Mercedes-Benz do Brasil

Mercedes-Benz do Brasil is the Brazilian subsidiary of the German company Mercedes-Benz Group, based at São Bernardo do Campo in the state of São Paulo. The Portuguese Wikipedia article that the name leads to describes the Brazilian branch as responsible for importing cars and building vans in the country. Its account begins in 1956, when Mercedes-Benz settled in São Bernardo do Campo, at first focused on making trucks. From 1997 it built its first utility vehicle, the Sprinter, at that plant, and in 1999 it began making cars in Brazil for the first time, with a plant at Juiz de Fora in Minas Gerais that produced the A-Class and then, from 2001, the C-Class. A plant at Iracemápolis, in the interior of São Paulo, opened in 2016; Mercedes-Benz announced its closure at the end of 2020 and the site is now occupied by the Chinese carmaker GWM. In 2020 the unit Mercedes-Benz Cars & Vans Brasil was constituted to focus on car and van production at two sites in the country.