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VOLVO

Volvo Group is a major manufacturer of trucks, multi-passenger vehicles and heavy duty construction machinery, while Volvo Cars is a separate company that handles the production of commercial grade cars that are most often associated with the Volvo name. Often referred to as “the safest cars in the world”, Volvo cars are known for their stylish but functional European-inspired design, their reliability and overall quality. Both Volvo Cars and the Volvo Group are based in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Volvo Group produced its first vehicle in 1927. After several decades of success in manufacturing and selling cars and trucks in European markets, the company opened an assembly plant in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada in 1963, marking the company’s entry into the North American market. Volvo Cars was sold to Ford in 2000, resulting in many of Volvo’s unique engineering features being shared with other Ford-owned brands and subsidiaries. In 2010, Ford sold Volvo Cars to a Chinese automaker, Geely Automobile.

Volvo Group has several production divisions, including Mack Trucks, Renault Trucks and Volvo Trucks, which produce vehicles including heavy trucks, diesel engines, boat engines and a range of construction equipment.

In 2015, Volvo Cars had several new models available for sale including the S80, the V60 Cross Country, the XC60, XC70 and XC90. Safety features and European design sensibility continue to be the hallmark of Volvo cars, with new features including 360 degree camera, Adaptive Cruise Control, active high beams, Park Assist pilot, radar-assisted blind spot information, and forward collision warning system. Collectively, these new additions to Volvo’s safety innovations are called IntelliSafe and form the basis of improvements that are intended to allow the company to meet its pledge to ensure that by 2020, no one in a new Volvo car will be seriously injured or killed.

New Volvo cars have an improved, strengthened chassis made from boron steel that handles collisions better and disperse the energy of an impact more efficiently. Seatbelts in new Volvo car models are also equipped with a technology that automatically tightens the belts in the event of an impact. Few people know that it was Volvo that invented the three-point seatbelt in the late 1950s, an innovation that the company continues to proudly promote today.

Considering the many safety improvements made to Volvo vehicles since the company’s beginning, it is easy to see how Volvo has acquired a reputation as “the safest cars in the world”. While this assertion is practically impossible to quantify, it is certain that Volvo directs an exceptional amount of resources towards improving the safety of their vehicles.