but also because of difficult situation in bus sales, both in Serbia and region.

- We think the situation will start changing as of the fall and that sales of especially this model for which there is a huge interest, will increase – Vicentic said for Beta agency.

He added that serious negotiations for the export of buses to Croatia are in progress. We expect that it will be implemented early next year – he said.

Vicentic said that in case there are no interested buyers in the Mercedes bus, it will negatively affect the cooperation of Ikarbus with the German company as well as Serbian economy.