The Lada

Lada

Lada is a trademark of AvtoVAZ, a Russian car manufacturer in Tolyatti, Samara Oblast. All AvtoVAZ vehicles are currently sold under the Lada brand, though this was not always so; Lada was originally AvtoVAZ's export brand for models it sold under the Zhiguli name in the domestic Soviet market...

 Samara or VAZ-2108 is an economy car

Economy car

An economy car is an automobile that is designed for low cost operation. Typical economy cars are small, light weight, and inexpensive to buy. Economy car designers are forced by stringent design constraints to be inventive...

 produced by Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

/Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n vehicle manufacturer AvtoVAZ

AvtoVAZ

AvtoVAZ is the Russian automobile manufacturer formerly known as VAZ: Volzhsky Avtomobilny Zavod , but better known to the world under the trade name Lada. The company was established in the late 1960s in collaboration with Fiat...

's Lada

Lada

Lada is a trademark of AvtoVAZ, a Russian car manufacturer in Tolyatti, Samara Oblast. All AvtoVAZ vehicles are currently sold under the Lada brand, though this was not always so; Lada was originally AvtoVAZ's export brand for models it sold under the Zhiguli name in the domestic Soviet market...

 brand, from 1984 until 2004. The brand name Samara originally was used only for exported models, in Russia the same model was called "Sputnik" (satellite), until 1991, when the sedan version of Samara entered in production, using the export name.
The Samara was to build on the success of the traditional Fiat 124

Fiat 124

The Fiat 124 is a mid-sized family car produced by the Italian manufacturer Fiat between 1966 and 1974. It was the replacement of the Fiat 1300 and Fiat 1500...

-based range, by providing a car that combined a robust build and ease of maintenance with a modern style.