It seemed likely that BMW's manufacturing facility would be crated up and taken by rail to the Soviet Union as part of the substantial post war reparations package.

In the meantime, surviving workers returning from the war recommenced automobile production, on a very small scale, using prewar designs.

Albert Seidler, the man in charge of Eisenach motor bike production, demonstrated the 321 to Marshal Zhukov and secured from him an order for five new cars.

The Russians were evidently impressed, and the plant passed under the control of “Sowjetische AG Maschinenbau Awtowelo”, a Soviet directed holding company focused on vehicle production.

Most appear to have remained to the east of the Iron Curtain, many being taken to the Soviet Union as part of a reparations package in respect of the Second World War.