Trucks like Tatra 111 (1942) became instrumental both for the German Nazi war effort as well as post-war reconstruction in Central Europe and Soviet Union.

Today, Tatra's production focuses on heavy, off-road trucks based on its century-long development of backbone chassis, swinging half-axles, and air-cooled engines.

[4] Using a Benz automobile purchased by von Röslerstamm as inspiration, the company built its first car, the Präsident, under the direction of engineers Hans Ledwinka and Edmund Rumpler.

[7] Ledwinka's next design, the Tatra 11, which was released in 1923, featured a rigid backbone tube with swinging semi-axles at the rear giving independent suspension.

Tatra's specialty was luxury cars using the most recent technology, going from air-cooled flat-twins to fours and sixes, culminating (briefly) with the OHC 6-litre V12 in 1931.

[8] In the 1930s, under the supervision of Austrian engineer Hans Ledwinka, his son Erich and German engineer Erich Übelacker, and protected by high tariffs and absence of foreign assemblers,[9][10] Tatra began building advanced, streamlined cars after obtaining licences from Paul Jaray, which started in 1934 with the large Tatra 77, the world's first production aerodynamic car.

[15] The Tatra 97 of 1936 had a rear-located, rear-wheel drive, air-cooled four-cylinder boxer engine accommodating four passengers and providing luggage storage under the front bonnet and behind the rear seat.

Many German officers died in car accidents caused by driving the heavy, rear-engined Tatras faster around corners than they could handle.

[citation needed] The factory was nationalised in 1945 almost three years before the Communist Party came to power and in January 1946 was renamed "Tatra Národní Podnik".

In 1951, the state planning department decided that the Tatraplan should henceforth be built at the Škoda plant in Mladá Boleslav, leaving Tatra free to concentrate on trucks, buses and railway equipment.

Although the layout remained the same, the body was all new, as was the engine, which was equipped with four overhead camshafts, a higher capacity motor (3495 cc) and an output close to 165 bhp (123 kW; 167 PS).

Over 11,000 cars were built, and sales slowed to a trickle of just a few dozen per year towards the end of production as Tatras began to seem more and more outdated.

Technically models TL-2 and TL-4 were almost identically designed; in fact TL-4 evolved from TL-2 where both had liquid-cooled OHC engines of max power output of 25.7 kW (35 PS; 34 hp).

Improved version T13 was introduced as T26 with a more powerful 4-cylinder flat air-cooled engine and in six-wheeler chassis created capable offroad light utility truck which later evolved into T72 model which was heavily used by Czechoslovakian army at the time and was also manufactured under license by the French company Lorraine-Dietrich.

[31] By adding an extra axle to the rear the type T28 was created; however, it was not successful and only limited production resulted in a mainly bus chassis.

Apart from the existing line up of T27, T92/92 a new heavy truck, the T81, commenced production featuring liquid-cooled 12.5 L V8 diesel engine with a power output of 118 kW (160 PS; 158 hp), in 6×4 axle configuration.

After the war the T111 contributed heavily to the rebuilding effort in Central and Eastern Europe and a memorial was built at Magadan, Siberia, for its exploits in the Far East of the USSR.

[34] The decision to replace the reliable but ageing T111 was taken in 1952 based on central planning economy of socialist government where directive was made to Tatra N.P.

In 1967 Tatra began production of the T813 off-road truck using its modular construction technology; the model incorporated the latest trends in commercial vehicle design such as cab-over-engine (COE) and wide profile tyres.

would be the sole supplier of off-road commercial vehicles of <12 ton capacity for Eastern Bloc countries, leading to a modernization of the company and its production models.

[42] The latest model intended for military customers is the T817 (T815-7),[43][44] marketed primarily toward the armed services of NATO member countries as a high-mobility heavy-duty tactical truck with a low profile cabin for C-130 Hercules transportability.

During the 1990s, Tatra decided to produce a bonneted CBE heavy duty off-road truck to continue the successful line started with the T111.

The T163 was purpose-built to be a heavy duty dump truck due to demand, and was based on Tatra's signature backbone tube chassis construction with its cabin being designed by Jiří Španihel.

[48] The serial T810 vehicles are equipped with the new design Tatra rigid axles with the WABCO disc brakes, with the ZF Ecolite transmission and Steyr drop box.

[52] As of late 2006, however, majority ownership (80.51%) was in the hands of Tatra Holdings s.r.o., an international consortium comprising Vectra Limited of UK, Sam Eyde of the U.S., KBC Private Equity of Belgium, Meadowhill s.r.o.

[citation needed] In August 2011, DAF Trucks announced it had built up a 19% stake in Tatra to tighten up cooperation between the companies.

With new owners, Tatra focused its production primarily towards building specialist vehicles tailored to buyers' custom orders.

[55] The current serial production models are: Several fire brigades and civil protection (THW) mostly in eastern Germany are traditionally using Tatra trucks.

As direct purchase from Czechoslovakia was impossible due to its alignment with Israeli foes, the lore has it that Israelis used the well-paid services of Nicolae Ceauşescu-led Romania, in cooperation with an American Company called ATC (American Truck Company) to purchase military trucks, including desert-equipped Tatras, leading to jokes that "Romania has a new desert".

Current photos of various Israeli weapon systems, including SPYDER slated for India, show new Tatras as the carrier vehicles.