Assar Gabrielsson

He married Anna Theresia ("Tessan") Andreasson (1890–1964) in 1916. They had four children; Lars, Barbro, Jan and Bo.

Assar Gabrielsson held a bachelor's degree in economics and worked as a sales manager with bearing manufacturer SKF in Gothenburg in the early 1900s. He was employed in 1916 by Björn Prytz at the sales department and was appointed sales manager for the entire SKF company group on 20 June 1922. He held that position until the new automobile company AB Volvo was founded as a subsidiary company within the SKF company group.

• 1891 Born 13 August in Korsberga, Skaraborgs län, Sweden. The son of Gabriel Nathanael Gabrielsson and Anna Helmina Larsson.
• 1911 Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Stockholm School of Economics (HHS).
• 1912–1916 Employed as stenographer in the Chancellery of the Lower House of the Swedish Parliament.
• 1916 Marries Anna Theresia Andreasson.
• 1916–1920 Employed by SKF in Gothenburg in the sales department.
• 1921–1922 Managing Director of the SKF subsidiary in Paris, France.
• 1922–1926 Sales Manager for the SKF-company group.
• 1926–1956 Managing Director at AB Volvo.
• 1947-1951 President of the Congress of Industrial Organizations.
• 1956–1962 Chairman of the board of AB Volvo.

In June 1924 when Assar Gabrielsson met his old friend Gustaf Larson in Stockholm, he unveiled his plans to try to establish the manufacturing of a new Swedish automobile. Gustaf Larson had worked for SKF between 1917-1919 but now worked for the company AB Galco in Stockholm. They made an agreement in August 1924 at the Sturehof restaurant in Stockholm, signed in a written contract more than one year later, on 16 December 1925. In this contract Gustav was supposed to carry out the engineering work for a new car, as well as an investment plan for a complete new manufacturing plant, but would only be rewarded for that work in case the project would turn out well, after at least 100 produced cars and in the case this was achieved before 1 January 1928. This famous contract shows that Assar Gabrielsson "owned" the project and that it was a high-risk project without any guarantees. Assar took the economic risks himself and Gustav, in the worst case, would have worked on the project without being rewarded, but still would have had his salary from AB Galco in Stockholm. Most of the capital that Assar intended to use for the project initially was actually extra sales commissions that he had saved from the time he was the managing director for the SKF subsidiary in Paris in 1921-22.

Back to 1922-23

The original idea, presented by Assar to SKF, was to start an automobile manufacturing business within SKF in order to get advantages over competitors when developing new bearings for the automobile industry, increased sales of bearings, but more important, the positive effects it would have on Swedish industry as a whole. He developed these ideas during the time he worked as managing director for the SKF subsidiary company in Paris 1921-22 when he discovered that competitor bearing companies in Europe had started to invest a lot in automobile companies in order to secure their sales to key customers. However, Gabrielsson failed to convince the board of SKF about his ideas, and the SKF company core business was bearings with no room for an automobile company. Assar then decided to build a test series of ten vehicles with his own financing and later present the car and an entire investment plan to SKF. The idea to build a pre-series of ten vehicles was most certainly related to the fact that no company would have given them an offer for the components (engines, gearboxes, chassis components etc.) with a less quantity and Assar were at that time certain that SKF would approve his plans in due time. Engineering, documentation and investment planning was carried out exactly in the same way as if it had been carried out by SKF in order to prepare for the set up of a new automobile company. Assar most certainly had the full support from the managing director of SKF, Mr. Björn Prytz, at that time, as long as his 'private' project did not interfere with his work as sales manager for SKF.

The first ten pre-series vehicles, model ÖV 4, were designed and assembled in Stockholm at AB Galco under the supervision of Gustav Larson, at that time still having his other work at AB Galco to attend to. A "design-office", often called "Volvo's first design-office", was established in one room of Gustav Larson's private apartment at Rådmansgatan 59. The design work started in the autumn of 1924 and a number of engineers were involved, among them engineer Jan G. Smith, that had returned from America in 1924, and later engineer Henry Westerberg. All the invoices related to the project was sent to Assar's private address at Kungsportsavenyn 32 in Gothenburg. In a lot of orders that Gustav Larsson made himself, he referred to Assar Gabrielsson as a "guarantee" that the deliveries would be paid by him personally. These details shows that the Volvo automobile project in the beginning was a true private project, not sponsored by SKF from an economic point of view.

The first prototype car was ready in June 1926. Assar and Gustav took that first car and drove themselves, on bumpy roads, down to SKF in Gothenburg to show the SKF-board and now present the final investment plan.

Assar Gabrielsson held his position as managing director for AB Volvo until 1956 when he became the chairman of the board (CEO) of the Volvo group. A position he held until his death in 1962.

• Title: Volvo Personvagnar från 20-tal till 80-tal, by Björn Eric Lindh, 1984. (In Swedish language only). ISBN 91-86442-06-6.
• Title: Volvo Göteborg Sverige, by Christer Olsson, 1996. (In Swedish language only). ISBN 3-907150-57-0.
• Volvo customer newspaper 'Ratten' (The steering wheel), No. 2, 1969 (In Swedish language only).

• The 30 year history of Volvo, by Assar Gabrielsson, 1959.