Club Four

Club Four was an alliance of 4 European Commercial Vehicle manufacturers: Saviem, Volvo, DAF and Magirus-Deutz, which was formed in 1974 in order to reduce their production cost of trucks. This alliance was so effective that other heavy vehicle manufacturers were forced to join this union indirectly. IVECO was created in 1975 after the merger of Fiat truck division and Lancia truck division and OM-Italy, UNIC-France and Magirus Deutz-Germany. In 1978, Renault group by merging both Saviem and Berliet into new formed company called RVI (Renault Véhicules Industriels), was able to effectively take over the North American market by acquiring the management shares of the American Mack between 1979-2001. DAF Company merged with the English Leyland company in 1987 and then finally in 1991 it was fully owned by the American PACCAR company. The cooperation of the original four companies continued even after their future mergers in later years, leading to the much larger Renault-Nissan-Volvo alliance in the 2000s, and made IVECO & Renault-Volvo much more closer. The Cabins of Renault Midliner/Maxter 1979-1999 with IVECO 80, 90, 110, and 130-seiries are good example of this close cooperation. Even this similarity can be seen between the cabins of Mack CS-series, Renault C-series (80’s) and Renault Sherpa which are all conventional cab design. The Club Four even had a significant impact on Iran’s automobile industry so as a result of that , “Saipa Diesel Company” is an indirect product of this event. Perhaps the failure for formation of a single company holds both products of Saipa Diesel and Iran Khodro Diesel–which has close cooperation with Diamler Benz– is one of many consequences of the Club Four.